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Too stupid to use RSS?

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11 replies

by charliespencer

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I'm trying to figure out RSS. I've never seen it working so I don't know what its supposed to do for me. You're probably trying to put your eyeballs back in their sockets and wondering, "What's to figure out? Subscribe to something and go!"

I'm using FF 2, and set Options, Feeds to "Subscribe to the feed using: Live Bookmarks". I went to Jack Wallen's TR web log at http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/opensource/ and clicked the Subscribe link. A "Add Live Bookmark" window opened and created a bookmarks folder with bookmarks to Jack's recent web log entries. What's this supposed to do for me? How does it differ from a conventional bookmark?

My understanding is this somehow allows me to be notified when the subscribed page is updated. How do the notifications arrive? Obviously it isn't in my mailbox, since nowhere in FF have I specified an e-mail address.

11 replies

by jmgarvin

That should take you to your live bookmarks and your updated RSS feeds...no?

by charliespencer

"I went to Jack Wallen's TR web log ... and clicked the Subscribe link. A "Add Live Bookmark" window opened and created a bookmarks folder with bookmarks to Jack's recent web log entries."

You're talking about the icon at the end of the URL, right? Is something else supposed to happen besides the creation of a new bookmark?

by jmgarvin

If you click the icon (looks like a speaker with two cones on top) that is left of the dagger and right of the URL, that should take you to a page that says "gathering feed" or something of the sort...

What version of FF?

by charliespencer

Clicking the icon (orange, white circle in the bottom left, two white quarter-circles in the upper left) pops up a new window titled "Add Live Bookmark". This window has two fields:

Name: Linux and Open Source
Create in: Bookmarks Toolbar Folder

If I click OK, a bookmark is created, but I'm not sure how it differs from a bookmark created by clicking Bookmarks, Bookmark This Page.

by jmgarvin

So, yes it does create an RSS bookmark (or live bookmark). So what the difference is, is that it comes from an RSS feed rather than the page itself.

by retro77

Go to google.com, create an account or sign in. Go to the custom start page and add some content. There are RSS feeds for stocks or news or whatever. Once you understand what it looks like, it might help you see if thats something you want or need.

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