IE7 Vs. Firefox 2.0: IE7 raises the bar for RSS support

Internet Explorer 7 is out now. IE7 not only joins Firefox in displaying RSS, it beats it in terms of user-friendliness - according to a recent article. And, after seeing the screenshots of IE 7 RSS rendering - and having used Firefox for a couple of years - I have to agree.

IE7 Vs. Firefox 2.0: Why This Browser Battle Matters To Businesses - News by InformationWeek:

Both browsers will have built-in RSS readers, but Microsoft's performs better by rendering feeds in a more user-friendly way, including filtering by category, showing time stamps on articles, and looking more like Web pages. Outlook 2007 will use the IE7 RSS platform to share, for example, calendar feeds.

The RSS-based Live Bookmarks features was ironically, not much more than a tip of the hat to the wildly popular file format. It is ironic because the Netscape adopted the file format about a decade ago - and Netscape later spun off its browser division as Mozilla.

It will be good to see how the RSS support in Firefox improves with the release of Firefox 3 in May 2007.

I expect support/enthusiasm for RSS will swell at more corporate sites and intranets during the next couple quarters.

It is already popular at social web sites, merchant sites, news sites, and web portals.

But there is nothing particular to these applications in RSS, which is a file format by the way - not a protocol. A website can deliver RSS files (feeds) using whatever protocol they like, just by specifying it in the URL; the same way they do with HTML files.

Usually, RSS and HTML are served with the HTTP protocol - but they do not have to be.

Another possible misconception is that RSS cannot be secured. That is not true at all.

HTTP security mechanisms like HTTP Authentication, Cookies, HTTPS, and SSL work fine with RSS files.

So there is nothing to say that RSS files have to be any more public - or any less secure or private - than HTML files, images, etc.

I think web-based applications will start publishing the results of searches on search/query/list pages wth RSS feeds. It is no big deal to do, nor is it innefficient.

They can be generated on the fly using standard servlet/JSP/ASP techniques, generated periodically, cached, or all of the above.

Users can then aggregate the feeds using their browser, a desktop based client application, or (if such things are available yet) a behind-the-firewall web-based aggregator stored/shared soley on the corporate Intranet.

Lots of work on computers in offices is status and event driven. RSS excels at organizing/sharing this information. Now, browsers are getting really good at displaying and using it.

RSS is a very simple file format. The only way to really understand it and what it can do is look at examples, read the specs, see what desktop and web applications are doing with it - and try it out yourself.

Users will be really empowered when they can pull down their work from a handful of feeds, aggregate them, custom filter/search them, and use that output to drive their workaday tasks. In other words, giving them better hunting and organizing tools - without spending money for custom software development or making them stop using web-tools that they are familiar with and like.

Technorati tags: firefox, msie, ie7, rss, web, browsing, software

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

Micro Persuasion: 35 Ways You Can Use RSS Today

Modern Media/Marketing/PR guru Steve Rubel has identified 35 current ways of using RSS that you probably have not thought of before. Apparently, these are real live actual RSS feeds.

They are not feeds that I recognize seeing before now.
Micro Persuasion: 35 Ways You Can Use RSS Today:

Steve Rubel

Technorati tags: rss, blogging, movie, news, religion, television

I like RSS a lot

I have been a heavy user of RSS since around 2001 or 2002.

I subscribed to some Netscape channels using the first incarnation of RSS back in the late 1990s. That was quite a while ago. It was interesting but interest fizzled out after a couple of years. It almost caught on back then, but not quite.

A year or two later, some folks resurrected it. RSS would not die.

At first, I just subscribed to RSS feeds with RSS news aggregators like the originally one at O'Reilly. They called their Meerkat and they just announced its retirement a few months ago.

I also subscribed to a lot of RSS news feeds using the popular Yahoo portal website http://my.yahaoo.com/


Then I got a fantastic application for the Macintosh called NetNewsWire.

The great thing about NetNewsWire is that it made finding, subscribing too, searching/filtering, and reading RSS feeds a breeze. I started using it back when it was in beta and I was probably one of the author's first customers for that product.

I still use NetNewsWire to this day. It is one of my most oft-used programs on my computer. It is the best way I have of keeping an eye peeled on the tech worlds that I am intent on keeping up with.


When I heard about Dave Wiener's Radio service for doing something called blogging back around 2002, I had to try it. I subscribed and posted on it a bit. Eventually, I got kind of bored with Radio.

There was too much complexity. Too many things were going on that I really did not understand, at least at the time. It seemed kind of slow on my Mac too.


A couple years ago, after Google bought the Blogger service - they decided to make it free.

I piled on with my second attempt at a half-decent weblog - Johnny Software Saloon.


The idea was to muse about little things going on in the world of software in a relaxed, informal way. Like the atmosphere in a saloon - only without the fights.

It has not proven really popular. At least as far as I can tell.

I think that is because it discusses so many different topics under the broad categories of software, programming, and computing - it does not really have a chance for an avid following. Not unless you are a Mac-loving, Java-swilling, XML-enthusiast like myself.


Almost exactly a year ago, Apple computer turned the switch on for their new podcasting subscription service via iTunes and the wildly popular iTunes music store.

I had been subscribing to a few podcasts for about a year. But when Apple did that, let me tell you - the podcasting world exploded.


This year, my TiVo started letting me subscribe to audio podcasts and to certain select video blogs (AKA vlogs) such as Rocket Boom.


All of these things rely on RSS to get their message out.


What is RSS?

A lot of people assume it is a protocol. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Like so many things in the post-2000 high tech world, RSS is simply a file format. Yet one more file format based on XML, actually, is what it is.


RSS is one file format that pretty much all programmers should learn. Certainly any programmers who work with the Internet, intranets, or web applications. Arguably, any programmer who works on software that produces or allows the editing of documents should be learning it too.

RSS is a very handy solution to a very common problem: keeping track of what is new. It can actually be used to catalog an entire set of things too.


RSS does not presume the presence or use of networking, really. All the links to other documents use URLs.

But a URL uses a network, right?

Nope. Ever see a URL that starts off with something that looks like file://?

Well, that is about as non-network related as anything could be! It simply says I want to read a file from the local computer.

Now, underlying that there could be virtual file systems, pseudo file systems mocked up by some application-specific program hooked into the operating system or language/development runtime environment, or a networked file system. Who cares?

The important thing is it is referring to a document, and it wants that document if they link is activated/traversed.


The Flock and Safari web browsers come with excellent RSS support for them built right in.

Firefox has some RSS support (live bookmarks) but I find the current version (1.5) of Firefox pretty weak as an RSS client. When I do use it for that, I use the Sage extension.

Sage is a free sidebar extension for Firefox. You can open Sage when you want to do some RSS reading or subscribing, and ignore it when you are not. It has its own bookmarks view, so that you do not have to hunt for them in your regular bookmarks.

When Firefox 2.0 comes out later in 2006, it is supposed to have some improved RSS support. I hope so. It really is not nearly as convenient for RSS news feed reading as everything else out there right now. It does work but it is not particularly useful.

Microsoft Internet Explorer 7 is supposed to have RSS feed support in it. As far as I know, it is okay. I have not seen it yet. I am all read up on the standards, so my attitude as far as what it can do with them is, surprise me.


Well, that is a good overview of what the RSS document standard is and how it is being used by some of the most popular and powerful programs and services. I know I left a few off but I think anyone can find any major ones extremely quickly by searching or asking someone.

Respectively RSS,

John