About RSS (no not the Saffron Brigade)
Putt's Law states that "Technology is dominated by two types of people: those who understand what they do not manage, and those who manage what they do not understand."
Having always posed as the former, I suddenly had the realisation that I am the latter when trying to put a email subscription option for this blog. Yet another instance of nature showing the mirror, I guess. Of course nature here has to be seen in a more expansive context including the virtual world. (Not that the real world is any less virtual. Guess, I am going way beyond scope of this post here)
In the right top corner of this blog, you now find a "Enter Your Email Address" link followed by a subscribe to... drop box. Though once completed it seems to be the easiest thing on the world to actually get it done, it took me over 2 weeks. The major problem I had here was the fact that the side bar links in feedburner (about this shortly) appeared to be Google Ads to the defective ad blocker installed in my eyes.
Anyway since there were few guys who envisaged interest in this whole Feeds stuff. (After all most of us do live in the state of Annamayakosha [;)]), I thought I would just give a few links to where you can learn more about this and also the procedure for how to install the same in your blog.
Well since the busy busy people that we are, we cannot afford to go to our favourite websites every now and then to check for updates, web feeds give the option where in the website pushes its updates into some online reader of the user where in the user can find all the updates of all his favourite websites he has subscribed to.
Therefore a webfeed needs,
a) a content providing website (like say this blog[Hint;) Hint ;)]) which has the Feed Subscription facility.
b) a data aggregator (like google reader) where the updates from (a) can be pushed into. (For a list of other popular aggregators see the drop down menu in the 'subscribe to' drop boxes on the right side of this blog)
c) Sometimes in addition to these two, there is an involvement of a third party called the Scrappers who syndicate webfeeds for websites which dont provide them.
d) This is the optional part (as is usually the case wherein the human element is involved;)). An user to actually read the content.
Well now there are two popular types of syndincation process, RSS & Atom. A good comparison of the two can be found here. I am not going to elaborate on this as this syndication process is done by the Blog Service Provider. In case of blogspot/blogger for example both RSS and Atom feeds are provided. You can choose which one you are going to burn based on the above link or of course totally by your whim and fancy
Good! Now that the basic understanding is got over with, time for some good old fashioned spoon-feeding. This is how you enable webfeeds and email subscriptions to your page. This is by no means the only way but merely the way I used. If you are aware of better means kindly comment on the same.
Here Goes,
1) Go to the Feedburner Homepage
2) Click on Register and create an account.
3) Follow the instructions in this link to activate the feed for your blogger/wordpress/other accounts.
4) This step is only for blogspot users: Go to your blog homepage and sign in with your blogger/blogspot account if it is not already signed it. Then click on customise. The page should go to "page elements" under "layout". Now click on "Add a Gadget" on the left hand side of the layout page. On the pop up page choose "Subscription Links: Let your readers easily subscribe to your blog with popular feed readers". Behold! Your Webfeed subscription link is ready. There is probably a similar methodology for wordpress and other users as well.
5) Now for the email subscription link. Go back to the Feedburner page. Sign in. Click on My Feeds at the top left corner of the page. Click on the name of your blog as it appears there. There are lot of things you can do here. But let me stick to the agenda and mention only about email subscriptions.
6) This feedburner page as you would have observed is in tabbed format. Click on the 'Publicize' Tab. On the left side of this page you will find the Services. ( No, these links below that are not Ads . In case you too get confused like me [:(]) One of this is Email Subscriptions. Click on this link and follow the instructions. Your email subscriptions link too is ready.
I tested this thing out and it works fine. In the email subscriptions links you can choose your delivery time. It delivers once a day. You can make as many modifications as necessary before that time and only the last modified post is sent as the email and also only if you post anything at all on that day. As for the Google reader or other aggregator used for the webfeed, it automatically gets updated every time you make a change but after a time lag.
I guess providing a subscription facility in your blog is an IDEA whose TIME has come. [;)]
Post Script: As for those who questioned me as to why the blog is not regularly updated, there is only one answer. And I don't have a choice but to quote Rajini Kanth here. "Sneeze, Cough, Hiccup, Yawn, Fame, Wealth, Power, Position and Moments of Grandeur do not come when we demand it. We cannot stop it when they come and we cannot hold them back when they leave."
