what is an rss reader ?
An RSS Reader is a client program you download on to your computer, in order to receive RSS feeds from RSS providers. There are different versions of RSS readers available that work in different ways; describing all their functions is beyond the scope of this tutorial, I will describe the features of one of the most popular and original readers - that of RssReader available for free download from rssreader.com.
What you will need for this tutorial :
- An RSS Reader Client Program. (Detailed Below).
- Microsoft Windows 98 or later.
- Microsoft .NET Framework 1.1.
- Internet Access during the install & configure process.
Step 1 - Download and install rss reader
As mentioned above, Microsoft .NET Framework needs to be installed for this RSS Reader to work. I could have chosen a reader that does not require the .NET Framework but to be honest, this is the best version I have found; that and the fact that the .NET Framework really will become a necessary part of the Windows operating system so you may as well get used to it and install it if you have not done so. You can get the .NET Framework by running a Windows Update or by visiting this section of the Microsoft website for more details.
Go to www.rssreader.com and download the latest version which at the time of writing is version 1.0.88.0. (There is a beta version but we'll ignore that one for this tutorial.) Once downloaded (unzip if necessary) run the setup.exe file and follow the prompts to install.
Step 2 - feed the reader!
Now that the program has been installed we need some feeds in there. At the end of this tutorial you will find links to some RSS/XML feeds that you might find useful. To show you how to install a feed into RssReader we have created a couple of test feeds. These feeds at the moment do not contain much information but will become an integral part of how we will update you with latest news from these sites. First of course we have an RSS feed here on the miniTutorials.com site. As with all feeds you need to look for either an RSS symbol or an XML symbol. These are essentially the same thing but different sites may use one of them or both. Some sites will have different feeds on different parts of their website for specific information or they may contain just one general feed for the whole site.
1. Goto miniTutorials.com and
scroll down the page until you see the rss/xml feed icons.
Right Click on the image and choose 'Copy Shortcut' from the drop down menu.
2. Open up RssReader by Right Clicking on the RssReader Icon in the
taskbar area and select 'Open Rss Reader '.
3. The URL should already be filled in for you, if not then Right Click
into the URL text area and paste it in. Click 'Next' to continue.
4. Accept the Title 'miniTutorials Feed' and click 'Next'.
5. Click 'Ok' to put the feed into the 'My Feeds' group.
Ok, The miniTutorials feed we just added should still be in view in the program. All feeds by miniTutorials (currently at least two) are shown in the bottom right hand pane with a brief intro as to what contents they contain. The top right hand pane shows all the feed titles only.
Click on the 'Read More' link in the bottom right hand pane below the 'MTBrowser 2' title. This will open up the relative page on the site within this bottom right hand pane. Above this pane are some icons, click on the green left arrow to return to the feed summary's page. Clicking on the 'Open in Browser' link will open the same informational page in your web browser instead of within the program.
I will leave the rest of this program for your investigation but as far as this tutorial goes we have achieved our aim and installed our feed reader program and some feeds.
Summary
Congratulations, you now have an excellent RSS Reader installed and have probably already begun to receive feeds from some of the sites above. I suppose it's a bit like collecting favourite links in your web browser. Over time you will come across feeds that you want, there is no rush to just stick anything in there for the sake of having it pop up every 5 minutes.
Want to know more?
Related Tutorials
RSS Display - Display your own or other RSS Feeds on your website.
RSS Deliver - Create your own RSS Feeds for delivery to RSS Readers or use with RSS Display.
