In my forum I needed an extension to show up our common del.icio.us links in the sidebar. So, I developed this extension that does exactly this: reads any RSS/Atom/RDF feed and displays titles and links in a side panel.

FeedReader extension

It should be able to read RSS, Atom and RDF feeds without problems.

It's labeled as 0.3 since I'm still working on it: I have to improve something here and there, plus improve customizability.

I'm also trying to make it as modular as possible. At this time in this package you will find that the fetch, parse and cache operations are handled by separate classes, so you might find useful to reuse the code for other extensions. Plus I'm working on an "easier" way to add Settings Panels.
If you're an Extensions developer, you might be interested on the classes ready inside this package.

If you want to give some feedback, it will be very appreciated. :)


Thanks a lot to SirNotAppearingOnThisForum since I've used its FlickrFeed extension as a base for mine (main code, RSSCache, Snoopy).
Thanks also to everyone that's supporting this Extensions and helping me to find bugs.

Yes, great extension folleto. Thanks.

It works fine, with the default feed, however, I'm getting the error:

Warning: Invalid argument supplied for foreach() in /home/.../public_html/forum/extensions/FeedReader/default.php on line 138

after changing to the feed source. Any ideas?

@strawberries
If you could give me the feeds that doesn't work I'll try to get them working. :)

@LoOkHerE
I need if possible the feed source, still I can do something already with the current error. I'll see. :)

@bloggywood
The theme shouldn't be cause of any problem, since I'm using standard functions. Could I ask also to you the feed causing the problem? With the del.icio.us feed does it work?

Hi folletto!

I have tried to in the "Attach"-section of default.php to use the one feed that is commented. On line 126 (http://im.digitalhymn.com/feed/). But there were no change. The feed still didn't show...

As soon as i changed the feed from del.icio.us to my own (http://bloggywood.se/feed/) it disappeard. I've checked the cache-directory, and the latest cache-file is from my feed with my content... strange? What could be the problem?

As you have probably noticed, i'm no expert. :) So i'm thankful for all the help i can get...

There was a similar feed reader ext in the older vanilla. The ability to alter the title and length of feed cached was in there. Possibility in a future update?

In fact, it's in 0.1 release due to this: I've got to make a few improvements before labeling it 1.0, those two are in the list. :D

At this time I'm trying to manage the bugs above, improving the cache and the parser and adding a preferences panel. :)

Thank you very much. I'll check them out. :D

@Mr K: You're a genius... well, a very intelligent and kind man. Thanks for sharign, that sorted it for me ; )

Thank you, at this time I was working on the Settings Panel in order to make the extension configurable. :)

One of the steps needed to be the detection of the feeds, if you are already doing something like that as a standalone class based on XMLPlainParser I'll skip that part and work on something elese. :)

I have to say that adding a panel is quite "hard", so since I'm already working on this I'm also creating a class to easy integrate a Settings Panel. Will be in with the next release of the extension.

Ok, version 0.2 is online... it should be able to read Atom, RSS, RDF now.

I'm quite there also for the configuration panel. At this time it just shows you the feed URL. ;)
For the configuration panel it's based on a meta-class that makes "easy" to create a configuration panel. It's in "beta" but still I'm quite there.

@ LoOkHerE
As soon I'm there with the Settings Panel it should be a configurable option. Incoming... ;)

great work folletto and great tips, Mr K.

gonna download the new version now.

Many thanks.

Dont some of marks classes already let you make settings panels pretty easily? I'd be amazed if they didnt...

Depends what is the meaning you give to "easy". ;)

Mark did an excellent work (apart from the capitalization gh :D) but adding a panel means something like 300 lines of code, looking at his own Style extension.

Since adding a panel I think should be something like: one line for the init, one line for a panel and then the content, I'm wrapping all the working/framework code inside a class to make everything straight.

At this time I have one line for the init and one class with a function for each "PostBackAction". Simple to understand, simple to implement, does right what you expect to.

