System Administration

newLocation

Reading further, Ehud Lamm proposes using < newLocation />, whereupon Morbus Iff suggested HTTP redirects, not unlike what I've done to preserve existing links. The latter option assumes the use of HTTP.

Regardless of the case used, either that of an XML element or of HTTP redirects, the feed consumer needs to update the subscription, or the link will rot as soon as the server hosting the redirect goes down.

3:39:54 PM # Google It!
categories: Writing Online, System Administration

Nobody's home but you keep banging on the door

I've been reading the recommendations for the next version(s) of RSS, and the existing specifications for RSS 0.92 and RSS 1.0 syndication. AFAICT, there's no means provided for the RSS file to update a subscriber with its current location. Without such a means, it is difficult to avoid link rot in subscriptions.

Not unlike the recent furor over RSS Auto-Discovery, implementation of a new element for the feeds themselves requires two things: use by feed producers (syndicators) and understanding by feed consumers (aggregators). Since I've found no precedent, there's a new element in my RSS feed: xmlUrl. It contains the current URL for the feed.

<xmlUrl> http://www.coxesroost.net/journal/rss.xml </xmlUrl>

Note that this is no longer at http://users.bestweb.net/~cwcjr/radio/rss.xml. If your subscription to my feed uses that URL, then you will need to manually update it.

Update: I haven't devoted enough time to convincing Radio to generate this automatically, so my statement above, about the xmlUrl element, is no longer accurate.

12:27:38 PM # Google It!
categories: Writing Online, System Administration