Manual: Concepts-News

Overview

What is RSS?

RSS is a family of web feed formats, specified in XML and used for Web syndication (information distribution). RSS is used for (among other things) news websites, weblogs and podcasting. The most common interpretations of the acronym RSS are "Really Simple Syndication", "Rich Site Summary", "RDF Site Summary", and "Real-Time Simple Syndication".

Why is it called the News on ?

We call the RSS implementation on our News mechanism, just to reduce usage of technical acronyms that are subject to change as the Internet evolves. It is also intended to identify the fundamental purpose for the implementation within a Referee Management Site. It certainly IS a mechanism to distribute late breaking News about activity on the site, but can also be used to distribute key information to specific subsets of Users (e.g. Referee News, Officer News, etc.).

Why use the News Concept?

It offers a great way to reduce reliance upon Bulk Email to communicate information effectively. As Email itself has experienced increasing difficulty with SPAM traps, etc., an alternate way to communicate from the central staff to the end user offers obvious benefits. If you're a video sort of person, check out this simple YouTube video titled RSS in Plain English

Using the News

To make use of the News Feed from a Site, two things are necessary:

1. Reading/processing the News Feed

Each desktop User that would like access to the News Feed will require some sort of a RSS Reader. These are available in many formats and operational arenas, including stand-alone programs or routines as well as add-ins into existing programs (such as the Outlook Mail Client, the FireFox Web Browser, etc.). Each User makes his/her own choice as to how to access the News Feed.

Most of the readers contain techniques within them that permit the User to determine when something "new" has been added to the News Feed from a subscribed Site. To work effectively, each User will need to be aware of how to look at the contents of the News Feed and, in fact, that the Site will be utilizing the News Feed to deliver information.

While many Browsers will automatically detect the availability of a News Feed, you may find it necessary to have some Users manually add your News Feed to their Reader. To do this, have them specify the following "Location":

http://www./news?channel=[channel]

where

http://www.

is the specific Domain Name offering the News Feed

/news

requests the News feed from the site

?channel=[channel]

is the optional keyword syntax that specifies a specific Channel (e.g. ?channel=Referee, ?channel=Emergency, etc.). If the requestor wants the primary feed, simply omit this portion

2. Placing information into the News Feed

An Administrator can place an item into the News Feed from a RSS capable RidgeStar site through usage of Administrator: Manage-Events. Simply add a new Event and:

Identify the Event as a News Feed Item

This is done by simply checking ON the News checkbox after Type in the detail page. This establishes that the Event is to be placed into the News Feed. It IS possible that the Event may also exist in the Calendar, as well as What's New.

Establish the News Channel

The "Channel" is the specific News Feed from the Site that the Event will exist within. An "empty" or unspecified Channel will cause the Event to exist in the Site's primary Feed (from the Home page itself). If specified, the Channel can be any value that is known to the end Users to contain a Feed (e.g., you could establish a feed called "Emergency" where you might place unfilled assignments that deperately need someone, etc.).

If the Channel name matches the name of a Page on the site, the page on the site will offer the feed whenever someone clicks to the page. Thus, if you'd like a specific News Feed to be made available to all Referees, simply associate the Event with Channel=Referee.

Comments

Successful use of the News Feed depends upon the end users of your Site understanding that you intend to utilize the News Feed to provide them information. RSS is an "OPT IN" sort of mechanism, which means the target audience will only receive your information if they periodically look at it (refresh the Feed).

Make sure you let them know you plan to use the News Feed and how you plan to use it.