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Feeds are simplified summaries of regularly-updated content on a website, for example, the list of articles on nano.org. By using some software to 'subscribe' to the feed, you can always check on the latest changes to the content without having to visit the website you took the feed from.
Feeds are usually identified by the orange logo shown to the right, and the feed can be accessed by clicking on the logo or some nearby text. When a feed is available on a page, your web browser may also automatically display a clickable feed icon in or near to the address bar.
Clicking on these links lets you subscribe to the feed though your browser which may also give you the option to add the feed to your list in some third-party software. Some older browsers do not have built-in support for feeds and you will need to obtain third-party software in this case. Either way, with this done, you can easily check the current activity on all the sites you are interested in just by glancing through the list of feeds you have collected, without needing to click through each section of every site.
Feeds are available on nano.org wherever you see the orange feed icon. These appear in three main places:
- In the top-right corner of the summary information at the top of a thread. Clicking this will take you to a feed of the most recent 10 posts to the thread.
- Next to the 'Most Recent' header on the right-hand side of the screen. Clicking this will take you to a feed of the 10 most recent additions to the relevant section of the site, such as the most recent articles or books.
- In or near to the address bar of your browser. The logo should appear here whenever a feed is available for the current page, including the above two cases. They are more useful, however, if you are viewing say "Articles by subject". Then, the address-bar feed logo will take you to the feed for that current selection.
- Most recent articles
- Most recent books
- Most recent public forum discussions
- Most recent 'Nanopinions'
- Most recent news stories
- Most recent job adverts
- Most recent event listings
There are two main types of feed: RSS (really simple syndication) and Atom. Both have been through more than one version, but by far the most popular formats are RSS 2.0 and Atom 1.0. By default, when you click a feed icon on nano.org, you are given an RSS 2.0 feed. If you would prefer links to Atom 1.0 feeds, you can select this by logging in and visiting 'My Account', where the option is under 'Edit details / change password'. If you are not sure what the differences are, just leave it set to RSS 2.0 — it does not really matter which you choose since the same information is presented in either case.
For the technically minded, nano.org publishes feeds in: Atom 1.0 and RSS 0.91, 0.92, 1.0 and 2.0. If you would like a particular feed in a version different to that selected in your preferences, you can add the 'version=' parameter to the URL shown by your browser as in these examples:
- http://nano.org/feed/articles?version=rss1.0, for the RSS 1.0 feed.
- http://nano.org/feed/articles?version=atom1.0, for the Atom 1.0 feed.
Nano.org does not endorse any particular software for subscribing to feeds, but the following general advice may be useful.
Most recent versions of web browsers have good built-in support for reading and subscribing to feeds, including:
- Mozilla Firefox 2.0 and newer (which calls feeds 'Live Bookmarks').
- Internet Explorer 7.0 and newer. Older versions display feeds in a 'raw' format and you will need third-party software to subscribe to them.
- Opera 9.0 and newer.
- Safari 2 and newer.
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