Archive for the ‘RSS’ Category

Find the RSS Feed URL for Almost Any Website

Posted on: October 10th, 2019 by Theme Mason

As a dedicated RSS user, you must have noticed some sites no longer go overboard to cater to you. Once when you will prominently see an RSS logo on a site, now, they are nowhere to be found. But RSS feed is still in existence, although it is now more difficult to find them because browsers don’t indicate them, and web pages hardly link to them. Despite this, most websites still offer RSS feeds.

Even after these years, RSS feeds are still beneficial. A lot of sites now prefer to hide the link to their RSS feeds. There are available RSS feeds on WordPress websites – unless they have been manually taken off by the admin. When you follow the RSS feed of a site, you get the opportunity to remain up-to-date on all contents the website publishes. This is particularly useful for those are busy and have overwhelming schedules – they will not have to miss out on contents from their favorite websites.

So, how do you get a site’s RSS feed URL?

Look for the RSS feed symbol

There are still some websites that have the standard orange RSS feed logo. When you locate this symbol, click on it and you will be taken to the RSS feed of the web page.

Finding hidden RSS feeds on most websites

There are a lot of websites built using WordPress – it is estimated that about 30 percent of the most visited sites are made by making use of WordPress, and all of them have feeds that can be easily gotten. To get the RSS URL feed on sites built with WordPress, all you need to do is include “feed” to the URL of the website and you will be taken to the RSS feed – example https://example.com/feed. If this doesn’t work, then that means that the website is not powered by WordPress, you can then try other methods such as:

  • Add “RSS” to websites that are hosted on Tumblr such as https://example.com/rss.
  • For websites that Blogger hosts, include “feeds/posts/default” to the URL, for instance, https://example.org/feeds/posts/default.
  • Add “feed” before the name of the publication if is built on Medium. So, a site such as medium.com/example-site then changes to medium.com/feed/example-site.
  • For YouTube pages, copy the URL and then paste it into an RSS reader.

Check the source code

If none of these methods are successful, check the source code of the web page to get the RSS feed. This can simply be done by right-clicking on a space that is empty on the site you wish to get its feed, and then select View Page Source’. Next, press “Ctrl+F” to search the code on Linux or Windows, or “command+F” on Mac computers.

Another method of finding RSS feeds of websites is to look at the HTML source, no matter the browser being used. Although it varies how you view it on each browser, for most browsers, all you have to do is to select “Page Source” under the “View” menu found at the top of your window. There are some browsers that this option can be found in the “Developer” menu. Once the Source window appears with the website’s HTML, make use of the “Find” option to search for the RSS feed. This will give you a long link – you can see the RSS URL feed in-between the quotes in the link.

Create a custom RSS feed

There are some websites that don’t just offer RSS feeds. But as disappointing as that sounds, there are tools available for scanning for RSS feeds on websites. Some of these tools are used regularly searching sites and creating RSS feeds. All that is required is the URL of the site and some parameters. This is done by:

  • The URL of the page: This can be done simply by copying the site’s URL and then pasting it.
  • Search for links inside HTML elements.
  • Go back to the web page you wish to create the RSS feed. Right-click and select “inspect”.
  • A pop-up window will appear, showing you the code of the website along with the website itself.

These are just some examples of finding RSS feeds for websites. Recent tools allow users to create their own custom RSS feeds that can give them all information imaginable.

Previous: How To Add A Blog Feed To Your WordPress Website

How To Add A Blog Feed To Your WordPress Website

Posted on: August 28th, 2019 by Theme Mason

Blogs without any doubt are powerful tools to promote products, services and thoughts and idea. The idea of blogging has been around for many decades even the internet became as famous as it is today. However, during the old days, people had to struggle quite a bit if they wanted to be in touch with the blogs that were the favorite to them. Posting of blogs was also a big problem. It was done by bookmarking the URL link. The site had to be visited daily for new updates and contents. It really was a big effort. Hence, if you ask those who belonged to the old world, they will tell you how tough and how much of an effort was needed for it. Checking on contents and blogs each time by making use of the bookmarks was certainly not the way forward.

