About RSS

RSS, or 'Really Simple Syndication', is an Internet format that allows for easy sharing of information such as news headlines and other web content. By subscribing to an RSS feed you can find out about news or other content updates to a website without having to remember to visit the site each day.

Subscribing to an RSS feed is different to subscribing to an email newsletter:

• It requires no email address and is not delivered to your email address
• Content cannot be blocked by various filters
• There are no viruses, trojans, or dangerous content to worry about
• It's opt-in, ie you only receive the content you choose and you can easily remove any feed when you don't want it anymore
• Your newsreader will automatically display the new item whenever the web page is updated.

If a web site provides an RSS feed, it is usually obvious from the orange 'RSS' or 'XML' icon(s) (eg. ) that link to their feed(s).

How does it work?

You first need an RSS reader or aggregator, which is special software for managing and reading RSS content.

1. There are many readers available and many are free. Some are programs you download and install on your computer, others are web-based services that you access with your web browser (eg My Yahoo! users can now add RSS feeds directly to their personal page). RSS reader functionality also may be incorporated in other client software, including Web browsers (eg Firefox, Opera and Safari, and promised for IE7) and e-mail clients (Thunderbird, Opera Mail, plug-in for Outlook).
   
   
2. Whichever style of reader you choose, once you have it you can then start adding content. Whenever you see an image (commonly orange) saying RSS, or XML, Syndicate this, etc., you can add the content feed into your reader. Generally this is done by clicking on the icon and copying the URL of the resulting page into your reader. Check your reader for specific instructions about how to add feeds.
   
   
3. RSS feeds are actually just XML files that your reader will regularly check to see if they've changed from the last time you read them. It will then display the new links and content summaries and allow you to click through to read complete articles in its browser. When clicking on the article you are taken to the source website to view the article.

All of the CPSU news feeds

CPSU News
 CPSU news

Agency/industry News
 Arts,sport & tourism
 Borders
 Centrelink
 Communications
 Health & welfare
 Justice & the courts
 Parliament, policy & regulation
 Science, education & research
 Tax & revenue
 Territories

Campaign News
 A better way to bargain
 Federal Election campaign 2010
 Political campaigning
 Agenda for change