goon's Journal: Quick note on RSS #30

Summary
  Journal #30, Mucking around with RSS &
  Perl this week. Fine tuning regular
  expressions. Listening to Dave Winer on
  ITConversations about RSS. Reading
  about RSS on JOS. RSS stands for
  `Really Simple Syndication` and
  simplicity is its focus.[0]

Really Simple Syndication
In a Joel on Software forum, I answered a query by Rudolf F. Vanek on RSS Feed creation. [1]

  `... What SW do you guys use to publish
  RSS Feeds? ...`

More questions need answering? For instance
        * Do you want the feed generated by your code or third party app, thus saving time & money?
        * What language are you using, planning to use?
        * What version of RSS are you planning to use?

By application
If you are looking for a product and not interested in coding a solution to generate RSS , then try some third party service like the poster above suggested. [2] There are limitations (update times, RSS version choice, length of items in file etc) but no coding requirements.

By code
If you are a developer, what language are you familiar with? Perl, Python, PHP, c# or lisp? Most langauges have libraries to help developers build valid RSS files without having to hand code to the specification. Of course you can do this if you like. But after the first couple of posts doing this will be akin to doing your morning yoga asana, `Surya-namaska`[3], over and over again. It may be good for you but, but not something you want to do all the time.

For me I use Perl (you can substitute you favourite/current langauge) and the CPAN module XML::RSS .[4] There are plenty of example bits of code and the module supports 0.9, 0.91, 1.0, 2.0 Rss formats.

Formats
`What is the difference between the formats`, you ask? If your not sure of the merits of each, then pop over to this RSS tutorial [5]. I chose to support version 2.0, the same as Dave Winer of scripting.com, the creator of the RSS format.

Reference
[0] `Mark Nottingham`, RSS Tutorial for Content Publishers and Webmasters:
http://www.mnot.net/rss/tutorial/#RSS09x
[Accessed Tuesday 13, September 2005]

[1] `Rudolf F. Vanek`, RSS Feeds Creation, What SW do you guys use to publish RSS Feeds?:
http://discuss.joelonsoftware.com/default.asp?biz.5.195510.6
[Accessed Tuesday, 13 September 2005]

[2] `Quinton Mawhinney`, Theres other alternatives available from third party companies if you dont have anything to make feeds with, like feedforall and free sites like rss.icerocket.com,nooked.com, rssbazaar.com etc:
http://discuss.joelonsoftware.com/default.asp?biz.5.195510.6
[Accessed Tuesday, 13 September 2005]

[3] `Surya-namaska`, A sana or exercise called the Sun Salutation pose:
http://www.santosha.com/asanas/suryanamaskar.html
[Accessed Tuesday, 13 September 2005]

[4] `XML RSS`, creates and updates RSS files in various different formats, 0.9, 0.91, 1.0, 2,0:
http://search.cpan.org/%7Ekellan/XML-RSS-1.05/
[Accessed: Tuesday, 13 September 2005]

[5] `Mark Nottingham`, Ibid.

Mirror of bootload: groking software, bit by bit into plain english