How Have Things Changed Now

The emergence of new technologies and the growing popularity of RSS feeds has changed the way in which people now view and read blogs. RSS stands for Rich Site Summary while some others also prefer to call it as Really Simple Syndication. This is a simple, effective and wonderful way that bloggers could use for boosting readership. It also will allow them to make their content accessible than ever before. Further, readers who are in touch with these blogs will also be able to connected and be in the loop always. RSS is becoming critical and indispensable and even big names like The Huffington Post, New York Time and others are offering their readers and stakeholders RSS subscription options. However, this depends on choosing the right RSS Plugin. There are many of them and you could look at the likes of Theme Mason who is considered to be one of the best. You can check the product out here https://thememason.com/plugins/rss-retriever/

What Is The Function Of RSS Feed?

Whenever a new content is published, having a blog feed helps the readers to post a stream of comments and posts. It also helps readers to keep tab of the blogs and does away with the need for physically visiting the site and checking for new blogs. Therefore, it certainly is a win-win situation both for the readers and also blog writers and publishers. The blog writers will be able to reach out to more number of readers and information seekers, who could later become prospective customers or stakeholders. On the other hand, the readers will stand to benefit from quality blogs and they will get notification whenever a new blog has been uploaded on the site and is ready for reading. Feed retrievers like Theme Mason could help in both the blog posters and individuals to take advantage of the functions associated with RSS feed.

Some More Benefits Of Blog Feed

There are obviously a number of advantages as far as blog feeds are concerned. To begin with they are extremely east to set up and manage. Further, whether it is news feed or wordpress blog feed it does provide quite a bit of value to the readers. We are listing down a few obvious advantages of RSS blog feeds. We will then try and learn the basics that may be able to answer the question how to add a blog feed to a WordPress website.

  • Contents become more accessible. There are many readers who have the habit of reading at least 20 blogs a day. For such readers, visiting different sites and finding out fresh blogs is not feasible. Hence, for digital marketers, this is a big problem because their contents and blog articles would get lost in the crowd. Readers will not be able to check it whenever blogs are published. When the blog publishers offered a feed, it will be possible to check the blog regularly and they also will get notifications whenever a new blog has been posted.
  • It could be useful when the internet connection is slow. Though ideally we would like to have razor sharp and fast internet connections, this is not possible for many. Having a feed comes in handy for readers who often have to encounter slow internet connection. It prevents the need for visiting each and every blog and loads each page individually.
  • It facilitates in constant searches. RSS feeds are extremely useful for digital marketing purposes. If you are into marketing of health supplements and regularly post blogs on your websites, having a RSS feed certainly helps. Readers can use the right key words such as health supplements in the feed. The will instantaneously grant them with results page that are full of health supplement related blog posts. The reader also has the option of feeding it in a feed reader. It will help to create a readymade and constant search for health supplements.
  • Contents can also be retrieved easily. Quite often readers like a blog article, read it and then forget about it. At a later point in time, they would like to have a look at the article once again for various reasons. In many cases this may not be possible because the article might get lost in the din. In such situations, having the right knowledge for adding a blog feed to your WordPress website could indeed play a big role. You have feed readers that come with archiving possibilities and it can retrieve old blog posts. This makes the reader and information seeker happy because they can have easy access to blog that are weeks, months or even years old.
  • When you have the right RSS feed coupled with a good WordPress website, as a reader you can easily share contents. The RSS feed permits the user to export the feed and post the same on their site with the help of a Javascript code. This certainly is a great way to reach new readers and also promote wide sharing of contents.

Hence, it is quite obvious that there are obvious advantages and benefits associated with RSS feed. However, the important point is to how to add a feed to your blog and with a WordPress website it is possible to do it quite easily. It therefore does make sense to contact RSS retrievers like Theme Mason for some of the finest themes and RSS feeds.

The method and type that you choose for adding a feed to your blog would depend on a number of factors. The most important factor is the blogging platform you use. There is no denying the fact that of all the platforms, WordPress is considered to be the best. You also should bear in mind that most blogging platforms come with their own built in feed readers. There are sites like BlogSpot and Blogger which are static websites. Here as a poster of blogs, you may have to put in that extra effort.

