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MS Reveals Info On New RSS Extensions

Posted by Zonk on from the many-hands-make-light-work dept.

dizzy_p writes "Microsoft released yesterday more information on their earlier announced extensions to the RSS format(s). The specifications can be found on MSDN. The question is, will the mainstream developer adopt these specifications, or will they only live in the Microsoft "Blogosphere" (To quote MSDN). The specifications in question are named Microsoft Simple Sharing Extensions Specification and Microsoft Simple List Extensions Specification"

22 of 146 comments (clear)

  1. Ah yes... by endtwist · · Score: 2, Insightful

    More proprietary extensions from Microsoft. Now the question is, how useful are they really?

    1. Re:Ah yes... by Prospero's+Grue · · Score: 4, Insightful
      More proprietary extensions from Microsoft.

      It's the Microsoft way...

      Embrace. Extend. Extinguish.

      --
      The opinion above is fiction. Any similarity to real opinions, including facts and logic, is purely coincidental.
    2. Re:Ah yes... by grcumb · · Score: 4, Insightful

      "http://msdn.microsoft.com/xml/rss/sse/ reads pretty much like an IETF RFC."

      Okay, it looks like an RFC, but why isn't it an RFC?

      Besides the fact that RSS doesn't appear to have been submitted to the IETF either, of course. Both the MS extension and original RSS spec were released under Creative Commons licenses. So what's the point of releasing a spec without going through the standards process? It depends on the motives of the issuer, doesn't it?

      I personally am strongly opposed to this kind of unilateralism. I'm not a big fan of Dave Winer's approach to things, and I'm even less of a fan of MS'. Having worked on the web almost from the day it was born, I can speak from experience, and MS has been a divisive force from the moment they cottoned on to this Internet thing, almost single-handedly creating the security nightmare we have today by plying half-educated cargo-cult 'developers' with convenience and ease of use that turned out to be easy for anyone to exploit.

      So please, when we look at this issue, let's not forget two things:

      • Specs exist for a reason - peer review, consultation and openness. MS has ensured none of these in this instance.
      • MS has created these pseudo-standards in the past, in effect, dressing itself up in black robes and saying, 'I belong on the Supreme Court too, 'cause I got the robes!'

      The (false?) naivete that the parent espouses does nothing to change my suspicion that this new 'standard' from MS is any different from what came before. MS are relying on just this kind of cursory investigation ('He must be a judge; he's wearing a robe!') to insinuate these extensions into the mainstream.

      I would trust them a lot more if they took the time to actually cooperate with the community, and to follow the well-established processes that exist. They've buckled down and done so in the past, so why can't they do it this time?

      --
      Crumb's Corollary: Never bring a knife to a bun fight.
    3. Re:Ah yes... by rspress · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I agree. Microsoft took a great thing, a standards based internet, and screwed it up so bad it will be years before the damage can be fixed, if at all.

      The worst offender is Active X. Great if you are running Windows and Internet Explorer but bad for the rest of the world. Of course when Microsoft proposed this they were going to give it to the world and provide the tools for all platforms but that never happened. Now we have websites and even embedded devices that will only work on their platform. Of course that was the plan. The only way to own the internet is to make sure it only works with your OS. This has spread to their servers and content creation tools. When now have sites that only work when running windows and internet explorer.

      When sun made a deal with Microsoft for Java it was to be a two way street. Any of the code developed for Java was to be sent to sun and the rest of the world. Microsoft accepted. Until it came time for their code to be opened sent back to sun where it would be open for all.

      With Microsoft you have to wonder what their intentions are. Most often it is to entrench their OS at all costs, despite the gloss their PR department tells the rest of the world. As for not going through the "official" standards channels there is probably a very good reason for that and Microsoft knows that.

  2. Adding to things? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    In all honesty I'd be more impressed if I saw them adhering to standards with even half the zeal that they want to "enhance" them.

  3. What kind of attitude is that? by Renegade+Lisp · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I'm not very familiar with this topic, and of course Microsoft-bashing is easy in this forum, but still: What kind of attitude is that? Making extensions to a specification and publishing them for everybody else to use? So that's the way standards are defined in the Microsoft universe? I thought "making a standard" meant getting together with everybody else (or at least some approximation of that) and work things out together?

    1. Re:What kind of attitude is that? by rmsousa · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Yeah, because standards that are developed from the beginning by a commitee are SOOOOO better compared to de facto standards. Now let me resume coding in ADA.

    2. Re:What kind of attitude is that? by rmsousa · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Maybe that's why they call them "extensions", not "standards"...

