Build it and they will come . . .

One of the great things about the Internet is its ability to deliver information to you in an automated way. We all have favourite sites that we visit regularly: blogs, social networking, podcasts, the news, and so on. Did you know that you can subscribe to the RSS feeds provided by your favourite sites, and then have all of the new content delivered automatically to your desktop or email? To subscribe to a site, and receive content as it is updated, find the RSS icon on the site.

Click on it and then choose where you want the content delivered to. The easiest way is to use an RSS Reader – these collect updated info from everything you have subscribed to and then deliver it to you. There are readers that work with your Internet browser, like FeedDemon 3.0 for Windows, Safari, and Firefox. There are also online readers like Google Reader, My Yahoo!, Bloglines, Pageflakes, and Netvibes. All of them do basically the same thing, although their appearances are different – check out a couple to see what format you prefer.

Once you have your Reader set up, start adding feeds from your favourite sites. You will only get content as it is updated – nothing new = no update. You don’t need to check the original website.

You can also have content delivered to your email if you prefer. Whatever method you choose, using a feed reader is a good time management technique – instead of visiting every web site separately, let the content come to you. I used RSS to deliver photos from Flickr to this blog.

Feeds are also available where you might not expect – you can subscribe to a Google search for something and then receive new hits as they appear online, using Google alerts. iTunes offers thousands of audio and video podcasts – each with its own feed.

If you have your own blog or website, you can publish your own RSS feed that lets people subscribe to your site and get content as you update it. This blog is written using WordPress which automatically generates an RSS feed.

FAQs

1. Where do I go to find out what to do? The first place to go is the course Moodle – this will give you all the administrative details for the course: the course outline, timetable, goals, requirements, and so on. The other important place is here – the course blog. This is where the communication for the course takes place, and where the instructor and students will be able to comment on the class activities.
2. What happens if I miss an exam? You may be given a make-up exam if you missed the exam because of illness. In this case, a doctor’s note is required. If you miss the exam for some other reason, you will get a zero unless there are extraordinary circumstances and you have made arrangements before the exam with the instructor.
3. I don’t have a computer at home so it’s really hard for me to get online. What should I do? There are many computers on campus you can use. Public libraries and many coffee shops also provide free or nearly free online access.
4. My computer/printer broke down/crashed/ate my homework. See number 3.
5. How often do I need to be online? That depends on what you are working on. You will see in the course Moodle, WHEN everything in the course is due, and WHAT to do. The discussion activities require you to communicate with other students so whenever you have one due, you will probably need to be online at least once a day for several days in a row. This is not a course in which you can go online once a week and expect to do well.

What other questions do you have?