Generous Feeds

What is a 'feed'?

Feeds from website allow you to identify the web content you like and have it delivered directly to you. They take the hassle out of staying up-to-date, by showing you the very latest information you are interested in. Not all websites provide feeds, but they are growing in popularity, and the Generous website offers feeds from some of its sections.

How do I start using feeds?

In general, the first thing you need is something called a News Reader. There are many different versions, some of which are accessed using a browser, and some of which are downloadable applications. All allow you to display and subscribe to the feeds you want. Once you have chosen a News Reader, all you have to do is to decide what content you want.

Generous offers a number of feeds in a format called Atom (which is very similar to RSS, which you may have heard mention of). In general we flag the relevant feeds for a page in the sidebars. Just click on the relevant link to subscribe to that content.

When you click on the link you can subscribe to the feed in various ways, including:

  • dragging the url of the feed into your News Reader
  • cutting and pasting the same URL into a new feed in your News Reader

Some browsers, including Firefox, Opera and Safari, have a functionality which automatically pick up feeds for you. (For more details, check their websites.)

What are the main Generous feeds?

There are quite a few Generous feeds (we even use them ourselves to make sure the site is ticking over nicely), The key ones you might like to follow are:

If in doubt, you'll probably find the 'combined' feed most helpful.

How do I get a News Reader?

There is a range of different News Readers available and new versions are appearing all the time. Different News Readers work on different operating systems, so you will need to take this into account when you make your choice. Here are just some News Readers available to download:

This material is based on the very helpful guide to feeds on the BBC’s website at http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/help/3223484.stm