Subscribe to SYC Life content
Many sites, including Southern York County Life, provide feeds of their content that you can subscribe to. Simple technology allows you to use software called a ‘feed reader’ or ‘aggregator’ to read content from sites instead of visiting the site itself. Don’t be put off by the acronyms like XML or RSS - this is genuinely easy to do.
Why would I want to do it?
If you like to keep up to date with a number of sites, you can do so more easily with a feed reader without having to go from site to site checking for new content. Once you’ve subscribed most feed readers will indicate when fresh content has been posted to a site you are subscribied to. It’s a great way to easily keep up with many different sites. Usually this includes introductory text of the content so you can decide whether you want to follow the provided link to the full content.
OK, so how do I do all this?
First, you’ll need a feed reader, or ‘aggregator’. There are two basic types of feed readers: those that you install on your personal computer and the online variety. If you are not comfortable installing software on your computer then an online feed reader might suit you best.
The following three feed readers are popular:
FeedDemon for Windows
NetNewsWire for Mac OS X
Bloglines which is Web based
Wikipedia has a list of news aggregators if you would like to explore some more options.
Bloglines, which is listed above as a popular online choice is very easy to use and is free. Sign up with them and when you log in you will see a subscribe button prominently placed on the screen. You will then be brought to a screen where you can enter the url (web address) of a site or feed. If you enter a web site address, the feed reader will attempt to discover where that site’s feed is and subscribe you to it. If the feed reader cannot find the feed you will have to enter the feed manually.
How do I know where a site’s feed is?
A lot of sites include a text link or button which leads to their feed. The trouble is there are many different names and acronyms in use to alert you to a site’s feed. This is partly to do with the different technologies being used to offer feeds, but don’t worry about that. The fact is you have probably seen these links or buttons but you may not have known what they were. A common button is a small orange button with white writing on it which might say one of the following:
RSS
XML
Atom
Webfeed
Feed
Subscribe
These buttons are usually links to the url (web address) of the feed for that site or blog. That is the url you need to give to your ‘feed reader’ or ‘aggregator’ in order to subscribe.
So, in a nutshell:
1. Choose a feed reader
2. Tell your feed reader where the feeds you like are
3. Read all your favourite sites in one fell swoop
So where is the feed for this site?
Actually, there are more than one. We have created the following feeds.
to Stories
to Dan’s Blog
Just click on the subscribe button and use the resulting url in your feed reader. In addition to these there are feeds from the forums found at the bottom of forum pages. You can subscribe to an overall feed for all forums, or to a feed for any one of the forums.