Archive for April, 2007

Sam Ruby pointed out HTTP 410 GONE support in feed readers or rather the lack thereof. He links to the list of User-Agent strings that continue to request the feed that is gone. One of the entries points at the Windows RSS Platform as an "offender":

Windows RSS Platform/1.0 (MSIE 7.0; Windows NT 5.1)

It's listed with 282 hits. At first I was surprised to see the Windows RSS Platform in that list since we specifically added 410 GONE support. But then it dawned on me: That's not the Windows RSS Platform!

Well, it is, but it isn't. The above User-Agent string is the one from the Beta 2 Preview release (Jan 2006) of the Windows RSS Platform. The User-Agent string changed in Beta 2 (April 2006) to the final string:

Windows-RSS-Platform/1.0 (MSIE 7.0; Windows NT 5.1)

I described the string here a year ago. See the difference? The dashes instead of spaces! Why the change? Well it turns out that the product token of the User-Agent string may not include spaces, since spaces delimit product tokens and comments.

So it turns out that there are still people running the Beta 2 Preview version of the Windows RSS Platform, or some application is "faking" the User-Agent string.

Either way, I just verified that the RTM version of the Windows RSS Platform handles 410 GONE correctly. I used the following Powershell script:

$fm = new-object -comobject "Microsoft.FeedsManager"

$feed = $fm.rootfolder.CreateFeed("gone","http://www.intertwingly.net/blog/index.rss")

$feed.SyncSetting

$feed.Download()

$feed.SyncSetting

When you run it you will see that the SyncSetting property is changed from 0 to 2 after the Download() call. Note that the SyncSettings are defined as:

typedef enum {     

FSS_DEFAULT = 0,     

FSS_INTERVAL = 1,     

FSS_MANUAL = 2

} FEEDS_SYNC_SETTING;

FSS_DEFAULT - Use the system-defined DefaultInterval value.

FSS_INTERVAL - Use the Interval value defined by the feed.

FSS_MANUAL - Do not automatically update the feed. Use Download to manually update the feed.

which means that the feed initially uses the default sync interval to get updated. Upon download, the setting is changed to Manual since a feed that is GONE should no longer be updated automatically.

- Walter vonKoch

Well, it's taken longer than anyone (including us) expected, but we can finally offer an update regarding the mail gadget. We're hoping that sharing this information doesn't jinx us and cause further delays :)

The gadget was pulled due to a security issue, which we initially believed could be fixed in a relatively quick fashion. We take security very seriously, and once we became aware of the issue, disabling this gadget was the best way to protect our users.

As our developers worked with the Hotmail developers to see how we could restore the gadget's functionality (while ensuring your data was secure), it became evident that the task was originally much larger than anyone anticipated. The gadget had to be rewritten to "talk" to Hotmail in an entirely new way, and the Hotmail team needed to add new functionality on their end as well. The time needed to design, implement, and test this new functionality is the reason that the gadget has been broken for so long.

However, there's hope on the horizon! While we can't yet give you a definite date (that would be really bad luck), we believe our developers have entered the home stretch with their bug fixes, and the light at the end of the tunnel is growing ever closer. Once the gadget comes back online, we'll return it to the directory so you can once again add it (if you have removed it), and of course, we'll post a very happy blog post here :)

There is a slight catch, however, that we wanted to alert you to. When the gadget returns, you will need to have a Windows Live Hotmail account to use it. This is the "new" version of Hotmail, which offers much richer functionality than the old one. The good news is that upgrading to Windows Live Hotmail is free, and can be done today, by clicking the link in the upper left hand corner of the screen after you log in to Hotmail. The link should look like this:

If you haven't yet tried Windows Live Hotmail, all of the cool new features are sure to keep you occupied until we get the gadget back online. :) Your email address will not be changed when you upgrade to Windows Live Hotmail.

Thanks very much for everyone's understanding - we know you've been anxious to get this gadget back, and we're doing everything we can to get it to you.

Sincerely,

The Live.com Team

Well, it's taken longer than anyone (including us) expected, but we can finally offer an update regarding the mail gadget. We're hoping that sharing this information doesn't jinx us and cause further delays :)

The gadget was pulled due to a security issue, which we initially believed could be fixed in a relatively quick fashion. We take security very seriously, and once we became aware of the issue, disabling this gadget was the best way to protect our users.

As our developers worked with the Hotmail developers to see how we could restore the gadget's functionality (while ensuring your data was secure), it became evident that the task was originally much larger than anyone anticipated. The gadget had to be rewritten to "talk" to Hotmail in an entirely new way, and the Hotmail team needed to add new functionality on their end as well. The time needed to design, implement, and test this new functionality is the reason that the gadget has been broken for so long.

However, there's hope on the horizon! While we can't yet give you a definite date (that would be really bad luck), we believe our developers have entered the home stretch with their bug fixes, and the light at the end of the tunnel is growing ever closer. Once the gadget comes back online, we'll return it to the directory so you can once again add it (if you have removed it), and of course, we'll post a very happy blog post here :)

There is a slight catch, however, that we wanted to alert you to. When the gadget returns, you will need to have a Windows Live Hotmail account to use it. This is the "new" version of Hotmail, which offers much richer functionality than the old one. The good news is that upgrading to Windows Live Hotmail is free, and can be done today, by clicking the link in the upper left hand corner of the screen after you log in to Hotmail. The link should look like this:

If you haven't yet tried Windows Live Hotmail, all of the cool new features are sure to keep you occupied until we get the gadget back online. :) Your email address will not be changed when you upgrade to Windows Live Hotmail.

Thanks very much for everyone's understanding - we know you've been anxious to get this gadget back, and we're doing everything we can to get it to you.

Sincerely,

The Live.com Team

It's been quiet here for a couple months, but plenty of things have been happening in the RSS world. Most recently, Windows Live Spaces had an update (more at the Space Craft blog).

Mike Torres, all-powerful lead PM on the Spaces team dropped me note to point out that they went RSS-crazy in this update, with category feeds, feeds for every list (even a feed for all lists), profile feeds, comment feeds, a feed of your friends, and even a feed of all of the feeds on your space.

It's fantastic -- everything you might want to get is accessible via RSS!

Mike's blog post has all the details.

- Sean