Project by Yapo Juares Tanguy Course "Innovation and New Technologies" - University of Camerino (teacher C. Vaccari)

1. SEMESTER PROJECT

2. ANALYSIS OF “RSS” ENVIRONNEMENT
by professor
YAPO Jaurès Tanguy Carlo Vaccari

3. INTRODUCTION
I- WHAT IS RSS
II- RSS, QUICK STORY
III- CARACTERISTICS OF RSS
a- The Channel Tag
b- Compulsory properties
c- Optional properties
IV- SYNTAX OF RSS SOURCES CODE
a- Header file
b- Syntax of channel tag
c- Syntax of channel properties
d- Sample coding

4. V- HOW TO ACCESS RSS FEEDS
a- Through web browsers
b- Online facilities
c- Aggregators
VI- WHO CAN ACCES RSS
a- Webmaster
b- End-user
VII- USAGE OF RSS, SOME FIGURES
VIII- PERSONAL OPINION
a- RSS, survival or decline?
b- RSS, challengers and potential successors
CONCLUSION
BIBLIOGRAPHY

5. HOW CAN I…?

6. OBSERVATION
- EXPANSION OF THE INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY
- RECENT RECORDS REVEALED MORE THAN TWENTY (20) BILLIONS OF
WEBSITES
- USER WILL NEED MONTHS EVEN YEARS OF BROWSING TO COVER THE
COUNTLESS WEB PAGES THAT MAY BE AVAILABLE
SOLUTION
- CREATION OF RSS
RSS IS AN APPLICATION IN XML FILE FORMAT THAT OFFERS WEB USERS THE
POSSIBILITY TO KEEP TRACK OF THEIR FAVOURITE WEBSITES FOR A SMOOTH
BROWSING. ESPECIALLY UP-TO-DATE WEB PAGES AT A GLANCE, WITHOUT
NECESSARILY STEPPING INTO THE RELEVANT WEBSITES.
INTRODUCTION

7. STANDING FOR REALLY SIMPLE SYNDICATION, A RSS FEED IS A
COMPUTING TECHNOLOGY USING THE 1.0 VERSION OF XML
(EXTENSIBLE MARK-UP LANGUAGE) FORMAT.
RSS HELPS BROWSERS SORT WEB CONTENTS THEY WISH TO
INTERACT WITH; WHICH CONTENTS ARE IN GENERAL
AUTOMATICALLY GENERATED PROVIDED UPDATES ARE AVAILABLE.
RSS FEED IS ALSO A POWERFUL TOOL TO WEBMASTERS TO
SYNDICATE (CLUSTER) NUMBER OF OTHER WEBSITES LINKS ON
THEIR WEBSITES FOR AN EASY BROWSE OF USERS ACCORDING TO
THEIR INTEREST.
SO, RSS FEED CAN BE REGARDED AS THE WEB-ON-DEMAND.
GENERALLY, RSS FEED ARE USED BY SITES MANAGING BLOGS,
NEWS, DOWNLOADS.
WHAT IS RSS?

8. - March 1999: NETSCAPE created RSS 0.90 (RDF - Resource Description
Framework- SITE SUMMARY)
- July 2000: upgrade to RSS 0.91 (Rich Site Summary) by DAN Libby with
(USERLAND), a simple version of xml (no more RDF specification)
- April 2001: RSS 1.0 by Aaron Hillel SWARTZ based on RDF then
September 2002 RSS 3.0 (not xml format)
- September 2002: Dave WINER launches RSS 2.0 at Harvard University then
RSS 2.01 in November 2002
Note: RSS 0.91 has been upgraded to various versions namely 0.92, 0.93, 0.94
RSS, QUICK HISTORY

9. HISTORY MAP OF RSS
figure 2.1
RSS, QUICK HISTORY

10. - ON A WEBSITE YOU CAN IDENTIFY RSS WITH THESE ICONS SUGGESTED BY
MOZILLA AND VALIDATED BY RSS BOARD
- SOME WEBMASTERS MAY USE THE FOLLOWING ICONS
figure 2.2
CARACTERISTICS OF RSS

