Thing 6 – Subscribe to blogs

Now that you have a feed reader account, take a look through its help screens and browse through the different menu options. (If you created a Bloglines account, I recommend using the Beta version.) Make a note of how to add and delete subscriptions, and of how to import opml files. (An opml file is just a computer readable list of feeds.)

Your task

1. Import this opml file of library-related blogs into your feed reader. (Right-click on the file and save it to your desktop first, then browse to it from within the Import section of your feed reader.) Experiment with your reader’s settings. For example, some people like to read feeds with the most recent articles at the top of the screen. Others prefer to have the oldest articles appear first, and work their way to the most recent. After browsing for a while you may want to mark all the messages as read. That way, you’ll only have new messages appear in your reader next time. Feel free to add and delete feeds at will. It’s your account.
2. Use your reader regularly! Set aside 15 – 20 min. every day as professional development time, and use it to check your feeds.

Remember, whenever you come across an interesting website, look out for the orange feed symbol , or an , or button. Follow your reader’s instructions to subscribe to that website’s feed.

You can also find blogs to subscribe to by using a service such as Google Blog Search or Bloglines Search, or by following links from other people’s blogs.

NB: In addition to RSS there is a feed format type known as Atom. From the user point of view, Atom feeds work exactly the same way as RSS. If you have a Blogger blog, you may have noticed that there is a section at the bottom of your blog that says “Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)” – that’s your blog’s feed.

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Credit: Adapted from the PLCMC Thing posted by HeleneB, under a Creative Commons BY-NC license, and from the Swinburne University Thing posted by TRR, under a Creative Commons BY-NC-SA license.

Original content by Jason Peart for the Chisholm Institute Library.
© Chisholm Institute 2008, released under a Creative Commons BY-NC-SA license.