This document defines conditions for displaying Rhode Island Government Information Exchange Feeds on state websites. Others are strongly encouraged to adopt these guidelines for proper attribution of information, which provides users with details about the source and authority of the information, and to ensure continued access to state government information feeds.
The following information must be displayed (unless noted as optional) when using Rhode Island Government Information Feeds. Information is drawn from the elements required by the RSS Specifications for Creation of Rhode Island Government Information Exchange Feeds. Utilization of these elements can be automated through your parser (eg, Magpie, REX parser).
Element |
Description |
Required? |
|---|---|---|
| title | The name of the feed (or "channel"). This information is contained in the <title> element of the channel. | Required for state agencies; strongly encouraged for others. |
| link | The URL to the HTML website corresponding to the information represented in the feed title. This information is contained in the <link> element of the <channel>. The feed title must be linked to this URL. | Required for state agencies; strongly encouraged for others. |
| description | Phrase or sentence describing the feed, including the official agency name of the content provider. It also includes any official language about the feed that should be displayed, with the comment "recommended language." | Optional. Use of any "recommended language" is strongly encouraged. |
 |
RSS identifier, linked to the URL of the feed. Enables users to add the RSS feed to their aggregator. RSS logo must be linked to the actual RSS feed; the image must be tagged with alt text; RSS feed for (title of feed). If the feed is filtered, add the filter criteria, e.g., RSS feed for Upcoming Meetings for (town). Shortening the title is acceptable to condense the alt text. Logo is available on the REX site. | |
 |
Rhode Island eGovernment Exchange logo, linked to the REX site, http://www.ri.gov/rex/ REX logo must be tagged with alt text: REX, RI eGovernment exchange. Logo is available the REX site. |
Required for state agencies; strongly encouraged for others. |
Element |
Description |
Required? |
|---|---|---|
| title | The title of the item. | Required |
| link | The URL of the item. | Required. |
| description | The item synopsis. | Optional |
| pubDate | Indicates when the item was published. | Required, if description is displayed. |
| source | The RSS channel that the item came from, derived from its title and URL of HTML page corresponding to the feed title if feeds are aggregated. | Required, if multiple feeds are aggregated. |
Feeds should be cached on the data consumers' servers as follows:
The data owner of any RSS/XML feed has the right to limit access to feeds based on server capacity. Any user of data feeds included in the Rhode Island Government Information Exchange project agrees to abide by these specifications. Failure to abide by these specifications may result in denial of service to the offending party.
Rhode Island eGovernment Information Exchange (REX): http://www.ri.gov/rex/
RSS 2.0 Specification: http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss/
RSS Specifications for Creation of Rhode Island Government Information Exchange Feeds
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.
The Rhode Island Web Data Sharing Committee's RSS Utilization of Rhode Island Government Information Exchange Feeds is offered under the terms of Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.