[Author's addendum: As of September 30, 2010, Google will discontinue this service. According to their blog post, Page2RSS can perform the same service as Google Reader's "track changes" and can even convert your already existing feeds.]
I’ve been a big Google Reader fan for years now, and I wanted to point out a feature that may not get as much recognition as others. Sometimes you want to add a feed for a site that just doesn’t have a feed. Surely there’s a better way to look for updates than bookmarking and (ir)regularly scheduled visits, right?
Turns out you can add a site to Google Reader even without a true RSS feed available. Google will watch that page for you and generate a Reader item when an update is found.
For example, I want to keep an eye on OIT Current News. I click into Reader and “Add a subscription” like I normally would, then add the normal URL of the OIT Current News page.
Google tells me, “http://oit.ua.edu/news/current.html does not provide a feed. We can create a feed for you, notifying you when the content on the page updates. (Learn more.)”
So far it’s worked brilliantly; I’ve gotten Reader items for each of the last three OIT Current News updates. Just another way Google can help bring the web to you!
