RSS and Live Bookmarks

Both Internet Explorer 7 and Firefox 2 include a new feature that automatically displays active RSS feeds on any web page you visit. This “feed detection” icon is the orange icon depicted to the right. When active feeds are detected, it lights up orange.

RSS Feeds have been around for awhile, but this built-in feature is relatively new with the release of IE7 and Firefox2. I was a somewhat surprised and irked that some of the feeds that I’ve subscribed to in other RSS readers, were not being found by the detector. As with everything related to RSS feeds, the fix was quite simple - put the following line of code in any page, to alert the detector of the presence of an RSS Feed:

<link rel=”alternate” type=”application/rss+xml” title=”Company News” href=”/highlights-rss.jsp”/>

My RSS feeds are now fully detectable - and yours can be too. For more information on RSS feeds, with an overview on the subject, I recommend reading Internet Technology Series: Get Your Site On Board with RSS.