Bela and the RSS Labs team just released a new version of OPMLworkstation.
Many many thanks to folks in the OPML community who provided feedback
on the first version, as well as ideas directly for this version. Thanks for sharing lots
of very valuable “wishes”.
OPMLworkstation has been expanded to provide free private and public hosting of OPML.
OPMLworkstation also has a one-click “browsing’ or tree directory
feature. What I think is fun is that users can create open public “mini
sites” that are similar to Dave Winer’s OPML blogroll.
using public OPML that was already in the public directory of OPMLworkstation.
1. Someone used OPML to publish a set of instructions for installing Joomla! Just click here. Not sure what Joomla! is, but the mini-site is fun and includes a playable video link.
2. Here is one that I think is in dutch.
3. Here is a Shel and Scoble presentation.
4. Here are class notes to John Palfrey’s Harvard course discussion of Grokster and the Grokster case.
5. Here is a mini site version of TopTenSources for venture capital.
I think mini
sites may be a good way to share reading lists, project plans (password
protected), and university class notes and study guides.
The mini sites generated at OPMLworkstation come with a permalink. The
permalinks are currently kind of ugly, but they work and will be
simplified in short order.
If you have a PowerPoint presentation you’d like to share, you can
convert it on OPMLworkstation, and in one-click generate a mini site
version. You can then email the link to colleagues.
PowerPoint outlines become OPML outlines, which are universally
searchable, shareable, and viewable with web-based services. No
more “PowerPoint silos” in the organization. OPML versions of
PowerPoint files constitute the richest possible metadata enabling, for
example, full text searching.
In OPMLworkstation the “slide
view” of each PowerPoint page is converted into a .gif graphics file,
each of which is apppended to the OPML outline at the appropriate
place. PowerPoint audio files are automatically made into
attachments to the OPML, and can be played. This means that one
could do a podcast in PowerPoint, using the voice annotation feature
built into PowerPoint.
Files produced by the PowerPoint converter are valid OPML.
OPML may be input from other sources. OPML is an open standard, after all. 
Bloglines (the largest market share open aggregator–when will Yahoo open up its OPML interface?)
OPMLmanager (a very good web-based editor)
OPMLeditor (the best overall editor, client-based)
OPMLworkstation can automatically upload OPML if it is given a URL, or users can cut-and-paste OPML files.
All files uploaded or cut-and-pasted are automatically tested with the OPML validator, using the validator (with Dave’s
permission) as an open community web service.
OPMLworkstation passes the
file in question to the validator, and then parses the results to look
for indications that the file successfully passed the validation test.
If a file does not validate, the user is given that
information within OPMLworkstation and is also directed to the OPML validator site for more
information.
OPMLworkstation does allow a user to save invalid OPML. Why? So
that the user does not lose his or her work. However, invalid OPML cannot be browsed
as a mini-site or otherwise further processed until it is fixed.
Any specific user file can be private, public, or public and indexed at OPMLsearch.
A user can can choose to keep any or all OPML private, viewable only in
his or her own password-protected “MyOPML” area, or a user can make
them public for the OPML community. Users can choose which of their
public files will be indexed and searchable at OPMLsearch.com. For
now, any registered user can see all of the community files hosted at
OPMLworkstation in a community directory.
Currently an OPMLworkstation
account is completely free for members of the OPML community.
Since one can become a member of the community simply by declaring that
one is a member, membership is free and open. The site has a
no-nonsense terms of use, and no-nonsense privacy protections.
