The RSS Series: Simplify life with RSS + Google

Last month I turned you on to what RSS is and how it could be very useful in keeping you up to date with the constantly changing world. In fact shortly after the article we noticed 4-5 times as many RSS subscribers on our blog. But something tells me that there are still some people who might need more.

I’ve personally tried a number of RSS readers – as stand alone applications, a part of an email program, or a program than runs through an internet browser and I have to admit that I’ve been most impressed with using Google. Google does have a RSS reader but I’ve found by customizing the homepage it’s made my life so much simpler. Let’s take a closer look at how it can make life easier for you too:

You’ll see that if you choose to personalize the Google home page you have an option to “make it your own”. When you do this it asks you to login with either your google login or to create a login using your personal email address. Of course, this is totally free.

Once you choose to customize your google home page you can add “stuff” by searching through google OR you can add your own URL that has an RSS feed. (If you don’t know how to find out if a site as an RSS feed check out part 1)

If you still aren’t sure if a site has an RSS feed you can always just enter it into the URL field and it will let you know whether or not you can subscribe to the web site.

Once you begin adding “stuff” you’ll see the information appear in three columns. You can add everything from your flickr contacts, to gmail, google calendar to all of your favorite web sites that use RSS. Now if you get crazy with adding content to your home page (like me) you can use tabs to keep you organized.

You can customize your Google home page even further by dragging and dropping the content to exactly the order you want to read it. Usually the top three articles show up per site you’ve added. If you want to read the articles all you have to do is click on the link to go to the web site. But Google’s added a new feature recently that makes life even simpler. You can choose the plus or minus symbol next to the link and begin reading through Google first.

Again, these are all just suggestions that will help you keep up with news and events, which is especially important in the graphics & web industry. So if you’re not already in love with an RSS reader, go take Google for a test drive and come back and let us know what you think. I doubt it’ll take much convincing for you to realize how much simpler it makes life. Don’t forget to add our blog to your RSS feeds!

Oh, and if you already use Google to stay current let us know your feedback.

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