How to Subscribe to News Feeds and Blogs
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- Creator: alta88
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Table of Contents
Websites may publish content for download by applications using one of either the RSS or Atom protocols. Such content is commonly called a "news feed" or "RSS feed" or "syndication". Feeds are often used by blogs, but more traditional websites can make any content available in this format. When you subscribe to a site's feed link, your feed reader (for example, Thunderbird) automatically checks the location and downloads the articles to local folders.
When you use Thunderbird to handle your Feeds, you can use the same presentation and tools (archiving, filters, search, etc.) that you are familiar with from managing your email messages.
Step 1: Create a Feed Account
First you must create an account in Thunderbird for your Feeds.
1. In the Menu Bar, click
. The Feed Account Wizard window appears.2. Type a name for your Feed account in the Account Name box, then click
.3. Click
. Your new account will now appear in Thunderbird's folder pane.
Step 2: Subscribe to Feeds
Next, choose the feeds you want to subscribe to.
1. Use your web browser to open a website that you want to subscribe to. Most media sites and blogs that are regularly updated have Feeds.
2. Look for a familiar RSS icon or text link on the site. On most sites the link appears at the bottom or on the side of the home page.
3. Right-click on the RSS link and copy the link’s address. (If you use Mozilla Firefox, click on the context menu. If you use Google Chrome, click .)
4. In Thunderbird, click your Feed Account name in the folder pane.
5. Click Manage subscriptions.
6. In the Feed URL box, right-click and paste the link address from the website.
7. Click
. Thunderbird will validate the link, create a new folder, subscribe a valid link to the new folder, and download all current articles. The new folder appears under your Feed Account in the folder pane.
8. Feeds can also be quickly subscribed by drag and dropping links from a browser onto either the Feed Account folder or any other folder in a Feed Account, directly in the folder pane. If a new folder is created, the folder's name is derived from the feed's title.
Step 3: Read and Manage Feeds
Reading and managing your Feeds is as easy as using your email in Thunderbird.
To read a feed
1. Click
to download all the newest feed messages, along with your regular email messages.2. In the folder pane, click on the folder whose content you want to read. A list of unread messages from the feed appears in the message list pane.
3. Click on a message in the message list.
4. Read the article in the message body. If you’d like to see the article on the website, click the link in the message header next to Website (this will open the link in your default browser).
5. You may also select the view action to perform when double clicking or hitting <enter> on a Feed message selected in the list. The options are found in
.- In the Subscribe dialog, select the feed folder and set Show the article summary instead of loading the web page checkbox. This preference applies to all feeds in the folder.
- Select a message from the message list, then click , and select whether to use the (folder setting above), or override the default and show or globally.
To organize your feeds
You can create email-style folders to group individual feeds:
1. Click on your Feeds Account name to select it.
2. Click
. The New Folder dialog box appears.3. Type a name for your new folder, then click
.4. Alternatively, you can organize your feeds by creating additional Feed Accounts. Just repeat Step 1: Create for every account you want to create, giving each one a different name.
Import and Export your Feeds
1. If you have a list of feed urls exported in the OPML format to a file, perhaps from another feed reader, you may Import them using
. Choose either a new or existing Feeds Account.2. You may also Import using the Subscribe dialog, selecting the Feed Account folder, and clicking
.3. To Export, select the Feed Account (top folder) in the Subscribe dialog and click Ctrl then click the button).
. The folder structure and preferences of your feeds will be saved to a .opml file. (To Export a simple list, press
Tips
- To quickly mark a feed's messages as all read, so they no longer appear in bold type, press Shift + C while the feed is selected.
- For options on how often Thunderbird checks for new feed messages and deletes old ones, click on , then click on the name of your feeds account. Click on below your account name for more options.
- Use the Quick Filter toolbar to save time if you're getting a lot of messages from a feed.
- If you wish to use Message Filters on feed messages and filter by website, create a Custom header named Content-Base. This header contains the feed message's website link.
- New in version 27: If your feed's publisher uses Atom and its threading extension, Thunderbird will group related feeds (like comments to a post) into threads just like it does with related email messages!
Advanced Tips
- Thunderbird has extensive logging of Feed activity, viewable in . Change the preference Feeds.logging.console to debug or trace (and restart) to see details of Feed processing.
Troubleshooting FAQ
Q: Why are feed messages sometimes duplicated?
A: Feed messages with identical content but different unique ids are not detected as duplicates. See this post for many more details.
Q: When viewing a feed web page, why are there blocks of text or code or script sometimes visible?
A: See Bug 662907 for details. A workaround is to create a css rule, in your [profile]/chrome/userChrome.css file or using the Stylish extension:
}
Q: When viewing a feed web page, why does a browser sometimes open or a random page sometimes loads in the browser?
A: Since Thunderbird wasn't designed to be a web browser, it will send all link requests to your default browser. In this case, script on the feed web page is attempting to open a link. The best solution is to install the Adblock Plus extension. In addition to having extensive built in filters, Adblock Plus lets you configure custom urls or domains to be blocked. See also Bug 524281.
Q: Why can't I see some images or video or documents or other embedded content when viewing a feed summary?
A: This is due to javascript being disabled for messages (emails, newsgroup posts, feed summaries). The request to implement a user configurable option to enable javascript, for feed summaries only, is Bug 456481.