An invisible correction
Fictional case: the reader deduplicates by identifier and misses a modification. Compare content and update time before saying nothing changed.
In-depth practical guides
Check an RSS or Atom feed for monitoring
Test reader delivery, preserve identifiers and detect silent collection gaps.
Updated :
AI-generated illustration · Reading room and research library. Illustrative scene.
Does no new item mean no publication?
A feed is a discovery channel, not necessarily a complete archive. Publishers can correct items, limit retention or change feeds. Compare received documents, reader behaviour and original pages.
Identify the channel
Record URL, operator, format and topic scope. Inspect the response: success may return HTML instead of expected XML. Keep access date and state.
Track identifiers
Store item identifier and public link separately. In Atom distinguish publication and update; do not assume every RSS guid is a URL. Changed titles need not mean new items.
Test delivery and recovery
Compare a known publication with the reader. Check polling, parsing failures and recovery after interruption. Include an update to an existing item.
Qualify coverage
Record oldest and newest entries, count and observed gaps. Compare a limited period with the publisher’s site. State what the feed cannot reconstruct.
Situations and decisions
Typical situations for preparing a check. They do not describe completed assignments or actual observations.
A week offline
An illustrative feed keeps 20 items. A gap can lose publications if more than 20 arrive. Test a recovery source instead of claiming full coverage.
Record to retain
- Feed URL and format
- Identifiers, links and dates
- Reader state and interruptions
- Comparison with original pages
Official references
Related source profiles
Related protocols
Checks before reaching a conclusion
- Is the expected format received?
- Are identifiers stable?
- Are updates detected?
- Are collection gaps known?
A tested monitoring channel with documented coverage and recovery.
Frequently asked questions
Is an RSS guid always a link?
No. Read the link element and guid attributes. Keep identifier and URL separate instead of making addresses from opaque identifiers.
Can a feed be the only archive?
Not for claimed historical coverage. Check retention and recovery; preserve relevant responses and compare primary documents.
TOOLS / REGISTERS
Write a record
Accessibility does not guarantee freshness or completeness. Cache and timestamp differences can delay arrival. Missing feed items do not prove non-publication.
- Access date and time zone
- Exact URL
- HTTP status / redirect
- Dataset / series code
- Publication date
- Version / revision
- Expected result
- Observed result
- Limit / uncertainty
- Decision / next action
- Review owner
- Next review