iwmw parallel session bath - september 2000 andy powell, ukoln [email protected] automated news...

IWMW Parallel Session

Bath - September 2000

Andy Powell, UKOLN

[email protected]

Automated News Feeds

UKOLN is funded by Resource: The Council for Museums, Archives & Libraries, the Joint Information Systems Committee of the Higher Education Funding Councils, as well as by project funding from the JISC’s Electronic Libraries Programme and the

European Union. UKOLN also receives support from the University of Bath where it is based.

IWMW, Bath - Sept 20002

Outline...

• news - who’s got it? who wants it?• news - on and off campus• about RSS• a quick tour of RSS-based news services• creating a first RSS channel• tools: creating and managing RSS• tools: using RSS• using RSS for other content• summing up


Exercise 1 - internal news

10 minutes - groups of 5• introduce yourselves• discuss…within your institution:

• who has news to distribute (list the top 10)• how do they do this (email, Web, paper,

phone, …, automated/manual process?)• who is the target audience• who owns the info• who publishes it• who cleans up!


Exercise 2 - external news

10 minutes - in different groups of 5• introduce yourselves• discuss… at your institution:

• what external news feeds would be useful to you (list 5 or 6)

• do you have any news feeds currently - how?• what organisations/services could you feed

news to (list 5 or 6)• do you feed any sites currently - how?


What is RSS?

• Rich Site Summary (or RDF Site Summary)• an XML application• a standard (de facto at least)• delivers news information on the Web... • …hmmm, delivers information about news

items on the Web (metadata)• an m2m (machine to machine) application• a portal content language

• originally developed by Netscape for My Netscape Network (Netscape’s portal)


What is RSS? (2)

• the most successful XML application currently(?)

• used by thousands(?) of ‘news’ sites• simple to create - tools not required(?)• ...simple to create tools!

• an RSS file contains enough information to describe

• the RSS channel (name, logo, …)• the news items in that channel (title, abstract, ...)

• the RSS file is the channel


RSS syndication• RSS enables exchange of structured information• RSS files/channels ‘pulled’ on regular basis using HTTP• frequency of collection set by the channel• can aggregate multiple RSS channels• merge by channel or in some other way• reformat into HTML or WML or...• …or re-present new merged RSS feed


RSS syndication (2)

HTMLnewsitems

HTMLnewsitems

News ServiceNews Service


RSS syndication (2)

HTMLnewsitems

RSSRSS

HTMLnewsitems



RSS syndication (2)

HTMLnewsitems

RSSRSS

Syndication service

HTML, WML, RSS, ...

HTMLnewsitems



Exercise 3 - a quick tour

10 minutes - on your own or in pairs• Use a Web browser to

• answer the questions on the exercise sheet

• take a quick look at some example sites


Publishing a channel

Overview/recap…

1) design channel

2) create RSS file

3) put it on your Web site (file extension should be .rss, .xml or .rdf - file should be served as text/xml)

4) validate it

5) announce it


Exercise 4 - creating RSS

15 minutes - on your own or in pairs

1) find 2 or 3 news items at your site

2) use notepad on your PC to create an RSS channel for your site containing 2 or 3 news items - use filename on your sheet

3) FTP it to ftp.ukoln.ac.uk - username ‘exxconf’

4) validate it


Tools - creating RSS

• use a text editor :-(• or any XML editor…• …but better to aim at managing news items

and RSS channel as a whole• deliver news items from within general

Content Management System (CMS)• create RSS channel dynamically based on

CMS• comments!• is anyone doing this already?


Tools - using RSS

• off the shelf support for RSS in products beginning to happen, e.g.• Zope support for creating and integrating

RSS• Coldfusion(?)

• roll your own,• Perl• ASP• Java

• comments? anyone doing this?


Exercise 5 - only news?

• 10 minutes - groups of 5• discuss…• what other kinds of information could be

shared using RSS? E.g. anything where content changes regularly...• notice boards• diaries

• use browser to find out about Web Logs


Summing up...

• there appears to be a requirement• internally and externally

• RSS seems to meet the need?• how do we get there?

• CMS may give us RSS for free...• ...or, in-house development

• identify external news content• work with external targets like HERO

iwmw parallel session bath - september 2000 andy powell, ukoln [email protected] automated news...

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