Thanks for visiting From My Pocket! I hope you find some useful Pocket PC tips here and that you'll check back frequently for updated content.

To be sure you stay informed of updated content and new articles, you can bookmark the website, subscribe to its RSS feed, or subscribe via email. 

Bookmark the website

Bookmarking websites has been my modus operandi for almost as long as I've been on the internet.  However, bookmarking is not an ideal method for keeping track of websites and blogs for several reasons:

• Bookmarks can become unwieldy in a short period of time.  Todate, I've probably got hundreds of bookmarked URLS scattered across numerous folders (I kept it fairly orderly for a while and then things started falling apart)
• Switching back and forth between browsers complicates things.  I switch back and forth between Internet Explorer, Firefox and now Opera (which I'm really loving BTW).  I waste quite a lot of time looking for bookmarks in my different browsers.
• Switching back and forth between computers also complicates things.  I use three different computers at home (a UMPC, a laptop and a desktop computer) and different shared computers at work.
• Bookmarks are static and don't notify when new material is available.  I wind up opening lots of different bookmarks only to find that the content has never changed.  For some dynamic websites, like Lifehacker, where the content changes frequently, I frequently miss interesting content because I was busy with other things and didn't get a chance to review the site.

To improve my current situation and, hopefully, gain some efficiencies I've been seriously exploring and learning about RSS feeds.

Subscribe to RSS feed

RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication.  RSS is a way to have updated content delivered to one place similar to the way you might have a newspaper delivered to your home.  The beautiful thing about RSS is I only have to go to one place to get updates from all my favorite blogs and websites.  Using RSS really is simply. . . all you have to do is sign up with an RSS News Reader service and subscribe to your favorite websites' RSS feeds.

Sign up with an RSS News Reader

RSS News Readers are nothing more than mailboxes that collect the RSS feeds you subscribe to.  There are multiple free RSS News Readers to choose from.  Some common RSS News Readers that are used by subscribers to From My Pocket include NewsGator Online, My Yahoo, Opera RSS Reader, Google Reader, Firefox Live Bookmarks, and Bloglines.  Internet Explorer has an embedded News Reader and Outlook 2007 even incorporates an RSS Feed Reader that works pretty well. 

RSS News Readers have various features and functions to accommodate reading styles and preferences.  It can be somewhat daunting trying to figure out which one to use. 

I've tried out several different RSS Feed Readers, but I always come back to Bloglines.  So I'll use Bloglines to demonstrate how RSS News Readers work.

Create an account for yourself by setting up a user name and password in the News Reader of your choice.

Add the RSS Feeds for your favorite blogs and websites to the News Reader.  You can usually do this by adding the URL of the blog you want to subscribe to into a dialogue box or by activating and using the News Reader's Subscribe button.

1)  Adding the URL of the blog you want to subscribe to into a dialogue box

• Login to Bloglines (or to the RSS News Reader of your choice)
• Select the Feeds tab; then select Add
• Input Blog or Feed URL in the space provided (see the red box labeled 1 in the screenshot below).
• Select the Subscribe button

2)  Use the News Reader's Subscribe button (see the red box labeled 2 in the above screenshot).  Many News Readers allow you to add a button to your Browser's toolbar.  When you open up a website that provides an RSS feed, the button is activated (it may change colors).  Selecting the button will automatically add that website's RSS feed to your News Reader. 

3)  Some websites include widgets or icons for various RSS Feeds.  If you use a News Reader that is associated with a widget, you can simply select the widget to subscribe to the RSS Feed.

You can usually tell if a website or blog provides an RSS feed by looking in the right hand corner of the website address bar.  If the website has an RSS feed, you'll see an orange icon .  If you click on the icon, you will be subscribed to the website, probably in the browser's default reader.  You can probably change the default reader to the News Reader of your choice, but you'll need to look around the browser options and preferences menus to find the specific setting - I could not find an option for this in Opera.

Once you've registered with a News Reader and have added some RSS Feed URLs to it,  staying up-to-date with your favorite websites and blogs is really simple.  All you'll need to do is login to the News Reader from any computer and with any browser and start reading!

The best way to understand and get familiar with RSS News Readers is by trying them out for yourself.  If you decide RSS News Readers aren't your thing, you can always unsubscribe from the feeds and go back to your old way of handling things.

 Subscribe to From My Pocket's RSS Feed

Mobile News Readers

There are several mobile News Readers that can be used on Pocket PCs and other mobile devices.  Some of these News Readers download content directly to the Pocket PC, so you can take your reading with you and are not dependent on a continuous internet connection. 

I am currently evaluating several mobile RSS News Readers for this year's Smartphone & Pocket PC software awards, and I'll be posting more about mobile News Readers in the near future.

Email subscriptions

If you don't want to subscribe to From My Pocket's RSS Feed, you can always subscribe via email.  All you need to do is select the link below and then enter your email address in the space provided and you'll get an email delivered to your inbox whenever I post new articles to the blog or update posts. 

Subscribe to From My Pocket via email

Rest assured, your email address is held in the strictest of confidence and will only be used to send you regular blog updates.  Of course you can unsubscribe at any time.

The authors of some websites and blogs only provide an abstract of articles in their RSS Feeds and email subscriptions because they want readers to visit their website to view the full articles.  This improve their website statistics and exposes their readers to posted advertisements. 

Even though I love having you drop by my blog regularly, and I hope you'll come back often to share your thoughts and insights in article comments, I provide the full version of articles in the RSS Feed and email subscriptions because that's what I expect and want in the blogs and websites to which I subscribe.

 Subscribe to From My Pocket's RSS Feed

Subscribe to From My Pocket via email