I still have to get a few details on the Vanilla workings for the Settings Panel and the wrapper class is ready for anyone that wants to add a configuration panel with just its code. :)

Take a look at the Mark's code on the Style extension and my code on the FeedReader extension and you'll notice a huge difference. :)

~

Context: I'm a user interface and user experience designer and before that a developer... and I've got a big concern on how the "developer" side needs to get a user-centric mind. It's quite crazy if you think that very little has changed since text editors to write code, for example. Now the "world" is trying -with many difficulties- to understand what means "user centric" for the final product... but still I think that there should be a sort of "developer centric" development, if you forgive me the word joke. :)

In this case, it's not a Mark's fault, since the project IS BIG, just I think that to make extensions development easier there should be an easier way to create a configuration panel. With this I mean that a developer should have a choice: the "core" Mark's classes and a "simple" alternative for an easier implementation, that on a not-time-critical task like the settings panel could handle a little overhead and simplification.


Mmmm... I made myself clear? :)

~

To define better my position: I think that Vanilla is one of the projects around with the best source code, well designed and parametrized, with an excellent architecture and good modules support... and of course, a class-based estensions system. Ode to Mark for this. :)

Sorry, I've been (and I am) a little lenghty, but I prefer to write too much and being unread than writing less and missing something important. :)

On the other side, I enjoy to write a "good" architecture so it isn't a problem at all for me to wrap a class instead of writing plain code... It isn't a loss of time at all, even if I will be the only one using it. :)

have you updated to the new version?
I'd recommend that and see if it fixes it

OK, so I just got the same type of error in the new version, this time alluding to line 176...

The feed I use comes from a delicious account, and I know that delicious sometimes has a moment or two of frozen time issues. If it was possible to display the errors message for the ext in the sidebar instead, or either revert to a 'default' feed if the main one isn't working.

The main problem with this error coming up is that if you have just typed and posted a message it will be lost completely.

VERY annoying for forum users who like to type long posts

Ok, thankyou again.

I'll check the error issue on line 176 and the parser problem on - as it seems - non-ascii chars. :)

[EDIT]
At a first look, it seems an encoding problem, maybe related to UTF-8 and mb php strings.

Could you please check if your feed is encoded UTF-8?

altho it looked excellent for me and most others, one of my regulars reported that the rss feed pushed my discussion threads half way down th epage.ie he had to scroll to see the threads and comments.

I took the rssfeeder extension off yesterday and he says it now looks perfect.

Great shame, because I loved the extension.

i am using the jazzman style/theme.....i think it relies/needs th evanilla theme to work

http://www.love2escape.com/chat

PS - i ended up also taking down the google adsense extension today because a regular poster reported that it was also pushing threads one quarter down the page on one of his pc's.

breaking news - turned the rss feed extension back on again - and now the poster who had the problems says look sfine.

So it may well have been the google adsense extension (sat at the top of each page) that was pushing everything down the page.

folletto, again many many thanks for this extension. I love it.

brought my site down, folletto. :(

Thus I had to disable the extension.

the error was:

Fatal error: Call to undefined function: mb_strtolower() in /home/mysitename/public_html/chat/extensions/FeedReader/XMLPlainParser.class.inc on line 209

For the time being, just remove mb_ from the function in that line and everything should be ok.

My fault, I was working on the solution to the other issue and I've forgot a multybyte function inside :|

I'll up a *fix* release in a while. I feel dumb in those situations :P

--> 0.3 zip on the Add-ons list fixed. Thankyou.

This a great extension.

Would it be possible to have multiple feeds?

Also can it be changed so the links open in a new window?

Multiple feeds, mmmm interesting.

In a new window... mmmm.

I have to manage the Settings panel, first, I see...

I'm sorry but life is calling in those days. I'll do what I can ;)

In case anyone else is looking for a solution, I deleted the cache and it's now working again.