Converting HTML to RSS

Aims Of This Exercise

This exercise is intended for use in a group discussion. The aim of the exercise is to address the technical and management issues of deployment of news feeds.

5.1 UK Web Focus News Feed

Go to the URL <http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/>. Look at the link to the RSS News Feed near the bottom of the page.

Copy this link and paste in into an RSS parser such as RSSxpress at <http://rssxpress.ukoln.ac.uk/> or the Redland RSS parser at <http://www.redland.opensource.ac.uk/rss>.

5.2 Viewing The UK Web Focus News Feed

Return to the list of UK Web Focus events at <http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/> and view the source of the page.

Do you notice anything special which is used to create the RSS?

5.3 The “Syndicate Your Page” Web Service

Go to the Syndicate Your Page service at <http://logicerror.com/blogifyYourPage/>.

Read how this service can be used to convert a simple HTML page with very minimal additional markup into an RSS news feed.

Is this approach suitable for your Web service?