SETTING UP WEBFEED (RSS) ALERTS

Webfeeds, also called RSS or news feeds, have been used for keeping up with news and blogs for some time. They are now moving into the mainstream of research alerts. To receive webfeeds you need to use a feed aggregator. There are many choices, but this guide will be based on Bloglines, a popular and free aggregator. (Please see the separate tutorial, How to set up Bloglines, for step-by-step instructions.)

What to use Webfeeds for There are, of course, many ways to use RSS feeds. We're going to highlight several of the most important for Fletcher students in this tutorial: New Acquisitions Journal Tables of Contents ABI Inform articles by research focus Government Agencies Web Sites Web searches 1. New Acquisitions
	Click for full-sized version	Our Library Catalogs page links to the Tufts University New Acquisitions page. You can search there for new library acquisitions by subject, author, keyword, or by Library. Once you do a search, for example, for all new acquisitions in the Ginn Library, you can right-click to copy the RSS feed into your Bloglines account and receive notification each month of the new arrivals at Ginn. Or, you could specify a subject, such as China, and see all new Tufts acquisitions for that subject each month.
2. Journal Tables of Contents
	Click for full-sized version	Many academic journal publishers will provide feeds of the Tables of Contents (TOCs) of new issues as they are published. For example, if you go to Oxford Journals Online and choose a journal, the home page will include the blue RSS button. You can right-click the feed link and subscribe in Bloglines. (Oxford also offers TOCs by e-mail. See our Guide to Search Alerts for more help with this.)
	Click for full-sized version	Ingentaconnect offers webfeeds of thousands of journal TOCs.
	Many individual publications offer their own webfeeds, including The Economist, the Chronicle of Higher Education and the New York Times. Here is one list of Electronic journals with RSS feeds.
3. ABI Inform articles by research focus
	Click for full-sized version	ABI Inform is a journal database of business, management and economics journals. They provide a service called Curriculum Match Factor. You can subscribe to feeds of the latest articles in your research focus. For instance, the available feeds in International Business are pictured to the left (click for a larger image). Additional categories of feeds are: Marketing, Management, Finance, Entrepreneurship & Innovation, Economics and Leadership & Organizational Behavior.
4. Government Agencies
	Click for full-sized version	FirstGov offers a library of U.S. government agencies that provide webfeeds. Click on any category to see what feeds are available; then right-click to copy the feed and paste it into your aggregator.
5. Web Sites
	Click for full-sized version	Many websites are now using feeds to keep users abreast of changes to their site. Some examples are: International Crisis Group (pictured left) Gallup Poll LLRX.com Ginn Library has two feeds of its own, one for the Ginn Weblog and one for library news and announcements. NewsIsFree offers a directory of hundreds of feeds by category of interest, including global news sources by region.
6. Web Searches
	Click for full-sized version	MSN Search offers RSS feeds for your search results. Do a web search and copy the RSS feed that appears at the bottom of the page. Add the feed to your aggregator and every time a new result matches your search, you receive the feed.
Further Assistance For more information, Tisch Library has a useful page on Keeping Current with Newsfeeds. If you have questions about setting up a feed aggregator, or finding and subscribing to feeds, use the Ask a Librarian service.

SETTING UP WEBFEED (RSS) ALERTS

What to use Webfeeds for

1. New Acquisitions

2. Journal Tables of Contents

3. ABI Inform articles by research focus

4. Government Agencies

5. Web Sites

6. Web Searches

Further Assistance