June 11, 2007
RSS on A-to-Z
A comment left on this blog post by Michael Porter reminded me that I’m very lax in posting actual instructions on adding RSS urls to an A-to-Z list, specifically EBSCO. It’s really rather simple. There may actually be an easier way to do it but this is the only way I have figured out how that keeps the RSS feed with the rest of the title.
First you have to log into the administration module for A-to-Z and download your holdings file:
- Log in to Ebsco A-to-Z administration module
- Cursor over “Title Wizard” then choose “Download/Upload”
- List format should be tab deliminated, list content should be All Resources. I download all columns, it’s just easier for me that way.
- When the download file has been generated, right click on the “Click here to download your A-to-Z collection. ” link and save onto your computer.
- Open up the file in Excell.
To add an RSS feed to a title I generally do the following, which ensures that the RSS feed is in the same spot as the ejournal entry on A-to-Z:
- Erase the data in the LinkId and ResourceId columns.
- Keep data in Title and Sort Title columns the same.
- Change source to RSS feed
- Put RSS feed url in URL and ProxiedURL field.
- Keep data in PrintISSN and OnlineISSN columns.
- Erase data in all coverage related columns, including embargo.
- Don’t change anything in the subject related columns.
- Change the IsCustom column to Y
- Don’t change the Delete column.
I generally then delete any other rows for that title and for titles that don’t have RSS feeds. After saving the file just go back to the A-to-Z administration module and upload the file as follows:
- Cursor over “Title Wizard” then choose “Download/Upload”.
- Click on the “Upload Collection” tab.
- Find the file on your computer.
- Click on the upload button.
From here you can customize as you wish. I added the orange RSS Feed square as a custom note the attached the note to any source that was RSS Feed.
I hope this tutorial is useful. Please leave any questions in the comment section and I’ll try and answer them as quickly as possible. I’ll definitely be more prompt than I was getting this post up and running.
