How to read RSS feeds

If you visit a website or blog and you see an icon like this:

you can subscribe to an RSS Feed. This means that instead of visiting the website or blog regularly to see what's new, you can have all the new stuff automatically delivered direct to a special page on your computer. Whenever something new is added to your page, you'll see an alert come up to let you know there's something new for you to read.

Click this icon to see how it works. This takes you to my RSS Feed for my dream interpretation site. If you experience problems with this, read on!

If nothing but code came up at that link, then you are most probably viewing through Internet Explorer 6, and you need to upgrade to IE7. This is a free upgrade - you can download IE7 quickly here.

If you successfully viewed my RSS Feed page, you'll have seen a help menu with further info about RSS Feeds and you'll have seen instructions on how to subscribe. Most RSS Feed pages look exactly the same as mine, and the subscribe instructions are exactly the same too. Mostly it's free to subscribe, as it is with mine. The instructions are easy to follow.

To take the example of IE7, all the RSS Feeds you subscribe to automatically appear next to your Favorites in your browser . Click the yellow star icon you know so well from your Favorites, and you'll see an RSS icon like this - you'll find your feeds there:

The only complicated thing about RSS Feeds is that it all depends on which browser you are using: Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari or Linux, for example. This is because you need special 'readers' to read feeds. IE6 doesn't supply a free reader, which is why you only see code, but IE7 comes with a built-in free reader so reading feeds is automatic. Some of the other browsers have built-in readers, and some don't. For the ones that don't, you need to download readers, and the links I've provided below take you through all of this.

Actually, there are many different ways to subscribe to, access and read your feeds, so I've sourced the following links to the simplest and best information according to the browser you use. They're all easy to follow.

But, before you do, it seems that many people, no matter which browser they use, find it easiest to subscribe to BLOGLINES at the link below. With Bloglines it's really easy to subscribe to, receive and read your feeds:
www.bloglines.com/login?r=/myblogs

Internet Explorer

www.microsoft.com/windows/rss/default.mspx

Firefox

http://johnbokma.com/firefox/rss-and-live-bookmarks.html

www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/livebookmarks.html

Safari

www.askdavetaylor.com/how_do_i_subscribe_to_rss_feeds_with_safari.html

www.apple.com/safari/

Linux

You'll need a special web-based news reader, such as Bloglines, Rojo, GoogleReader or NewsGator, which you can read about and download here:

Bloglines

www.bloglines.com/login?r=/myblogs

Google reader

www.google.com/accounts/ServiceLogin?hl=en&nui=1&service=reader&continue=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2Freader