RSS Feed for this forum

Is there one? If not can we get one? There's usually simple plugins available for most forums.

Here's some reasons for providing RSS feeds:

1. Its much easier to find new content on regularly updated web pages (ie: news sites and forums) with an rss reader than it is a browser.

2. The cost of bandwidth for RSS feeds is negligible. (infact, can save bandwidth because people are more likely to only read topics which interest them).

3. You get listed in lots of pages that link to RSS feeds (more publicity/hits/etc).

4. Lots of software now supports RSS feeds. For example: Firefox (live bookmarks are RSS), Outlook (with plugin), IE (with plugin), Opera, dedicated readers, Thunderbird, and others.

5. Its easy to do (probably)

6. Its free

Anybody else think its a good idea?

PS: Sorry if there's already an RSS feed. I did have a look around but couldnt find it anywhere. If there is maybe it should be linked to from the front page?

I think its an excellent idea, would love to see one. The only problem I see is the potential loss of advertising revenue.

By the way, there isn't currently an RSS feed enabled, or an XML one, otherwise they would be at www.sheffieldforum.co.uk/external.php?type=rss or www.sheffieldforum.co.uk/external.php?type=xml

The only problem I see is the potential loss of advertising revenue.

Many sites (The Guardian and BBC sping to mind), provide just the headlines and when you click on them the website opens in the view (adverts included). I'm pretty sure some of the prewritten forum scripts must do the same, perhaps displaying the new post and displaying the full thread (from the website - adverts included again) if you click on the post?

Yeah thats exactly how they work, but, from the point of view of the owner of the site, the longer you visit a site, the more chance you are going to click on an advert.

That said, there are still lots of successful news-related sites that generate all their income from adverts who have RSS feeds (www.theregister.co.uk being one).

Hiya,

I've written RSS feeds for various web sites - the technical issues are probably not that difficult - vBulletin 3.0.5 supports RSS and there have been versions written for vBulletin 2 by third party develoeprs.

However, the issues are probably more managerial than technical - perhaps you could use the 'Contact Us' option to directly raise the issue with Geoff?

Also, don't forget that the running of the board is a volunteer activity; we do quite a lot of stuff that's non-standard with the board but it does take time!

Joe

Just wanted to bump this up to the top and add my vote for an RSS feed.

Can anyone recommend a free fully featured RSS reader?

FIREFOX :thumbsup:

firefox is hardly "fully featured"... :)

Originally posted by daleam
FIREFOX :thumbsup:

I use Firefox - how do I find the RSS stuff daleam?

(I'm new to this RSS stuff........)

With respect to an RSS feed for the Forum, I took note of what was said and have passed it on to Geoff.

I'll keep you posted.

Joe

Originally posted by Draggletail
Can anyone recommend a free fully featured RSS reader?

I'm on a Mac so I use Safari - but in the PC world you might want to check out Awasu (http://www.awasu.com/), which is free and looks to have a pretty good list of features.

I know its not full featured, but it works.

With regards to RSS in Firefox, any page that has an RSS feed, should display an RSS sign in the address bar (far right of address bar) or at the bottom right, in the status bar.

You just click those to subscribe to the feed.

:D

I use SharpReader (google SharpReader)
I find it to be very good and kinda like MS Outlook, it is very simple to use and you can install plugins for it and everything.

Tilly

Excuse my ignorance but what's RSS when it's at home?

Really Simple Syndicate ;)

Originally posted by Rich
Excuse my ignorance but what's RSS when it's at home?

it's a firefox only feature, rich!












(j/k)

No good to me then.. Firefox is waaaaaaaaay over-rated IMO.

Originally posted by Rich
No good to me then.. Firefox is waaaaaaaaay over-rated IMO.
Mayby but it is better than internet explorer

Originally posted by Zinger549
Mayby but it is better than internet explorer

No it isn't, when I tried FF I found it clunky, bloated and pointlessly slow.

And no, I wasn't using a warezed copy, it was a legit copy downloaded off mozilla.com.

Theres no such thing as a warezed copy of FireFox, its free for anyone to download so what would be the point of pirating it? Muppet.

Originally posted by slh73
Theres no such thing as a warezed copy of FireFox, its free for anyone to download so what would be the point of pirating it? Muppet.

Whatever, I still say Firefox is crap so yeh.

And no, I am not a "Muppet" :rant:

Well youre doing a pretty good impersonation of one then, so yeh. :rolleyes:

Rich does have a point, Firefox is slow, to start-up, but this is because it isn't built into the XP structure, it's got it's own engine.

IE is the same engine as Windows Explorer so it's going to be quicker at loading etc.

But Firefox is better IMO when it comes to ease of use. Its very easy to customise, and there are thousands of themes and extensions, some of which are very useful.

The main reason people use Firefox is safety, but in reality, barring ActiveX, IE is much safer, and has less 'holes'.

Microsoft have fixed it, it's just took Mozilla's kick up le derriere, for them to do it.

Firefox isn't bulletproff like some people would have you think.

But I like it, I didn't start using it because of all this 'security' issue. I just find it easier and nicer to use. I just hope MS make IE7 more like Firefox.