Blessed by the Potato

I’m pretty new to all this RSS stuff myself, so I thought I’d figure out how to manage it in one program (Thunderbird) and share my experiences.

Note that while it’s kind of neat (especially if you want to download the blog text to read off-line), I really prefer the traditional web interface, firstly because it doesn’t separate comments and the pages, and secondly because then you’ll have access to all of the static pages which are not part of the RSS feed (e.g.: the recipes section).

First up, you’ll need to install an appropriate program, such as Mozilla Thunderbird. In Thunderbird, go to Tools->Account Settings and select “Add Account” (bottom-left in that window). Select an RSS News/Blogs account type.

Once your account is created, click on the account in your folders pane, which will bring up the large window with the large options icons. Select “Manage Subscriptions”. Then click on “Add”.

Now switch windows to the webpage here. Scroll down to the very bottom where you’ll find a link that says “Entries (RSS)” and “Comments (RSS)” (you’ll need to be on the main page rather than this one; open a new tab/window if you need). Right-click the link you’re interested in subscribing to and select “Copy Link Location”, then switch back to your Thunderbird window, where you will have an “Add Feed” dialog box waiting for that URL. Paste it in. Note that due to the way I’ve got the server set up, this might give you an address with the site’s IP rather than the URL, and since the IP can change from time to time the better links to use are http://www.holypotato.com/?feed=rss2 and http://www.holypotato.com/?feed=comments-rss2

That’s all there is to it. You can go to tools->account settings to choose how often to have Thunderbird check the sites for updates, and whether you want it to happen at startup. Hitting “get messages” will manually force a scan.

Note: if the URL that you cut and paste starts with feed:http:// you might need to get rid of the feed part so that it’s just http://.

I was going to put screenshots of each step in this, but after reading it over, it seems straightforward enough, so I think I won’t bother. Leave a comment if you do want screenies.