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Creating a RSS Feed
By David Stern
As you might have read in other articles in this site, a good method for promoting your blog is creating a RSS feed for it. A RSS feed is a XML file that will tell websites and software called "aggregators" about the content of your blog and when it is updated. The aggregators will then create links to your blog, which will increase the traffic to it and it's ranking in search engines. I'll explain in a few steps how to create a RSS feed. I'll give examples from my own blog’s RSS feed. You can view the whole feed by following the following link: http://www.faceglobal.com/FaceGlobalRssFeed.xml. From the browser's menu, click "view", and then "source", to see how the feed is created. Like any XML file, the RSS feed is made of tags – like html, which is also XML.
Open the notepad program (start --> All Programs --> Accessories --> Notepad). In the notepad, click File --> Save As.
Set "Save as Type" to "All Files".
Set "File Name" to "RssFeed.xml". Let's start with an opening tag that will look like this:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="us-ascii" ?> The main tag wrapping the whole RSS feed is the <rss> tag. In it, there will be a <channel> tag. Now the feed is supposed to look like this:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="us-ascii" ?>
<rss version="2.0">
<channel> </channel>
</rss> Inside the <channel> tag (between <channel> and </channel>) will come all the information. We will start with general information about the whole blog. Let's add now the following tags:
Title (mandatory) – the title of the blog.
Description (mandatory) – a general description of the blog.
Link (mandatory) – a link to the main page of the blog.
Copyright (recommended) – who the blog's copyright belongs to.
Language (optional) – what language the blog is in.
Managing Editor (optional).
Web Master (optional).
Ttl (Time to Live)(optional) – how much time, in minutes, this update of the feed is relevant.
Last Build Date (recommended) – the last time the blog was updated. Notice that the date and time must be in the following Format: “Sun, 11 Jan 2009 00:00:01 GMT”.
Example for these tags:
<title>Face Global - Blog of an Artist</title>
<description>
A blog written by David Stern, an Israeli artist (b. 1979).
The blog deals with music, photography, poetry and life in Israel.
</description>
<link>http://www.faceglobal.com</link>
<copyright>David Stern</copyright>
<language>en-us</language>
<managingEditor>david@davidstern.co.il (David Stern)</managingEditor>
<webMaster>david@davidstern.co.il (David Stern)</webMaster>
<ttl>60</ttl>
<lastBuildDate>Sun, 11 Jan 2009 00:00:01 GMT</lastBuildDate> Another tag in this section is the <image> tag. It is also optional. It is good if you have a logo for your blog. This tag will have a few tags in it:
Title – The image's title and alt attribute.
Url – The image’s url.
Link – The url which the image links to.
Width & height – The image’s dimensions in pixels.
Example:
<image>
<title>Face Global - Blog of an Artist</title>
<link>http://www.faceglobal.com</link>
<url>http://www.faceglobal.com/post-images/Crater-Lake/sunset.jpg</url>
<width>187</width>
<height>114</height>
</image> The <item> Tag:
The <item> tag describes an item in your website, or in a blog’s case – a post in your blog. Every post will have an <item> tag. It will include in it the following tags:
Title (mandatory) – The title of the post.
Description (recommended) – A description or summary of the post.
Link (mandatory) – The url of the post. Notice that the aggregators will create a link to the post with the text in the title and this url. Use keywords for your title for search engine optimization.
PubDate (recommended) – The publishing date and time of the post. Notice that the date and time must be in the following format: Sun, 11 Jan 2009 00:00:01 GMT.
Author (optional) – Author of the post.
Category (optional) – A category which the post belongs to. If you use this tag, the aggregators will show in the heading of your feed a list of all the categories, linking to their relevant posts.
Example:
<item>
<title>42nd</title>
<description>
<![CDATA[
Another piece of my original music.<br />
<a href="http://www.faceglobal.com/David_Stern/English/SellaBand.aspx" title="SellaBand">SellaBand</a>
]]>
</description>
<link>http://www.faceglobal.com/posts/42nd.aspx</link>
<pubDate>Sun, 18 Jan 2009 00:00:01 GMT</pubDate>
<author>David Stern</author>
<category>Music</category>
</item>
<item>
...
</item>
<item>
...
</item> Now your RSS feed is done. Look again into my feed (http://www.faceglobal.com/FaceGlobalRssFeed.xml) and compare it to yours. Upload it to your blog, and link to it from your blog's front page. Submit it to www.pingomatic.com or to similar sites. Don’t forget to update you rss feed each time you update your blog. What you need to update is:
1. The last build date tag with the current time and date.
2. Insert a new <item> tag with your new post's details.
3. Submit it again to Pingomatic. |
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