General Information

OIT has established an RSS feed of the Service Updates web page. By entering the Service Updates RSS information into an RSS enabled browser or e-mail client users can obtain the latest information on upcoming maintenance and current outages of major OIT supported services.

Note: for information on past Service Updates, please visit: http://www.oit.duke.edu/help/service/history.php

What is RSS?

The technology of RSS allows Internet users to subscribe to websites that have provided RSS feeds; these are typically sites that change or add content regularly. To use this technology, site owners create or obtain specialized software which, in the machine-readable XML format, presents new articles in a list, giving a line or two of each article and a link to the full article or post. Unlike subscriptions to many printed newspapers and magazines, most RSS subscriptions are free. The RSS formats provide web content or summaries of web content together with links to the full versions of the content, and other meta-data. This information is delivered as an XML file called RSS feed, webfeed, RSS stream, or RSS channel. In addition to facilitating syndication, RSS allows a website's frequent readers to track updates on the site using an aggregator. Definition provided by Wikipedia - the Free Encyclopedia

Use one of the following supported RSS readers:

Firefox

1. Visit www.oit.duke.edu/help
2. Click on the orange icon just to the right of 'Current Outages.'
3. Select the Subscribe Now button on the next page.
4. In the Add Live Bookmark window, enter Service Updates in the Name field and select OK.
5. To view Service Updates, select Bookmarks - Service Updates or the link will be added below the address bar.

Thunderbird

1. Select Tools - Account Settings
2. In the Account Settings window, select News & Blogs. If you do not have a listing for News & Blogs, select Add Account. In the New Account Setup window select News & Blogs, select Next. Enter News & Blogs as the Account Name, select Next. Select Finish.
3. In the All Folders listing, right click on News & Blogs and select Subscribe.
4. In the RSS Subscriptions box, select Add
5. In the News Feed properties box, in the Feed URL space enter http://www.oit.duke.edu/help/service/rss.php
6. Select OK
7. To view the Service Updates feed, visit the Folders column within Thunderbird, expand the News & Blogs listing, and select Service Updates.

Safari

1. Visit www.oit.duke.edu/help
2. Click on the orange icon just to the right of 'Current Outages.'
3. That will take you to http://www.oit.duke.edu/help/service/rss.php and display the latest Service Updates. Select the '+' to the left of the address bar and select Add from the Bookmarks window.
4. To view the Service Updates RSS feed, either select the Service Updates bookmark from the Bookmarks Toolbar, or select Bookmarks - Bookmarks Toolbar - Service Updates or Bookmarks - Bookmarks Toolbar - View All RSS Articles.

DukePass (students only)

A channel is located under the News tab of DukePass (dukepass.duke.edu)

Or you can create a new channel for the Service Updates RSS feed:

1. After logging into DukePass, select the Edit icon to the right of 'Duke News.'
2. In the 'Add a New Feed' box, enter 'Service Updates' for Description and enter the following URL in the 'Feed URL' box:

http://www.oit.duke.edu/help/service/rss.php

Aggregator

If you already have an aggregator subscribe to the feed using the following URL:

http://www.oit.duke.edu/help/service/rss.php

Help

For assistance with RSS feeds, please contact the OIT Service Desk at 684-2200 or submit a help request online.