What is PulsePAD?

We all have our favorite websites, blogs, news portals and directories that we surf to on a regular basis. Most likely, your favorite sites update regularly and keep you coming back for more. Chances are most of these sites you visit on a regular basis syndicate their content using RSS. (What is RSS?). You have these sites residing in your bookmark list or in your personal RSS feed reader.

What if you could pull all the regularly updating content from your favorite collection of sites into one application? What if you could take that application and embed it in your website so that your visitors can be exposed to all that great content? What if that application included a bunch of interactive features so that your visitors could discuss the content and create a community around it? Well, now you can -- with PulsePAD!

PulsePAD is an online service provided to webmasters, bloggers and anyone who owns a website. Use PulsePAD to further establish your website as the thought leader on any topic or niche.

• Aggregate any RSS feed or syndicated content you wish using our simple set up wizard - add as many sources as you like!
• Customize our application so that it fits seamlessly into your website's layout and design.
• Add more value for your website's visitors and create a community greater engaged with your site

The PAD in PulsePAD stands for Portal for Aggregate Data. It is our mission here at PulsePAD to provide simple services that make it easy to combine content in more valuable ways.

Examples

What are RSS and Feeds?

What is RSS?

RSS, or Really Simple Syndication, is an XML-based format for content distribution on the Internet. It's an excellent way for Internet users to get updated news content and online articles -- you pull in all the stuff you want, without having to search for it.

How Does RSS Work?

Basically, when a new article is posted or a change is made to a webpage, RSS keeps track of the changes and delivers them to you. RSS feeds are most often attached to text, images, podcasts, and video, but they can be used with any document (word processing and spreadsheets) that has content that changes.

Who Benefits From RSS?

Anyone who has been frustrated at the time it takes to find what you want on the Internet can appreciate the time-saving feature of RSS. If there are web pages you visit daily or regularly -- let's say you always read the front page of The New York Times and your best friend's weblog -- RSS eliminates the need to check for updates. Every time something changes on the page, it comes to you. RSS always shows the most recent changes.

How Do I Use RSS?

To view RSS feeds, you need an RSS reader (also called an aggregator), which trolls RSS feeds across the web to regularly update content. All are pretty easy to use, offering users the change to read, email, save or clip content with a click of the mouse. There are many free, web-based readers, all which compile and update feeds, all which allow anonymous access to their feeds from any computer with Internet access. For heavier users, there are desktop, application-based readers that offer more features.

What Can RSS Help Me Do?

One of the original uses for RSS is the ability to create a personal newspaper with new content updated every morning. Beyond that, on the short list of things RSS can do is make it easy to search for an organize information about a particular topic, keep up with your kid's homework, track packages, find cheap airfares, or follow e-Bay auctions and sales. You can get your horoscope, search for jobs, read your favorite comics, get software updates, keep up with other people's schedules and follow calendar listings for your favorite clubs and venues. You can see what others are saying about your favorite sports teams or keep up with what others are saying about your favorite (or least favorite) celebrity. All without surfing through popup ads, slow downloads and poorly navigated sites. RSS saves time. It's as simple as that.

Can I Access RSS Only Through a Computer?

You can access RSS feeds on mobile devices and many cell phones or via email as well as on a computer.

What is a Feed?

A feed is similar to a bookmark in a web browser. If you subscribe to the feed of the New York Times home page, for example, you will always see the latest content from that page in your reader. You can create special search feeds for specific words or phrases, which can be extremely useful for research, or clip content you find for later use or sharing with others. Put another way, a feed is a website that changes.

What is a Post?

In your web reader, each feed shows new articles, or posts, in a list. The reader allows you to read the article on its original page, mark the article as read, rate it, email or IM it to friends or clip it for future reference in a folder.

Who Publishes Content in RSS?

Most online news and information sites publish RSS feeds, and more are being added every day. Part of the popularity of weblogs, or blogs, is that software that creates them have RSS capability, which allows friends and other people to subscribe and share content.

How Do I "Subscribe" to a Feed?

There are various ways. You may see the orange symbol on web pages, which is a link to the RSS feed or a page of feeds. Copy the URL (the web address) of the feed you want and paste it in your reader to subscribe. Many pages offer one-click subscription to well-known aggregators like NewsGater, Bloglines, Rojo and Google Reader. The latest versions of the popular web browsers Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Appls' Safari now incorporate RSS feeds into their bookmark systems. If your bookmarks are showing updated content, you are subscribed to RSS feeds and you don't even know it.

About

PulsePAD is the brainchild of us, Grant Storry and Judd Vinet. We've been working on a series of web projects and dot-coms since the late 90s. These last couple of years have really seen a resurgence of web startups, many under the banner of Web 2.0 application providers. Much of the thrill from the original boom has returned and the industry is vibrant once again with ideas and renewed optimism. It is within this environment that we have decided to throw our hats back into the ring and see what becomes of PulsePAD -- Delivering the pulse of the Internet.

Here at PulsePAD we're passionate about creating value in meaningful ways. In fact, our mission is to provide simple services that make it easy to combine content in more valuable ways.

We like to make web-enabled products that are simple to use and are passionate about infusing Web 2.0 concepts into our ideas and designs. We always appreciated feedback and would like to hear from you at: feedback (at) pulsepad.com.