Getting Started

Introduction

This tutorial is an introduction to Really Simple Syndication (RSS).

It guides you, step-by-step, through the basics of RSS and shows you working examples in action. This tutorial follows the mantra that the best way to learn is to do . Because of this, you will be creating your own RSS files by hand.

Who should use this tutorial?

This tutorial is mostly meant for beginners to RSS (i.e., those with no or very little prior RSS experience). However, those experienced with RSS may also find this useful as an aid in filling in any missing information about RSS that they were not aware of, or as a refresher guide.

This tutorial assumes that you have some experience with HTML (or XML) and that you are comfortable with the basics of markup . In other words, code like this doesn't bother you:

This is some markup with <b>bold</b> tags.

If you are comfortable with that, you should have no problem learning RSS.

What do you need before you start?

To get the most from this tutorial, you will need a text editor and a RSS reader. You must also know how to use each of these.

It is not mandatory to create RSS files in this tutorial (you can just read on), but this would be a less effective way for you to learn. You'll retain the information more and absorb it better if you create the RSS files yourself.

How to use this tutorial

Although each page in this tutorial has been written so that it can act as a "standalone" tutorial, it does assume you already possess the knowledge of the information taught in previous pages of this tutorial. Although you may jump to any point in the tutorial that you wish, we suggest that RSS beginners read this tutorial in order.

Tutorial

1. What is RSS
2. Why use RSS
3. How RSS Works
4. Hello World (article not yet written)
5. Syndicating
6. Blogs
7. Broadcatching
8. Microformats
9. Advanced Broadcatching