A way around this is to generate a GUID that is embedded in the subscription URL for each user that subscribes to his RSS feed. The GUID could consist of the WAN IP, User-Agent string, and timestamp down to the millisecond converted to an MD5 hash in the query string of the subscription URL. The GUID is generated once and then stored to track retrievals of the feed. RSScache does this. It's quite elegant. However, it doesn't solve the problem for current subscribers. Glenn would have to migrate everyone over to the new feed containing the GUID generating code. I can't think of an automated way to do this, at the moment.

posted: 8:49:23 PM  permalink  trackback ()  comments ()    

I was reading Glenn’s post about his RSS throttling scheme. I don’t think it is working quite like he wants it to. He will serve his Wi-Fi Networking News RSS file if it has changed since the last time an IP and User-Agent combination retrieved it. I haven’t received updates via RSS in a while. I suspect it is because that all the networks I’m regularly on use NAT, specifically the Time-Warner RoadRunner network. The problem with Glenn’s approach is that many people will access his feed with the same IP and User-Agent combination if they are coming from a NAT’ed network. If a corporation standardizes in a specific aggregator and they run a NAT'ed network, only one person in that company is going to get his feed. This could greatly impair the site if the company is a wireless vendor or carrier. Given his scheme, only one user using a specific RSS reader will get updates whenever the RSS file gets updated. This may be inviting more problems that he bargained for. In order to insure that I get the updates I can change the frequency with which I check Wi-Fi Networking News to, let’s say, one second. If another fan of Wi-Fi Networking News reads this post and wants to beat me to the updates with Newsgator, he may set his RSS reader to check every 0.75 seconds. Glenn’s inviting a DDoS attack with his scheme. Then again, I may be completely missing something.

posted: 7:34:55 PM  permalink  trackback ()  comments ()    

It’s interesting to see all of the stuff coming out of China these days. Dan Gilmore spent some time in China last month teaching and talking to student and faulty about blogs. IBM is selling its PC business to a Chinese firm. PalmSource just bought a Chinese firm. I think it’s safe to say that US high tech industry is in love with China. What business wouldn’t be? The economics look great. Who will have the next major deal with a Chinese firm? Who knows, but I’d put money on a coming decade of great stories out of China.

posted: 7:26:24 PM  permalink  trackback ()  comments ()    

Why don’t you blog more about what’s going on at UserLand?

posted: 7:24:12 PM  permalink  trackback ()  comments ()    

I’ve created my Radio UserLand feature wish list. You can find the OPML version here and the ActiveRenderer version here.

posted: 7:23:12 PM  permalink  trackback ()  comments ()