The RSS Feeds Home Page (Outlook 2007)

If you are just learning about RSS feeds, or would like to add some feeds from major sources like Forbes magazine, FOXsports, or MSNBC, the Outlook RSS Feeds home page will help you.

To reach the Outlook RSS Feeds home page, look for the RSS Feeds folder in the Outlook 2007 Mail Folders list. Click that, and Outlook opens a page called: "RSS Feeds - Outlook Syndicated Contest (RSS) Directory." This page gives you basic information on using feeds in Outlook 2007 and a collection of more than two dozen feeds you can easily subscribe to right from the page.

This page has two big things going for it:

1. A collection of big-name feeds from Microsoft partners


2. A simplified way to subscribe to them

To see the current set of partner feeds, scroll down the page. There's a lot of good, mostly mainstream, stuff here. If you would like to see the simplified subscription method that this page provides, pick one of the feeds, and continue with the next section.

Subscribing to Feeds with the RSS Feeds Home Page

1. On the RSS Feeds home page, click the link for the feed you want to subscribe to.


2. View the Microsoft Office Outlook Security Notice that appears. But DON'T PANIC!
   
   
   
   This notice is nothing to worry about right now.

   The notice warns you that the RSS feed you are about to subscribe to may be unsafe. It sounds ominous, but is really pointless. The warning appears because the RSS feed includes hyperlinks. But hyperlinks are the links by which you navigate around the Internet. Throwing up a warning that hyperlinks are a security concern is in effect telling you that using the Internet can be dangerous.

   While it may be true, it is a silly warning. Especially when it pops up for every one of the RSS feeds that Microsoft lists in its directory, and could theoretically be applied before opening every single web page in existence.

   Click Yes and move on.



3. Next a dialog box appears asking you if you reall want to "Add this RSS feed to Outlook?" and offering you the option to configure how the feed works through an Advanced button.
   
   
   
   
   Confirming that you want to add the feed.

   While you can configure the feed, I recommend you accept the default settings, and click Yes here too.

After a moment of grinding and whirring, Outlook adds a folder for the new feed to the RSS Feeds folder and displays a list of the topics it has downloaded. Now that you know to ignore the spurious security notice, this is a quick and easy way to add RSS feeds to Outlook.