Implementing RSS feed functionality inside of Sitefinity is quite simple, but initially I wasn't sure what settings mattered and what to expect from the RSS Feed control.... so now that I have pulled it together, let me pass it on for others to benefit from:

Concepts

There are two components to consider:

• RSS Feed Service  (behind-the-scene)
• RSS Control (public facing)

The RSS Feed Service is an HTTP Handler that listens and responds to requests for RSS feed content.  Typically there is a  .XML or .RSS file that contains content to inform subscribers about.  However this requires periodically creating and/or updating the file for fresh content.  With the Sitefinity RSS Feed Service, the content is dynamically created when a request is made for RSS content.  Thus, you create an RSS Feed service for some targeted content (ex. a blog, a set of web pages, a forum, an event, etc) and Sitefinity will take care of serving up the right content when requested.

The RSS Control is simply a link to the RSS Feed content that the service is serving up. You can add the RSS Control to a page with a text or image link that points to the RSS feed content.   In reality, you could just put a hyperlink on the page to that references the pseudo RSS feed file.

Implementation

Below is a step-by-step illustration of setting up both the RSS Feed service and placing the reference to it with an image link on a Sitefinity page.

RSS Feed Service

Log into Sitefinity and go to the Administration section with the RSS Feed services are defined.

Fill out a name for the RSS Feed service and a reasonable description to help you understand its purpose and maintain it in the future.

Enter a simple name for the RSS file off the root of your website; the .rss file type is used because it is a standard.   If you were to go to this URL, Sitefinity would dynamically generate the RSS feed content and display it.

Set the Channel URL to the content page that you plan to get the dynamic content from.  When the end-user reviews your RSS feed, it will be shown a set of topics and the start of the content.  If the user wants to view the full content, they click on the link and it goes to this Channel URL.

Click the Select button next to the Channel URL textbox to open the Channel URL dialog and navigate an existing page that you'd like to use to display the content whent the end-user clicks-through to the full content.

Select a specific blog to include in the RSS Feed.

You have now completed the creation of the RSS Feed service.  When a request comes in for that RSS Feed, this service will 'serve' up the content dynamically.

Next you want to show a link to the RSS Feed so people can click on it and opt to subscribe to the feed.  Without this, no one would know what you are offering and thus no one would sign up to watch it.

RSS Feed Control on a Web Page

Go to pages

Edit a page that you want the RSS Feed link displayed on.

From the set of controls in the 'Add Controls' dropdown.  Open the RSS Feed section then drag-n-drop the RSS Feed control into a placeholder on your page.

Edit this instance of the RSS Feed control

Fill in Text as link text.

Enter the RSS feed file URL that you created above (ex. ~/pdr.rss)

Optionally specify a CSS class to use for positioning and formatting of this link. 

.cssRSSFeedLink
{
  text-align:right;
  position:absolute;
  float:left;
  padding-top:2px;
  padding-top:5px;
}

If you want the link to be a link image, then go out on the web and find a nice RSS image and upload it to the Images directory of your website.  Enter that relative URL for the image in the Image URL property.

Scroll down further to fill out the ID and Target. 

The ID specifically describes this instance of the RSS Feed link. 

Use a target of _blank so a new browser window opens to show the RSS Feed subscription page.

Click " I'm done " to complete the configuration of the RSS Feed link.

Publish the new content

The result is a page with the RSS.gif image as a hyperlink that a user can click on. 

If they hover, they see your descriptive text.

After clicking on that RSS Feed link, the Sitefinity RSS Feed service dynamically created the RSS Feed document and displays it in a separate web browser window.  If the user is interested, they can click to subscribe.  

The user must have an RSS Viewer (ex. Microsoft Office Outlook) in order to view new content based on the RSS viewer periodically requesting the latest version of the content.  They can then read the highlights in the viewer and click on the content to jump to your website to view the full content.

So there you have it... setup the RSS Feed service to define what to watch and then include a link to the RSS Feed URL so someone can decide whether to subscribe to it.