11. In a practical way, a RSS FEED is a hyperlink made up of three important parts: the URL of
the site, the TITLE and a SHORT SUMMARY of the topic it refers to.
a- The Channel Tag
Syntactically, the main component of RSS FEED is the channel tag along
with a set of properties that are also tags.
1- Compulsory properties
- Title tag: refers to the name given to the channel serving as reference to
browsers
- Link tag: is the URL address of the website the feed serves
- Description tag: a short comment on the related topic
- At least one Item tag: specifies the contents of the feed.
Item tag also includes sub tags such as title, URL, description, PUBDATE etc.
CARACTERISTICS OF RSS

12. 2- Optional Properties
- Language tag: setting the language in which feed contents the
be generated
- Webmaster tag: providing few informations on the webmaster
- Pubdate tag: that displays the date of the last publication for
the content
- Docs tag: is the link of the website that refers to the files or to
specification on the format used (Harvard specification)
CARACTERISTICS OF RSS

13. a- Header File
Any RSS FEED starts with the XML and RSS
TAGS that specify their version.
sample coding
<?xml version=”1.0” ?>
<rss version=”2.0”>
<channel>
…..
</channel>
</rss>
SYNTAX OF RSS SOURCE CODE

14. b- Syntax of Channel Tag and its Properties
<channel>
<title> MY_RSS_FEED_HEADLINE </title>
<link> http://innovation2013unicam.wikispaces.com </link>
<description> This is the wiki for unicam2013/2014 computer
science Master students…</description>
<item>
…
</item>
< language> en-gb </language>
<pubdate> sun, 26 jan 2013 </pubdate>
</channel>
SYNTAX OF RSS SOURCE CODE

15. c- Sample Coding
<?Xml version=”1.0” ?>
<rss version=”2.0”>
<channel>
<title> MY_RSS_FEED_HEADLINE </title>
<link> http://innovation2013unicam.Wikispaces.Com </link>
<description> This is the wiki for unicam2013/2014 computer science…</description>
<item>
<title> Semester Project </title>
<link> http://innovation2013unicam.Wikispaces.Com/yapo+juares/rss_project </link>
<description> As a 1st year computer science student at Unicam, YJT undertook a
project in Innovation & New Tech. in the field of aggregatin. He has …</description>
</item>
</channel>
</rss>
SYNTAX OF RSS SOURCE CODE

16. A- Web Browsers
Almost all recent browsers incorporate RSS FEEDS reader on their interface
- Internet Explorer7 and Later Versions
- Displays RSS icon on the toolbar.
- When a site runs RSS FEED, Internet Explorer highlights the RSS icon
figure5.1: WEBSITE WITHOUT RSS FEED
HOW TO ACCESS RSS FEED

17. figure5.2: WEBSITE WITH RSS FEED
HOW TO ACCESS RSS FEED

18. - To read a feed, user click on the feed icon button on the toolbar to select desired feeds (if
the website offers many feeds)
- Then select “subscribe to this feed” button
- Make desired set up (create/select folder, rename, add to favourite bar),
- Then click on subscribe. The feed is saved in the favourite centre.
figure 5.3: SAVING OF RSS FEED
HOW TO ACCESS RSS FEEDS

19. - Firefox
- Safari
- Opera
b- Online Facilities
- Netvibes
- Mon Yahoo!
- Iwake
- Sys Monitor
- Pretty RSS
c- Aggregators
- Rssowl
- Feedreader
- Vienna
- Netnewswire
- Bloglines
HOW TO ACCESS RSS FEEDS

20. a- Webmaster
A webmaster can include RSS FEED to its websites to:
- Ease the browsing of his users
- Keep in touch with its public
- Customize its contents with respect to the topics discussed in the website
- Make advertisement for other websites
b- End-user
Any web user can access feeds to:
- Organize his web usage timing
- Focus only on topic of his interest
- Control the daily updates of his favourite websites etc.
User is prompted to a simplified web page consisting of a set of links, that contains a
TITLE, a URL and a DESCRIPTION of the related topic.
WHO CAN ACCESS

