Oct 13, 2008 Feed My Inbox

14 Comments

How to Auto-Populate the URL in Feed My Inbox

Last week we added a feature to Feed My Inbox that should be useful for website owners and administrators. You can now create a link on your website that will auto-populate the URL in Feed My Inbox when clicked on.

For example, if you would like to create a link that will automatically fill in your feed URL or website address, it should look like this: http://www.feedmyinbox.com/?feed=your_feed_url_here .

Subscribing to our blog would look like this: http://www.feedmyinbox.com/?feed=http://www.brightwurks.com ;

OR like this: http://www.feedmyinbox.com/?feed=http://feeds.feedburner.com/brightwurks .

The first link uses our website address, and the second link uses our feed URL. Feed My Inbox knows how to parse both properly, so you can do it either way. Once clicked, the page will look like the screenshot below. All the user has to do is enter their email address.

Thanks to Corey for the suggestion last week.

14 Comments

Oct 16, 2008 8:59PM

1. pollyalida

Thank you for this feature! The simple solution that I was looking for.

Oct 18, 2008 2:57AM

2. arif

You have all the right idea for a simple and easiest subscription service for RSS-to-Email; however, the arrangements of feeds in an email needs improvements, first of all, you need to be able to figure out how to remove owner's avatars. It has been done by other similar services. Then you should be able to check if you can improve the alignments of other images in a post. The best is to keep the image to the left of the text (check how Yahoo News delivers its feeds, no one does it better than Yahoo). The image should also be resized to match the post regardless of how big or small it may be on the blog post.

Overall, you should concentrate on improving the look of an email when it brings the RSS feeds.

Email is certainly here to stay and majority of average internet users still don't have any clue on RSS. So you have a winner here, but I wish you'd look into above suggestions soon.

Oct 20, 2008 11:57AM

3. Nick

@arif Thanks for your comments. One thing to keep in mind when viewing these emails is that Feed My Inbox simply interprets the code from the feed. We do not manipulate that data. This means if an avatar is in the feed, an avatar will show up in the post. If an image is in the feed, the image will be posted in the email without being re-sized (although we are looking into some options with images).

We display feeds of all kinds, in numerous languages, formats and styles. If we start manipulating data within a feed to "fix" something, it will most likely break something else in many other feeds. That is why we take a hands-off approach in styling the emails. Feed readers like Google Reader do the same thing.

If you have a suggestion for the display of certain feeds, it would be a great idea to let the owner of the site/feed know so they can update it. Thanks!

Oct 20, 2008 5:42PM

4. tsabeeka

oh yeah :)

Oct 21, 2008 1:50PM

5. Dean

Great app, love it. It's exactly what I have been looking for but never thought about going about it this way. Just reviewed it on my site http://www.ireviewtechnology4biz.com. Any plans of a wordpress pluging?

Oct 21, 2008 3:06PM

6. Nick

@Dean, thanks for the comments and blog post! We do have some features in the works that will be of great use to webmasters :-). Stay tuned to the blog and our twitter feed for announcements in the next 2 weeks. Thanks!

Nov 6, 2008 8:09AM

7. Ron

Hmmm ... am I correct that adding this parameter on a link to feedmyinbox will only auto-complete the first line, "Enter a Website URL?"

If so, could we have a parameter that will automatically fill in the "Enter Your E-mail Address" line?

Nov 7, 2008 3:43AM

8. Nick

@Ron - This really is a quick fix until we have a better way of doing it, but YES, we do have a parameter for email as well. It would go like this:

http://www.feedmyinbox.com/?feed=your_feed_here&email=your_email_here

Sound good?

Nov 8, 2008 8:14PM

9. Ron

Yes, and that was really quick! I want to modify my Bookmark so the Inbox I normally use will now be selected by default.

Question: I'm confused by the utility of the first parameter. Wouldn't the feed address normally change and have to be re-entered/pasted anyway, each time a new feed is registered? One wouldn't want to register the same feed over and over. Or am I misunderstanding the purpose of it?

Assuming we want to register a different feed each time, what do you advise? Use a dummy parameter and then change it before activating? Or, is there syntax that includes _only_ the second parameter?

If the second choice is correct, please give another example of the syntax for setting one's Inbox alone, as a default.

Nov 10, 2008 12:58AM

10. Nick

@Ron I'm not sure I completely understand your questions, but the link is simply an option. If anything about the link is confusing, I recommend that you visit http://www.feedmyinbox.com and submit your parameters manually.

Otherwise, we now have a nice feature where you can create a sign-up form to add on your site or blog (http://www.brightwurks.com/blog/new-feature-create-your-own-signup-form/). Maybe that will work for you. Thanks.

Apr 13, 2009 5:15AM

11. Adrian Short

This is great. I've just implemented it in seconds across the whole of Mash the State, a campaign site that's encouraging UK councils to start using RSS (only 15% of them are!) and listing all the ones that do.

Councils spend huge amounts of time and money implementing their own email news services but rarely think of serving up RSS and having email subscription to that content delivered by a third party.

For an example of FeedMyInbox in action, see our page for Barnet Council here:

http://www.mashthestate.org.uk/councils/barnet

Nov 3, 2009 9:34AM

12. Bradley

Great solution. Please add it to the "extras" link along with the feed my inbox form. (I had to search for it here.) I love the form and use it on my site, but for emails, a link works better.

Cheers!

Oct 10, 2010 6:40AM

13. Ben

This is really great. Just want to know if we create the link programatically (say php), does the feed url need to be urlencode?

Cheers

Oct 11, 2010 12:00AM

14. Nick

Hey Ben, what do you mean urlencode? No matter how you generate the subscription link, it has to follow the format outlined above and list either the website or the feed URL at the end.

Also keep in mind that we watch for "bots" that mis-use our service to subscribe people without their consent. I'm confident that is probably not what you are doing, but keep in mind that anyone filling out that form must click a confirmation link to opt-in before getting notifications from our service. Thanks!

How to Auto-Populate the URL in Feed My Inbox

14 Comments

1. pollyalida

2. arif

3. Nick

4. tsabeeka

5. Dean

6. Nick

7. Ron

8. Nick

9. Ron

10. Nick

11. Adrian Short

12. Bradley

13. Ben

14. Nick

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