Why Choose WordPress

As is the case with most blogging platforms, WordPress comes with an inbuilt provision for RSS feeds. This is suitable for comments and content. Whenever a page is published on WordPress, it has a meta tag embedded into it. This meta tag points to the location of the RSS feed of the site. In other words, WordPress users have things quite easy for them. They do not have to do anything difficult or additional for adding an RSS feed to their blog. They can instead promote their RSS feeds quite easily. All that they have to do is to incorporate a simple RSS icon into the sidebar of the blog content. This does increased the visibility of the feed quite significantly. Further, it also helps readers to discover and also subscribe to it. Further, those who use WordPress can also boost the efficiency and productivity of their feeds. They can do it by adding post thumbnails or even separating the RSS into different categories or also based on different post types.

Hence, it is quite obvious that there are a number of advantages and benefits using WordPress website. However, you must know how to add blog wordpress blog feed. This again is not very difficult and we are happy to share some of the simple tips and steps that could help you to answer the question how to add a blog feed to your WordPress website.

There are basically eight steps that you must follow for adding a blog feed to your WordPress website. They are being listed below. We will also have a brief look at each of the steps in some detail so that the readers are able to get a reasonably good idea about adding blog feeds to their WordPress websites.

  1. Add a new blank page
  2. Have a name for the blank page
  3. Blank text boxes
  4. Publish button
  5. Settings the “Settings” right.
  6. Choosing the right page that has been created
  7. Decide on the number of posts you want to display
  8. Have the blog page and other settings saved

1. Add A New Blank Page

You will have to go to the dashboard. In the dashboard you have to choose Pages>Add New. Once this has been done, the Add New Page will appear. This blank page can be used for writing a new post to your WordPress blog or website.

2. Have A Name For The Blank Page

Each blog page must be unique for easy identification and readability. You must understand that this will be the main page as far as your blog is concerned. You must name the blog appropriately. This will automatically set the page slug to blog option.

3. Blank Text Boxes

The text box has to be left blank. This is because you would not want to have any contents displayed on the blog. On the contrary, WordPress has the facility to display your blog posts making use of this page. This happens after you have assigned it as your blog.

4. Publish Button

The next step is to save the blank blog page. Once it has been saved to your database, it has to be published to your WordPress websites. There is a link that helps you with the publishing process. You also then need to assign the page that has been created as the Blog Page. This will make your blog visible to the readers.

5. Settings the “Settings” Right

The reading setting page has to be opened and necessary changes to the settings have to be made. This is self-explanatory and flexible. You can change the settings according to your specific needs and requirements.

6. Choosing The Right Page That Has Been Created

You have a post page drop-down list and can choose this for the page that has just been created. To cite an example, you can select the blog page and consider it as a posts page, or you can even choose posts and blogs that have been created earlier and posted.

7. Decide On The Number Of Posts That You Want To Display

This is also referred to as the Blog Pages Show Section. It helps you o decide on the number of posts that you wish to display in the text box of the posts. It has unique setting facilities. This allows you to specify and mention the number of posts that you would like to appear at that page at any given point in time. For example, if you enter 7, the blog page will show the last seven posts that you have made to your blog. This is a free field and it will allow you to input the number of posts based on your preference. However, you must bear in mind that it will display only the blogs that are there in the page. If the number is less than 7, it will show only the as many number of blog posts as available.

8. Have The Blog Page And Other Settings Saved

The options that you have set are saved and your blog will be located in the actual domain name you have created. For example if the domain name is XYZ, then it will also be saved under http://yourdomain.com/blog (where XYZ.com is your actual domain name. The link can be added to the blog under the navigation menu and it can be done by adding it the custom menu.

The Final Word

We are sure that the above would have given a reasonably good and clear idea about wordpress blog feed and how to go about it. It also would have given the readers an insight into the various reasons as to why it makes sense to go in for RSS feeds for the various blog posts that are posted on your WordPress website. It will help in reaching out to more customers and also the readers will be able to get access to new blogs and avoid searching for the same in the websites like searching for a haystack in a needle.

Review of the top 10 RSS Readers

Posted on: June 16th, 2019 by Theme Mason

Nowadays, staying updated with the latest news is a breeze, thanks to plenty of useful RSS readers. In case you don’t yet know, RSS Reader stands for ‘Rich site summary’. It constitutes a family of web feed formats that are used for transferring information from blogs, websites and other similar platforms. RSS feed was developed to simplify the process of transferring information between websites and users in an easy and readable form, and going by their current popularity, they definitely seem to have met their goal. But with so many RSS readers out there, how do you know, which one makes the cut? Well, that’s what we will find out in the next few sections.

