What Is RSS?
RSS is the acronym used to describe the de facto standard for the syndication of Web content. RSS is an XML-based format, and while it can be used in different ways for content distribution, its most widespread use is in distributing news on the Web. 

A Web site that wants to allow other sites to publish some of its content can create an RSS document (also called an RSS feed) and register the document with an RSS publisher. Syndicated content can include data such as news, events listings, news stories, headlines, project updates, excerpts from discussion forums or even corporate information.

Because there are different versions of RSS, the term RSS is most frequently used as a name to mean the syndication of Web content, rather than as an acronym for its founding technology. When using the name RSS the speaker may be referring to any of the following versions of Web content syndication:

• RDF Site Summary (RSS 0.9, RSS 1.0)

• Rich Site Summary (RSS 0.91, RSS 1.0)

• Really Simple Syndication (RSS 2.0)

When using the term RSS, most will use it in reference to Rich Site Summary or the previous version called RDF Site Summary. When referring to Really Simple Syndication, it will usually be called RSS 2.0, not RSS. There are several versions of RSS available, with the most commonly implemented version being RSS 0.91. The most current version, however, is RSS 2.0 and it is backward-compatible with RSS 0.91. It's important to remember that RSS is an XML (Extensible Markup Language ) based format and that all RSS feeds must conform to XML v1 standards.

RECOMMENDED READING: For those interested in learning more about XML, we recommend reading "A Technical Introduction to XML" on XML.com

How To Create An RSS Feed
When a Web site publishes an RSS document, the feed will usually contain a summary of the most recent articles and content published on the site. Most feeds will offer readers a headline plus a brief headline description (or summary), along with a description of the source Web site. RSS feeds are created by using tags that are enclosed in brackets, much like HTML code is. For those interested in creating their own RSS feed, all you need to start is a text editor (like Notepad). All you really need to know, at the very minimum, are the tags you must include to make the RSS feed work. 

Here we will show you the basic steps to creating an RSS feed, using Webopedia's most recently published articles as our feed headlines. The example uses only the basic tags required to make it work. The first three tags you will need to know how to use are the title, description, and link tags.

title: The title or headline
EXAMPLE: <title>All About RSS</title>

link: The URL of the Web page where the content (or news story) is located.
EXAMPLE: <link>http://www.webopedia.com</link>

description: A sentence that describes the content.
EXAMPLE: <description>How to create simple RSS Feeds</description>

This code as typed into your text editor would look like this:

These three tags, when combined are called an item. After you have specified the details for each of the three required tags, you then wrap the <item> tag around it, like this:

If you have several items (headlines) for your feed, you use the same three required tags with each wrapped in its own <item> tag. For example, we'll use the last four articles published on Webopedia as our items:

Now, that we showed you the tags and the information you need to produce items (the title, description, and URL link) for your RSS feed. Another important aspect of RSS feeds is making sure you identify the feed source (called a channel), which is usually your Web site that publishes the content. This is done using the same three required tags, as above, but you simply omit the item tag. When you leave out the item tag feed readers are able to distinguish between your channel information and your item information. For a Webopedia feed we might use something like this:

You will also need to specify the channel using tags that are inserted at the beginning and end of your document. <channel></channel>. Everything we have done so far is going to be placed between the open and closed channel tags, like this:

Now, at this point we are almost done creating this RSS feed, and so far the process has been relatively easy. We have specified the items and channel for an RSS feed. In finishing up, much like in any HTML or XML file, we also have to specify the document type. In an RSS feed you need to show that the feed meets XML both RSS specifications. Now this particular feed does meet XML 1.0 and RSS 2.0 specifications. We will show this in the code with the following tags:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<rss version="2.0"></rss>

The <?xml version="1.0"?> does not require a close tag, and it will also be the very first line in your RSS document. The RSS version tag, however, does require a close tag and it needs to be wrapped around everything in your <channel> tag, like this:

RECOMMENDED READING: The RSS Specifications Web site will provide you with details on the different specifications and what is required to meet them.

Saving and Validating Your Feed
Now that you have a basic RSS feed typed up in Notepad or another text editor, you need to save the file. Since RSS is an XML-based format we're simply going to make up a file name and give it an XML extension. We'll call ours webofeed.xml. If you have a browser that supports Feeds, you can view our example feed here.

After the file has been saved, the next step is to validate your feed. A Feed Validator is used to basically check your code for errors. If the validator finds any problems with your feed, it will highlight where the problem occurs to help you fix it. To use a Feed Validator you must upload your RSS feed to a Web server, then enter the URL into the Feed Validator.

Two of the more popular online Feed Validators are FEED Validator and RSS Validator.

Continue on to page 2 for non-required (optional) channel and item tags, more on RSS specifications, and a look at feed syndication and aggregators.

• Part I: How to Create an RSS Feed (Page 1)
• Part II: How to Create an RSS Feed: Optional RSS Elements <'tags'>, Syndication and More (Page 2)

By Vangie Beal
Last updated: July 17, 2008