Really Simple Syndication (RSS) is a text-based format and an application of the markup language, XML. For more information on general RSS, please refer to the Mini-Tutorial section.

So what does it mean to you? RSS is a Web technology that enables you to gather site-specific news in an organized (usually chronological) and aggregated manner. It's a technology that essentially requires two components: The Feeder (a site that "feeds" RSS files), and The Reader (a "subscribed" reader with an aggregator/newsreader - a tool that can read RSS files.)

You As The Reader
Many news sites and many more blog sites syndicate (or send feeds of) their articles (usually just the title of the article and a link to it). If you regularly visit one of these sites, then you can subscribe to their RSS feed using your newsreader of choice (note that your SiteBlog 2 is capable of reading RSS feeds -- please refer to the SiteBlog 2 Guide). The primary advantage of subscribing is to not only have instant access to the most recent articles from your favorite RSS-enabled sites, but also to know when there is a new article (as opposed to constantly visiting the site to see if there are any new articles). So essentially, subscribing to a RSS feed is the equivalent of a "newspaper" coming to you instead you going to it. It's comparable to "ordering" a specialized TV channel that's available to you when you want it, how you want it - except it's free!

On sites that enable RSS you'll often see an "XML" icon (or a link called "RSS" or "Syndication" or "Meta"), which is the direct link to the RSS file. When you click on it, all you will see is the raw XML code, which you can ignore. You simply need to copy and paste the URL of that raw XML page into your favorite newsreader or into SiteBlog 2's RSS Link tool.

You as The Feeder
One of the great features of SiteBlog 2 is its ability to also be a feeder. You can syndicate your blog and allow frequent visitors to subscribe and be The Readers of your content. This is enabled by default.

SiteBlog 2 is capable of being both a reader and a feeder of RSS content. It's all you need!

eXtensible Markup Language (XML) is a flexible meta-language capable of adapting to many different types of environment - on and off the Web. Unlike HTML, XML is not fixed and can be customized to fit almost every need. Think of XML as a more advanced, yet simpler to implement and deploy, version of HTML.

Will you need to know XML in order to use RSS? Not at all. SiteBlog 2 will do all the work for you.

A trackback is an embedded communication mechanism by which two blog sites can interact with each other. The most common use of trackback is for remote commenting. For example, you read an interesting article at myfamilyblog.somedomain.com and wish to comment on it, but instead of commenting in myfamilyblog.somedomain.com you decide to post your own article (with your comments) in your blog and reference the original article.

When you publish the article, SiteBlog 2 will "ping" or notify myfamilyblog.somedomain.com that someone (you) is linking to their article. The trackback will appear on myfamilyblog.somedomain.com's article in the form of a link back to your blog, your blog's name, and a brief excerpt of your article (usually the first few words.) The most useful feature of a trackback is that it appears for the benefit of both the owner of myfamilyblog.somedomain.com AND all of its readers as well. Please note that both you and the referenced blog must be trackback-enabled. For more information on trackback, please refer to the SiteBlog 2 Guide.

SiteBlog 2 provides an option to password-protect any of your published articles. When you password-protect an article, the article title does appear but the contents of the article will only appear once the designated password is entered by the reader. As with any password, the article password is case-sensitive. For instructions, please refer to the SiteBlog 2 Guide.

In each article, SiteBlog 2 enables you to create a customized field name that can be used in any other article. It's essentially a template text field. For example, you can create a custom field called "What I'm currently listening to" (this is known as the Key). If you're currently listening to Bob Dylan and you wish to let your readers know, then select the "What I'm currently listening to" Key and type "Bob Dylan" (this is known as the Value) in the corresponding text box. You may enter more than one Value per Key.

If you are familiar with HTML, then you have the option of entering basic HTML tags for either the Key or the Value. For more information, refer to the SiteBlog 2 Guide.

In your article, both the Key and its Value will appear next to each other. Multiple Values per Key will be separated by commas.

Yes. By default, the timestamp is set to GMT, but you can easily change it to your time zone in the Options menu item by adding or subtracting the number of hours difference between your zone and GMT. For example, if you are in Central Standard Time the difference between Central and GMT is minus six (entered as "-6"). For reference, SiteBlog 2 will provide the current GMT time.

The format of the timestamp can also be changed in the same menu item. The default date format is month/day/year (12/2/2005), and time format is x:zy am/pm (3:35pm).

For more instructions, please refer to the Mini-Tutorial section and the SiteBlog 2 Guide.

You can add images to your articles with a press of a button. In the text-formatting menu of each article in the Write section of the SiteBlog 2 admin panel, click the "picture frame" icon. You'll be prompted to enter the URL of the image you wish to display in your article. Please note that the image must already exist on the Web somewhere. SiteBlog 2 does not permit image-uploading.

For more instructions, please refer to the SiteBlog 2 Guide.

For every published article the name of the article's author (presumably you) appears next to the timestamp. By default the author's name is "site_admin", which you can change by modifying the Nickname field in the Profile menu item.

If you wish to publish an article but have it appear on your SiteBlog 2 in the future, then you can choose the day and time and SiteBlog 2 will automatically display it on the day and time specified. Why would you want to do this? Suppose you take a vacation but still wish to publish an article on a daily basis. In such a case, you can pre-publish several articles each with incremental future dates and SiteBlog 2 will automatically display them according to the date and time you specified per article.

You can change the day and time of each article in the Advanced Editing mode. Make certain that the Edit Timestamp box is clicked.

A podcast is basically like an online bookmark that allows someone with the right software to find an audio file (that you've recorded) and listen to it. The podcast "file" can be any audio file that has been converted into MP3 format. SiteBlog allowsyou to upload the MP3, and include a link on your blog that people can click on to get the podcast.

The way the podcast is delivered is through a "feed". A person needs to downloadfree podcast-friendly software such as iTunes (available for free from http://www.apple.com/itunes/download), or iPodder (http://www.ipodder.org).

The general process for creating a podcast is that you upload the file using SiteBlog, and then a person can click on the Podcast link on your blog, to get the feed. You may offer one Podcasted MP3 file at any time. Uploads will count against the disk space available with your hosting plan.

Once uploaded, your Podcast feed will be available to anyone who visits your blog site. Users can click on the "Podcasts" link at your site in order to find the feed for your audio file. You can also find a link on your Podcast Manager screen, that will look something like this:

http://blog.yourdoman.com/blog_admin/podcasts.php

You can copy and paste that link, and share it however you like, through email, a web page, etc. -- but again, a person needs to have software like iTunes or iPodder installed to correctly "get" the podcast.

For more instructions, please refer to the SiteBlog 2 Guide.