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RSS Version 3 Specs Up for Review

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the we'll-be-supporting-atom-in-a-few-weeks dept.

Jonathan Avidan writes "The RSS 3 Homepage now offers its first publicly available specification, the RSS 3 Lite-type Specification First Draft, intended for review and commenting for revision. RSS 3 is a reworking of RSS 2.0, filling the gaps and removing unnecessary features and is fully backwards-compatible, rather than a new format."

12 of 147 comments (clear)

  1. Unnecessary features by kevin_conaway · · Score: 4, Insightful

    How does one remove features and still remain backwards compatible?

    1. Re:Unnecessary features by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You remove features for which support was optional. Old implementations should discover that you're not using the options, new implementations no longer even check for them.

  2. While we're on the subject... by gowen · · Score: 4, Interesting

    ... plans are afoot for Microsoft to co-opt RSS and rename it "web feeds"[from El Reg, so take it with a pinch of snuff]. Now, that is a better name, but it wouldn't be the first time that some incompatible variations got added to an open standard during this process (*cough* Kerberos).

    --
    Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
    1. Re:While we're on the subject... by Trigun · · Score: 4, Funny

      It'll be an application octet/stream with a signed key that you need to decrypt it. They key will be available in the new Microsoft Web feeds viewer only, or on hacker sites two days before official launch. The actual feed will be the equivalent of `cat /dev/mem > newsfeed.web`, and subscribing to more than one feed will require a separate high speed connection installed on your computer.

  3. Yay, XHTML in RSS by Gopal.V · · Score: 4, Informative

    They removed

    <clouds>
    <skipHours>
    <skipDays>
    <textInput>
    <source> element
    <pics> element
    <guid> element's optional "isPemraLink" attribute

    And added

    The <comments> element's optional "type" attribute
    The <pubDate> element's optional "type" attribute
    The <ttl> element's optional "span" attribute

    Looks like good news for bloggers and God knows what for stuff like GeoRSS or BlogTorrents :)

    I've been waiting for that a long time now

    --
    Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur
  4. Re:Gzip RSS by Bogtha · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Why isn't gzip compression of RSS feeds part of the specification?

    It is. It's part of the HTTP specification, RFC 2616. Every data format transmitted over HTTP can take advantage of it. There's no need to treat RSS as a special case.

    --
    Bogtha Bogtha Bogtha
  5. Re:Im sure Microsoft can improve it by $RANDOMLUSER · · Score: 5, Funny

    I'm sure you're wrong. Microsoft will undoubtedly implement RSS 3.0 into Longhorn with no changes. After all, they're committed to Open Standards.

    --
    No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism. - Winston Churchill
  6. Is it an accident.... by hta · · Score: 4, Interesting

    that this happens on the day after the IETF announces that it's approved the ATOM syndication format?

    Announcement reproduced below:

    The IESG has approved the following document:

    - 'The Atom Syndication Format' as a Proposed Standard

    This document is the product of the Atom Publishing Format and Protocol Working Group.

    The IESG contact persons are Scott Hollenbeck and Ted Hardie.

    A URL of this Internet-Draft is:
    http://www.ietf.org/internet-drafts/draft-ietf-ato mpub-format-11.txt

    Technical Summary:

    This document describes the Atom format for syndication. It is XML-based and is considered to be the successor to the earlier RSS formats. Its primary use is for web-based content, but is expected to be used for non-web content as well, such as personal news feeds.

    Working Group Summary:

    Some members of the working group remain unenthusiastic about some sections of the document, but the chairs strongly believe that there is rough (or better) consensus in support of the document as a whole.
    For some of the parts with the most contention, there cannot be more than very rough consensus due to basic differences in the way people would design parts of the format, particularly given that we have many models in existence with the different flavors of RSS. For some parts of the document, there is contention about whether or not a particular item should or should not be in the Atom core versus being an extension. For some parts, there is contention whether there should be MUST/SHOULD/MAY leeway for content creators in the presence or absence of an element, or the semantic content of an element; the
    group really pushed RFC 2119 around during the past few months.

    Protocol Quality

    Scott Hollenbeck and the XML Directorate have reviewed the specification for the IESG. Test implementations have confirmed basic protocol soundness.

  7. Awful, awful idea by Bogtha · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I get the feeling that this is a practical joke/troll by Jonathan Avidan - the person who is editing this new specification, the person who maintains the website linked to, and who submitted this article to Slashdot.

    Yeah, the RSS 2 specification could do with cleaning up and clarification. No, it's not feasible because of too many people doing stupid things like announcing new versions of RSS all on their own and fragmenting the community.

    From the FAQ:

    Who designs the RSS Version 3 standard?

    Jonathan Avidan managers this site and edits the specifications according to common requests and open debates held in the Message Board and via email.

    Follow the link. It's a new message board with no posts.

    There is zero community behind this "standard", it's just a spec some guy decided to write of his own accord. In contrast, a real community effort, Atom, has just reached 1.0 and is standardized by the IETF. Nobody should take this "RSS 3.0" seriously.

    --
    Bogtha Bogtha Bogtha
    1. Re:Awful, awful idea by hritcu · · Score: 4, Interesting

      For what purpose is the RSS Version 3 standard necessary?

      The 0.9x class of standards is outdated and underdocumented. The 2.0 class is highly underdocumented, filled with unnecessary features though lacking others which could be useful. The RSS 3 standard is supposed to extensively document the standard, to expand where expansion is needed and to remove unnecessary features.

      Is any of you satisfied with the explanation that the world needs a new RSS standard because the other versions are not well documented? What on earth stops him (Jonathan Avidan) from documenting them properly?

      --
      If you don't fail at least 90 percent of the time, you're not aiming high enough. (Alan Kay)
  8. Re:An implementing client should support everythin by Bogtha · · Score: 4, Informative

    Five? There are nine different versions of RSS. Not counting this new RSS 3.0, or the previous RSS 3.0 that has been around for years.

    --
    Bogtha Bogtha Bogtha
  9. Re:rss3? by Bogtha · · Score: 4, Insightful

    In fact, fuck XML altogether. The Internet got along just fine using custom text/binary based formats for three decades.

    Er, you do realise that XML is merely a simplified subset of SGML, on which HTML is based? Hard to agree that the Internet "got along just fine", when its killer app is based on something that is very similar to XML, only far more complicated

    But the tag-based syntax is optimised for specifying a tree-structured document and the attributes of text it contains.

    Sounds like RSS to me.

    --
    Bogtha Bogtha Bogtha