21. - SURVEY IN SEPTEMBER 2007 ON FRENCH WEB USERS’ INTERACTION WITH RSS FEEDS
figure 7.1
USAGE OF RSS, SOME FIGURES

22. figure 7.2
USAGE OF RSS, SOME FIGURES

23. USAGE OF RSS, SOME FIGURES
figure 7.3

24. figure 7.4
USAGE OF RSS, SOME FIGURES

25. figure 7.5
USAGE OF RSS, SOME FIGURES

26. a- RSS, Survival Or Decline?
- INTRODUCTION OF RSS INCREASES BROWSING ACTIVITY
- INCREASE OF COMPANY SELLING. ACCORDING TO MARKETINGSHERPA, 75
MILLION CONSUMERS AND BUSINESS PEOPLE IN USAAND UK USE RSS
REGULARLY
- RSS PROVIDES UNIQUE NEWS AUTOMATICALLY TO ANY USERS
- OFFERS THE ABILITY TO DISPLAY LATEST NEWS OF A WEBSITE ON SOCIAL
NETWORKS DIRECTLY
- ENABLES CUSTOMIZED CONTENTS ACCORDING TO THE RECIPIENT:
. Facebook users are fans of entertainments. so, it is the best area for kidding materials
. On Twitter, we share latest news. so, suitable for exclusivities, latest offers, scoops
. The scope of LinkedIn covers jobs offers, services providers
- OFFERS POSSIBILITY TO A WEBMASTER TO ACCESS AND SPREAD NEWS
FROM OTHER WEBSITES
- HIGHLIGHTS A WEBSITE BY SEARCH ENGINES INDEXING
PERSONAL OPINION

27. However, RSS shows some weaknesses:
- In a regulation viewpoint, RSS is not a specified format i.e the standard
is not approved by any international board like W3C, IANA (Internet
Assigned Numbers Authority)
- Feeds updates require constant manual interventions of the webmaster
- Provides contents that require specific tools to read them
- Feeds face bugs issues
- Some aggregators are not free
- Lost of data. Google has recently killed off the GOOGLE READER
destroying users’ data (since July 15, 2013)
PERSONAL OPINION

28. A- RSS, Challengers And Potential Successors
1- ATOM
- ATOM IS SPECIFIED (IETF) LANGUAGE CREATED TO OVERCOME RSS
UNCONTROLLABLE SPECIFICATION CRISIS
- ABLE OF READING FEEDS, IT ALLOWS USERS TO WRITE TO THE WEB
2- E-NEWSLETTER : DOCUMENT THAT INFORMS, ANNOUNCES, REMINDS,
ADVISES, INSTRUCTS, ADVERTISES AND COMMUNICATE WITH DELIVERY
FREQUENCY, CONTAINS UPCOMING INFORMATIONS
3- PINTEREST: ONLINE CATALOG OF INSPIRATION THAT PROVIDES UPDATES,
IDEA, GUIDANCE WHEN WORKING ON A PROJECT
4- PODCAST
5- WIDGET
PERSONAL OPINION

29. TO SUM UP, EVEN THOUGH RSS IS LARGELY USED, IT IS NOT REALLY
PERCEIVED BY USERS.
MARKETINGSHARPA STATES OUT OF 75 MILLION OF USERS, 50
MILLION REALLY HAVE NO IDEAABOUT THE APPLICATION
THIS SITUATION LEADS TO THE FOLLOWING OBSERVATIONS:
- LACK OF PROMOTION ON THE APPLICATIONS
- APPLICATIONS ARE MOSTLY USED BY PROFESSIONALS OF THE
INTENDED FIELD
- THEY DISAPPEAR EARLY
CONCLUSION

30. - Innovation and New Technologie Course materials
- http://opikanoba.Org
- http://atomenabled.Org/
- http://www.Mnot.Net/rss/tutorial
- http://t37.Net/resultats-de-lenquete-sur-lusage-des-flux-rss-chez-les-
internautes-francophones.Html
- http://www.Xul.Fr/xml-rss.Html#fonctionnement
- http://www.Clubic.Com/r/rss/
- http://www.Rssboard.Org/
- http://blog.Creationdln.Ca/redaction/pourquoi-installer-un-flux-rss-sur-
son-site-internet--442.Html
- http://www.Bloomonline.Co.Nz/2013/05/whats-the-difference-between-
a-blog-and-a-newsletter/
- http://www.Usda.Org/trifold/IS02503.Pdf
- http://www.createmixedmedia.com/blogs/the-creative-life/and-what-
the-heck-is-pinterest
- http://weblogs.about.com/od/choosingabloghost/p/What-Is-
Pinterest.htm
- http://webapp.wisestamp.com/
- https://forms.Bl.Uk/newsletters/index.Aspx/subscribe.Html
- http://www.Businesspundit.Com/what-is-a-newsletter-good-for-anyway
BIBLIOGRAPHY

31. NOW
THE CHOICE IS YOURS TO…