Watching what is new at Gamespot/TV.com with help from RSS

I recently discovered RSS feeds at Gamespot.com/.

It is a video game fan/news social website run by CNET - the same folks who run TV.com.

I have been wanting a way to read my TV.com blog postings using RSS for quite some time. Almost a year, in fact.

Well, last week I found it is possible - just not in a way I would have expected.

Blog postings from TV.com are mirrored to Gamespot.com and vice-versa.

Pretty cool. I really wish they would put forth an RSS feed of show/episode/actor news, user contributions to the site, and so forth.

It is not that hard to program. So I hope they do it soon.

I guess until then I have a reason to pop by and see my Johnny Software user profile on Gamespot.com every now and again.

Apple - Apple - Mac OS X - Leopard Sneak Peek - Dashboard

Apple is planning some exciting improvements for Dashboard when they release Mac OS X Leopard (10.5).

Apple will let regular users, not just programmers/designers become web developers.

There will be a couple of approaches mere mortals can become web wrights.

• They can click a button in the Safari toolbar while they are looking at a web page they want to use to make a widget. Poof, it pops up as a widget.
• They can use Dashcode to create a widget, starting with ready-made templates supplied on a palette.

Once a user, or programmer, or designer has created a Dashboard widget, they can deploy it to their own Dashboard - or, submit it to Apple so other Macintosh owners can use it.

Apple - Apple - Mac OS X - Leopard Sneak Peek - Dashboard

One of the types of widgets they make easy to write using Dashcode is an RSS news feed widget.

The RSS news feed documents are being adopted on the Macintosh faster than any other OS that I know of. RSS is not just visible here or there - it seems like it is supported everywhere.

Apple already has RSS support in screen savers, Quartz Composer, Safari, and more - they are going to make it more accessible than ever!

One of the few things in Firefox 1.x that I am not a huge fan of is the RSS support. It is a little awkward to use, a little inconvenient.

Not so in say, Safari. There you just click a button while looking at a web page - and, suddenly - you are looking at an RSS feed for the site.

RSS support in most operating systems is pretty good these days. Even applications are supporting it now. Thanks to the tireless elves at Apple, hammering away day and night - it looks like by next year Mac owners will have even more ways to enjoy RSS feeds than ever before!

Technorati tags: macosx, dashboard, apple, macintosh