BOGS vs. REGULAR WEBSITES
Blogs differ from regular websites in that a person can subscribe to a blog. This similar to subscribing to a newspaper or magazine except that blogs do not usually issue new articles on a scheduled basis. Some regular websites do this but they usually refer to their new articles as "news". New articles are usually referred to as "postings". To know about new postings you have to have "reader" software (also called "aggregator" software). Reader software (some free some for a price) can be installed on you computer or you can use an online blog reader service that includes the reader software. A blog or news website has to use an RSS script that tells the reader software what postings are available.
RSS
RSS is an acronym for Really Simple Syndication. RSS is a scheme developed to allow for the syndication (promulgation) of website information. Blog and news websites must include an XML script in the home server directory. XML is an acronym for Extensive Markup Language (similar to HTML). It is a text format coding language that tells the blog/news reader what postings are available.
If you know how to write XML code, or learn how, you can use a text editor like WordPad and create the code. Note, the file must be saved as a text file, not as a word processing file, and must be named "rss.xml". If you don't want to do the XML coding you can use a software product that will create the XML file. I recommend the following product.
ONLINE BLOG READER SERVICES
Following are links for a few of the online blog reader services.
http://www.bloglines.com A good free service.
http://www.newsgator.com Free and paid services.
http://my.yahoo.com/s/guest-promo.php Free Yahoo blog search.
http://www.pluck.com Free/paid online service and reader software.
How Blogs Work
