Netscape dumps critical file, breaks RSS 0.9 feeds

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Jan. 12, 2007

In the standard definition of RSS 0.91, there are a couple of lines referring to "DOCTYPE" and referencing a "dtd" spec hosted on Netscape's website. We're betting that those lines are the source of "New Year's cheer" for more than a few webmasters.

Specifically, the two lines are:

We're not entirely sure when it began, but we're guessing that sometime after New Year's Day, 2007, attempts to access my.netscape.com/publish/formats/rss-0.91.dtd began generating "404 errors" (file not found). Evidently, someone at Netscape deleted that seemingly unimportant file from netscape.com's server.

About a week into 2007, we began receiving complaints from readers of this site and its siblings, LinuxDevices.com and WindowsForDevices.com, that our RSS feeds had begun to malfunction. So, we investigated the problem.

One of the first tests we performed was with the online RSS feed validator. It found no problems, and even offered us a "valid RSS banner" that we could associate with our now-nonworking feeds.

We tried several feed readers, and eventually got an error message from one of them -- something to do with a "DOCTYPE" statement. Googling the two keywords, RSS DOCTYPE, led us to a blog posting that mentioned 404 errors in attempting to access Netscape's rss-0.91.dtd "Document Type Definition" file -- the very one defined in the standard definition of RSS 0.91. Uh-oh!

More googling led to a cached copy of the old Netscape-hosted rss-0.91.dtd, which we then placed on our servers. And, we modified the DOCTYPE references in our RSS feeds to point to new location of the dtd document, rather than the traditional location at netscape.com.

Apparently, a lot of feed readers and services (e.g. Firefox and Google) don't bother following links to dtd files, or may have their own cached versions available. But others -- Microsoft's Live.com RSS feed gadget is one example -- do check for the files, and refuse to load feeds if the referenced dtd file can't be located.

We're guessing that someone at Netscape deleted the venerable rss-0.91.dtd file from its traditional location on netscape.com around the first of the year -- most likely whoever did it thought they were simply cleaning up some insignificant cruft.

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Home \| News \| About \| Contact

	Ziff Davis Enterprise Home \| Contact Us \| Advertise \| Link to Us \| Reprints \| Magazine Subscriptions \| Newsletters Tech RSS Feeds \| White Papers \| ROI Calculators \| Tech Podcasts \| Tech Video \| VARs \| Channel News
	Baseline \| Careers \| Channel Insider \| CIO Insight \| DesktopLinux \| DeviceForge \| DevSource \| eSeminars \| eWEEK \| Enterprise Network Security \| LinuxDevices \| Linux Watch \| Microsoft Watch \| Mid-market \| Networking \| PDF Zone \| Publish \| Security IT Hub \| Strategic Partner \| Web Buyer's Guide \| Windows for Devices
	Developer Shed \| Dev Shed \| ASP Free \| Dev Articles \| Dev Hardware \| SEO Chat \| Tutorialized \| Scripts \| Code Walkers \| Web Hosters \| Dev Mechanic \| Dev Archives \| igrep
Use of this site is governed by our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. Except where otherwise specified, the contents of this site are copyright © 1999-2010 Ziff Davis Enterprise Holdings Inc. All Rights Reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part in any form or medium without express written permission of Ziff Davis Enterprise is prohibited.