    3. Re:What kind of attitude is that? by Renegade+Lisp · · Score: 2, Insightful
      Maybe I missed something...but, what the hell are you talking about? RSS is already a standard, and Microsoft is publishing an "extension," as they clearly state.

      That is correct, they are calling it an "extension". But still, a "Microsoft Extension Specification" (which is the full term they use on the web site) sounds a whole lot different than a "Microsoft RFC" or a "Microsoft Extension Draft" or a "Microsoft Proposal". As I said in another post, this is very much a matter of style. But look to IBM for an example of a mega-player who's much more developed in its use of correct style in these matters.

    4. Re:What kind of attitude is that? by ergo98 · · Score: 1, Insightful

      You were wrong. Just let it go and admit that you were wrong - Microsoft never called this a standard, and what they've done is entirely within their rights. It doesn't "look like a standard", it looks like a specification, and it's one that Microsoft has stated that they are going to follow. Good for them for at least publishing it for the world to see.

      IBM does things entirely the same way, by the way, as does Google, Sun, Apple, and everyone else. That's if they're nice enough to making it unburdened and public.

      Microsoft has a lot of things that people can slam them about, but this isn't it. It just makes this group of people look idiotic when there's reaching to the depths like this ("Uh...it looks like a standard!").

  4. Java by superpulpsicle · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Can we learn from the lesson of Java that M$ is not the company that should be setting the standard for anything industry based. They always come out with their own modified version of XYZ and make everybody else play with them.

    1. Re:Java by John+Hurliman · · Score: 2, Insightful

      And that's why Jscript and J# are the industry standards now? /endsarcasm

  5. Embrace and extend will not work as well.. by Ckwop · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Embrace and extend will not work as well as Microsoft think. Why? Because it's not the user that decides what feeds are available - it's the webmaster.

    Webmaster's want to maximise the number of people who can productively use their site. Given the choice of Microsoft's custom format or a format submitted to the IETF for an RFC number I know which one I'd rather use.

    Simon.

  6. Presumptions... by design+by+michael · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Funny, I don't ever recall reading that Microsoft was responsible for the development and evolution of RSS. And now they want to set their own development standards? Seems to me that we had this same problem with HTML circa 1998/9.

    --
    401 - Attention span not found
  7. Re:SSE Licensing information enigma by marcosdumay · · Score: 2, Insightful

    That means that if they happen to have a patent, they can submarine it. They can wait till everybody start using their extensions and then "disover" a patent and get fees (but constant fees) from people.

    --
    Rethinking email
  8. Re:Proprietary? by houghi · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Also, MS explicitly states that they have no intention of burdening implementations of the standard with patents.

    I have no intention of getting a hangover ever again in my life. There is a slight difference of not having the intention and not actually doing it.

    --
    Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
  9. R is for "really" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    I have to wonder about the mentality of someone who looks at the RSS specification and thinks "What Really Simple Syndication needs is to be less simple".

  10. Obviously.. by anethema · · Score: 2, Insightful

    ..This is the second phase in their usual plan of Embrace, Extend, Extinguish.

    --


    It's easier to fight for one's principles than to live up to them.
  11. Rss and VB 2005 by bokmann · · Score: 2, Insightful

    And today, this article appears on Developer.com: "RSS: So Simple with Wisual Basic 2005".

    http://www.developer.com/net/vb/article.php/356714 1

    "In no time, you can build a simple RSS viewer that takes a user-entered RSS feed URL and retrieves the title, description, and link for that channel."

    And so now we can expect a rapid proliferation of readers that don't work with every other RSS feed in the world; they will require the 'Microsoft Extensions' (I am assuming this of the VB implementation, either now or in the future). RSS feeds and readers alike will eventually have to implement it one way or the other.

    I don't know what the plan for World Domination here is, but it goes something like this:

    1) Wedge yourself in the middle where no one wants or needs you
    2) ???
    3) Profit!

  12. EEE by Antiocheian · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Stage 1: Embrace

  13. faux-standards again? by recharged95 · · Score: 3, Insightful
    Actually, I'd buy it if other orgs accept it with the additional rule that Microsoft conducts a JCP-like paradigm in extending it further.

    Otherwise, this undos everything, i.e. takes the simple out of RSS

  14. Re:SSE Licensing information enigma by killjoe · · Score: 2, Insightful

    RAND licencing basically means open source projects are not able to implement this feature. I don't know of too many open source developers who can afford to pay licensing fees to MS. I suspect that there are patents out there and that MS will price them just above what the open source developers can afford. That way they can be non discriminating and still be a "standard".

    This is why ECMA is a joke. ECMA should not allow patented standards. It's an oxymoron.

    --
    evil is as evil does