[:D]
Having always posed as the former, I suddenly had the realisation that I am the latter when trying to put a email subscription option for this blog. Yet another instance of nature showing the mirror, I guess. Of course nature here has to be seen in a more expansive context including the virtual world. (Not that the real world is any less virtual. Guess, I am going way beyond scope of this post here)
In the right top corner of this blog, you now find a "Enter Your Email Address" link followed by a subscribe to... drop box. Though once completed it seems to be the easiest thing on the world to actually get it done, it took me over 2 weeks. The major problem I had here was the fact that the side bar links in feedburner (about this shortly) appeared to be Google Ads to the defective ad blocker installed in my eyes.
Anyway since there were few guys who envisaged interest in this whole Feeds stuff. (After all most of us do live in the state of Annamayakosha [;)]), I thought I would just give a few links to where you can learn more about this and also the procedure for how to install the same in your blog.
Well since the busy busy people that we are, we cannot afford to go to our favourite websites every now and then to check for updates, web feeds give the option where in the website pushes its updates into some online reader of the user where in the user can find all the updates of all his favourite websites he has subscribed to.
[Click on image to Enlarge it]
Courtesy: http://www.gocomics.com/calvinandhobbes/Therefore a webfeed needs,
a) a content providing website (like say this blog[Hint;) Hint ;)]) which has the Feed Subscription facility.
b) a data aggregator (like google reader) where the updates from (a) can be pushed into. (For a list of other popular aggregators see the drop down menu in the 'subscribe to' drop boxes on the right side of this blog)
c) Sometimes in addition to these two, there is an involvement of a third party called the Scrappers who syndicate webfeeds for websites which dont provide them.
d) This is the optional part (as is usually the case wherein the human element is involved;)). An user to actually read the content.
Well now there are two popular types of syndincation process, RSS & Atom. A good comparison of the two can be found here. I am not going to elaborate on this as this syndication process is done by the Blog Service Provider. In case of blogspot/blogger for example both RSS and Atom feeds are provided. You can choose which one you are going to burn based on the above link or of course totally by your whim and fancy
Good! Now that the basic understanding is got over with, time for some good old fashioned spoon-feeding. This is how you enable webfeeds and email subscriptions to your page. This is by no means the only way but merely the way I used. If you are aware of better means kindly comment on the same.
Here Goes,
1) Go to the Feedburner Homepage
2) Click on Register and create an account.
3) Follow the instructions in this link to activate the feed for your blogger/wordpress/other accounts.
4) This step is only for blogspot users: Go to your blog homepage and sign in with your blogger/blogspot account if it is not already signed it. Then click on customise. The page should go to "page elements" under "layout". Now click on "Add a Gadget" on the left hand side of the layout page. On the pop up page choose "Subscription Links: Let your readers easily subscribe to your blog with popular feed readers". Behold! Your Webfeed subscription link is ready. There is probably a similar methodology for wordpress and other users as well.
5) Now for the email subscription link. Go back to the Feedburner page. Sign in. Click on My Feeds at the top left corner of the page. Click on the name of your blog as it appears there. There are lot of things you can do here. But let me stick to the agenda and mention only about email subscriptions.
6) This feedburner page as you would have observed is in tabbed format. Click on the 'Publicize' Tab. On the left side of this page you will find the Services. ( No, these links below that are not Ads . In case you too get confused like me [:(]) One of this is Email Subscriptions. Click on this link and follow the instructions. Your email subscriptions link too is ready.
I tested this thing out and it works fine. In the email subscriptions links you can choose your delivery time. It delivers once a day. You can make as many modifications as necessary before that time and only the last modified post is sent as the email and also only if you post anything at all on that day. As for the Google reader or other aggregator used for the webfeed, it automatically gets updated every time you make a change but after a time lag.
I guess providing a subscription facility in your blog is an IDEA whose TIME has come. [;)]
Post Script: As for those who questioned me as to why the blog is not regularly updated, there is only one answer. And I don't have a choice but to quote Rajini Kanth here. "Sneeze, Cough, Hiccup, Yawn, Fame, Wealth, Power, Position and Moments of Grandeur do not come when we demand it. We cannot stop it when they come and we cannot hold them back when they leave."
[:D]
Comments
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