• WHAT: A simple way to keep up with changes on your favorite web pages via your cell phone
  
• WHY: Sometimes you just can't sit at your computer waiting for changes
• COST: Absolutely free (text message rates apply)

If you're a news freak, an eBay fanatic or just someone that wants to keep up with the latest entries on a web page you probably already know what an "RSS Feed" is.  If you don't, there's a great tutorial HERE.  But suffice it to say that an RSS "feed" puts all of the updates that are added to a web page in one place, on one page in your browser (or in your email application) so that it's easy and convenient to keep up with the latest on your favorite blogs or news sites.

RSS feeds work with one small problem – they don't do you any good if you're away from your computer.  I mean, if you're looking to keep track of news, follow a particular blog about politics, read the late-breaking developments on a patent case or something else that requires your attention, what good does an RSS feed do if you're out of the office?  Answer: Not much… until now.  

There's a company of folks that must be as fanatic about keeping up with their news and information as I am; they've developed a very cool application that is web-based but uses text messaging to update you on the latest information using RSS feeds.  It's called Pingie and the interface couldn't be simpler.  

If you've got a favorite web page that you want to keep up with - say, the latest tips and tricks on TheWirelessWizard.com - the first thing you need to do is to get the RSS feed URL (translation: get the address of the web page that is available in this feed updating process).  In virtually every case where an RSS feed is available, which isn't all the time, there will be a logo that looks like a orange square with some radio waves in it.  That's the RSS feed indicator - just click on that and it will take you to the page that contains all these real-time updates.  Using the page that the summary for this blog post appears on as an example, TheWirelessWizard.com's tips, tricks and shortcuts page, the RSS feed is: http://www.thewirelesswizard.com/tips-tricks-shortcuts/rss.xml


Now that you know what the RSS feed is, go to the Pingie page that you'll use to set up the text messages to your phone.  CLICK HERE to go to the Pingie site.  From here it's a breeze as you only need to fill in three blank fields: email address, RSS feed address and your mobile phone number.  The email address is for verification only - the updates that you receive after you set up the alerts will go to your phone.  


So the end result of this is simple - whenever a web page that you want to track is updated you will receive a text message on your phone telling you that that has occurred, in addition to a quick summary of that change (the size of the summary is dependent on both the limits your phone company sets for these text messages as well as the limit that the web site establishes for its RSS feeds.  Some RSS feeds offer just a line or two, others offer the first paragraph, etc.  


Regardless of the size of the update, it's a lot more efficient to get alerted to it on your phone than to have to be at your computer to keep up with the latest additions to the site.  


Pingie is still in beta, but is fully functional to the best I can tell, so I feel confident in telling you about it.  If you have any comments about it, problems with it or suggestions about how to improve it, say so in the comments below.