What is RSS/XML/RDF ?
RSS is simply an acronym for 'Rich Site Summary' or 'Real Simple Syndication', whichever you prefer.
RDF is the acronym for 'Rich Data Format.' Quite simply, they're all ways to obtain the latest information in the form of news, sports, weather, etc. delivered to your desktop 'feed reader' or browser.
The Orange square to the right of this story is a typical feed/RSS logo.
There are others, as well.
A feed reader is an aggregator or collector. When instructed, the aggregator asks all the servers in its feed list if they have new content; if so, the aggregator either makes a note of the new content or downloads it. Aggregators can be scheduled to check for new content periodically. The kinds of content delivered by a web feed are typically HTML (webpage content) or links to webpages and other kinds of digital media. Often when websites provide web feeds to notify users of content updates, they only include summaries in the web feed rather than the full content itself. Some browsers, such as Mozilla Firefox come with an option (within their preferences) as to how to handle these links to feeds. Firefox offers what it calls 'Live Bookmarks', which allow the user to view the bookmarked feeds within the browser. Most readers are available as freeware. Bloglines, My Yahoo, Google Reader are but a few of what is available. Below are some other examples of feed logos or icons.
