Semantics of linking rss and atom feeds in html documents

Question

Say on a site I have a blog and portfolio. These are the two most active areas on this site. In terms of linking separate rss feeds for the blog and portfolio. would it be best to:

1. link the blog and portofolio feed on every page?
2. link the blog only in the blog?

Since the files are linked I am wondering if

1. Are feeds downloaded with the css and javascript links?
2. Do they contribute any relational semantic value to the page itself?

I would think in some sense that they do, since they are a directly linked different format, but I guess that depends on what interprets semantics anyway.

Also, when linking the file which protocol(url prefix) is it better to use: (they all seem to do the same thing)

1. http://localhost/myfeed.xml
2. feed://localhost/myfeed.xml
3. feed:http://localhost/myfeed.xml

thanks for all of your thoughts on this.

Answer 1

First question: I would choose 1. If users want your feed, they should get it anywhere in your site.

Second one: The feed is not downloaded with the page, it's just linked so the user get's it as semantic information for the page.

Third: I like to use 1, but I'm not sure if there's any difference.

Answer 2

Convention seems to go with using your first example as the link for an RSS/Atom feed:

http://example.com/feed.xml

Feeds are not downloaded with CSS or JavaScript. They're just plain and really simple. You can include inline CSS and even embed them with video.

External linking to CSS, or running any JavaScript, not happening and won't work. They should be considered stand-alone and focus on the content.

Where you put the link on your site depends on you. If you want it on every page, put it on every page. If you only want to include it on the home page, put it there.

But it wouldn't hurt to include this in the HEAD section of the pages of your site:

<link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" 
           title="Example Title" href="http://example.com/feed" />

When present, a compatible browser will tell the visitor to your site/page that there is a feed available. This is usually represented by the feed icon in the location bar.