Feedly

If you’re looking for an RSS reader with a simple, clutter-free interface- Feedly is a great option. Featuring an option called ‘add content’, this RSS reader helps you to seamlessly filter out new content. In this way, you also come across the content that you are actually looking to subscribe. Although Feedly is free to use, it also has a paid subscription plan. Available at $5, this plan comes with more features while also allowing you to integrate the feeds on web platforms like Dropbox and Evernote.

Inoreader

Inspired by Google reader’s demise, Inoreader is a simple and incredibly functional RSS reader that comes with plenty of configurable settings. Like other RSS readers in the market, Inoreader too has a simple interface and highly navigable features. You can use this nifty tool for subscribing to your favorite blogs, Google+ feeds, news portals and other websites. What’s more, you can also tailor personalized rules that’ll perform tasks like sending emails or sending to instapper. Currently, Inoreader comes with four different view modes, and four themes for user interface.

Newsblur

Available in both free and paid plans, Newsblur lets you subscribe to more than 64 feeds. You can read the entire text of these sites on the web reader, and also save those stories that you are looking to read later on. The best part: you won’t even have to click aggressively while using Newsblur, simply scrolling will work. Articles will display one after another thereby ensuring glitch-free reading. One of the defining aspects of Newsblur is the fact that it allows sophisticated filtering. With this feature, you can automatically underline or hide stories according to your mentioned criteria. This way, you only get to see the content you’re actually willing to read.

The Old Reader

If you’re fond of devouring every kind of content, The Old Reader is just the right platform for you. Not only does it come with some awesome content, but this tool also allows you to share recommendations with friends more comfortably. Unlike most other RSS readers, The Old Reader will also suggest you the content read and liked by your buddies. The free plan of this app lets you read articles as and when you want to, while also allowing you to subscribe to up to 100 feeds.

Feeder

With a compelling and intuitive interface, Feeder is one of the best RSS readers out there. With extended support for integrations like Gengo, Upwork and more, the dashboard of this tool improves your productivity to great lengths. If you’re using the web version, the up and down arrows can be used for browsing through stories. There’s also another feature called Simple few that only lets you see text and the multimedia contents.

Digg Reader

Digg Reader is an online RSS Reader that comes free of cost. This news aggregator boasts a clean and highly navigable user-interface that lines up every feature that you’d need for reading and sorting your RSS feeds. Since this RSS reader also integrates with alternative web services like Instapaper, it gets easier for you to bookmark all the posts that you are planning to read later.

RSSOwl

RSSowl is a solid application for organizing, listing and reading all the content you love. The interface of this tool is extremely comfortable, and this alone, makes it easier for you to sort through the articles that you are looking to read. With cross-platform functionality, news filters and a feature for instant search, this application comes with every other feature that you’d expect from a premium grade RSS reader. What’s more, it also lets you save your searches, and notifies you about the kind of content you are looking to read.

FlipBoard

One of the best RSS reader apps, Flipboard comes with a magazine-style interface and is designed to offer an entirely new kind of experience than your regular RSS feed reader. While it isn’t as well-assorted as Feedly, you will still find a wide range of stories from whole new perspectives. In fact, there’s a special section called ‘What’s your Passion’ that lets you follow the topics and ideas that interest you. Despite functioning like a news aggregator, this is one tool that’ll allow you to transform your RSS feeds to a perfectly curated magazine.

Flow Reader

Flow Reader is a web-based RSS reader that lets you stay in sync with all the publications you love. Additionally, it also keeps you updated about the trending topics on Reddit, Youtube and Twitter. With this web application, you get the chance of subscribing to as many blogs as you’d want. What’s more, you’d also get a feature where you can check posts in a reverse chronological order. This will not just let you go through headlines faster but will also connect you with the ones that actually draws your attention.

NewsFlow

With a simple interface, this is one of those RSS readers that offers you a truly seamless reading experience. From letting you organize categories, to allowing you to add your favorite sources as feeds, this is one of the best RSS readers out there. As you add an RSS feed here, you will find ample options to tweak it according to your preference.

Bottom Line

So now that you know about the best RSS readers, explore your options, and pick the one that perfectly lives up to your needs.