Re^2: How to retrieve all RSS data

[aquarium]

like has been said, you need to compare apples to apples when it comes to coding.
look at the feed directly in the browser, without a reader, i.e. put the whatever.rss url in the browser url bar. depending on browser it might look a bit different, as most browsers try to apply some basic styling..but importantly all the feed items will be in the page just as your code would download the feed and do things to it.
rss reader applications, some of which are like google reader and some (especially older ones) are standalone GUI applications. these reader applications do a whole lot more stuff behind the scenes, and hence don't just present the feed as you would get it with a single GET request in code.

[show]

Thanks guys for your reply. I see what you are saying but what makes me still puzzled is that When I have a brand new RDF link, and start feeding for the first time with Google Reader, it is able to retrieve old feeds. So there should be a way to do this.

[Utilitarian]

Perhaps you weren't the first person to request that feed on your list and as a result you are added to those monitoring an existing stream. This stream, having existed before you began monitoring it, will have items prior to your adding it to your iGoogle account.

Perl can do many things, but time travel isn't one of them