dnews

√app«dnews

Web Developer News

Using PHP and MagpieRSS to present Dynamic News Feeds

In my ongoing quest to demonstrate how the resources I review using the drx application are both pragmatic and worthwhile, I present RSS News feeds for Web developers from a number of different sources, and in several categories. I tweak this list often, so stay tuned. Suggestions are also welcome.

Although wrapping dnews as an application object took a little work, the engine behind actually fetching the news items is the MagpieRSS PHP feed parser (via Expat). Magpie supports RSS 0.9x, 1.0, 2.0 and most Atom format feeds. Installing and getting it working was incredibly easy. The Magpie library is very simple to use, but be warned of the old adage “garbage in = garbage out,” meaning pick your sources carefully and check them out by hand before plugging the results into your own pages. This is especially important if you are using XHTML like I am, or you can easily break your site.

On the bright side, since the results are cached, once an update is fetched (by anyone, not necessary you), the items are displayed very quickly. Not only does this improve the quality of the user’s experience, it is also good practice in order to avoid hammering your sources with requests.

On an even brighter note, I spent approximately one afternoon implementing this application. In addition to MagpieRSS, Feedview and the RSS Feed Validator were also very useful while developing dnews. Enjoy.

By popular demand, I have published a document which describes how this application was built. Visit the Howto MagpieRSS tutorial for more information.

RSS Channel Selector

Developer Buzz

1. Reliance Socially app to update Social Networks on R World

Socially is a VAS application available on Reliance R World for free download with which you can stay connected to your virtual friends via social networks. As of now, Socially is linked with Social networks like Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin. It means you can access multiple sites from one window. Users are now moving ahead of [...]Reliance...
Published: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:44:01 GMT
URI:http://www.artima.com/forums/flat.jsp?forum=196&thread=285170
2. links for 2010-03-10

Books in the Age of the iPad — Craig Mod (tags: apple books ipad) 6 reasons why the iPad could be the 'Star Wars' of tablet computing :: CHICAGO SUN-TIMES :: Andy Ihnatko On a scale of momentousness the iPad feels like a much bigger deal to me than the iPhone did. (tags: apple ipad) Cameron Daigle Dot Com | PodCamp Nashville 2010 Presentation I...
Published: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:44:01 GMT
URI:http://www.artima.com/forums/flat.jsp?forum=196&thread=285168
3. Update Windows 7 Offline with AutoPatcher Updater

AutoPatcher is useful to save your time installing a new Windows OS. You can create a custom Windows setup on your own, but AutoPatcher offers an easier way to do it. With AutoPatcher, you don&#8217;t have to go through all the troubles of creating a custom Windows setup. AutoPatcher has now been updated to support [...]
Published: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:44:01 GMT
URI:http://www.artima.com/forums/flat.jsp?forum=196&thread=285165
4. Panic Blog » The Panic Status Board

Panic Blog » The Panic Status Board: We had our own, comparatively down-market, status screen at work. It displayed four full-screen browser sessions (our coffee-round rota, Google News, Cacti graphs and currently playing music) on a…
Published: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:44:01 GMT
URI:http://www.artima.com/forums/flat.jsp?forum=196&thread=285163
5. Google looks to be `cloud-computing' rainmaker for other o...

more images more images Google opens Web store for business applications SAN FRANCISCO â" Google Inc. will sell the online services of other business software makers in an effort to fill its own product gaps and persuade more companies to rely on applications piped over the Internet. The online store that was announced late Tuesday marks...
Published: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:44:01 GMT
URI:http://www.artima.com/forums/flat.jsp?forum=196&thread=285161
6. Updates for Office and Entourage for Mac Released

Owners of Microsoft’s Entourage and Office 2008 for Mac will be happy to learn that Microsoft has today released an update. The update to office, making it version v12.2.4 will include several improvements to performance and overall stability. Macnn also reported the update, “also included a number of fixes that address security...
Published: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:44:01 GMT
URI:http://www.artima.com/forums/flat.jsp?forum=196&thread=285159
7. Michael Fogus talks to RubyLearning's Clojure Course Parti...

On the eve of the first free, online &#8220;Clojure 101&#8221; course, Michael Kohl of RubyLearning caught up with Michael Fogus, author of the forthcoming book &#8211; The Joy of Clojure. In this interview, Michael Fogus talks to the Clojure 101 course participants on Clojure. Michael>> Welcome, Fogus and thanks for taking out time for...
Published: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:44:01 GMT
URI:http://www.artima.com/forums/flat.jsp?forum=196&thread=285157
8. Times Reader – A Desktop Client to Read the Latest News ...

The New York Times is the largest local metropolitan newspaper as well as third largest overall in the US. Recently it has published a desktop client Times Reader for readers. Times Reader is an Adobe Air application designed to help you read the latest news from the one the giant journalism The New York Times. This tool delivers news [...]
Published: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:44:01 GMT
URI:http://www.artima.com/forums/flat.jsp?forum=196&thread=285155
9. Combine Multiple PDF Files Online Free Up To 80MB

There are many free pdf tools you can use to do this job, but sometimes you just don&#8217;t have access to the programs that you&#8217;ve installed in your computer and, thus, you need to do it using an online application. Meet ilovepdf, an online pdf combiner that lets you combine multiple pdf files for [...]
Published: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:44:01 GMT
URI:http://www.artima.com/forums/flat.jsp?forum=196&thread=285152
10. Perl one-liner to sample your Mac's voices

I've been following stories about Roger Ebert's new voice, which a company has made so that they can apparently plug it into his Mac. In his appearances on camera, the voice he's been using is the Mac "Alex" voice. What other voices does your Mac have? Here's a Perl one-liner to play them. From the Terminal window, paste this in at the prompt:...
Published: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:44:01 GMT
URI:http://www.artima.com/forums/flat.jsp?forum=196&thread=285149
11. Life Tech CEO's 2009 compensation falls 60 percent with no...

Life Technologies CEO's 2009 compensation falls NEW YORK â" Life Technologies Corp. Chairman and CEO Gregory Lucier's compensation fell 60 percent to just over $4.5 million in 2009 on a lack of stock awards, according to an Associated Press calculation of figures disclosed in a regulatory filing. In 2009, Lucier received a 14 percent boost in...
Published: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:44:01 GMT
URI:http://www.artima.com/forums/flat.jsp?forum=196&thread=285147
12. Attention BioWare RPG, Oblivion, and Todd McFarlane Fans!

Press reports today from EA announce a new, huge RPG deal with Curt Schilling’s development studio, 38 Studios that will see Spawn creator Todd McFarlane art directing and author R.A. Salvator penning the story. The title is currently code-named “Project Mercury”, GameSpot reports, and will be an brand new IP set for release on the [...]
Published: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:44:01 GMT
URI:http://www.artima.com/forums/flat.jsp?forum=196&thread=285145
13. Uninstall Panda Internet Security 2010, 2009, 2008, 2007 C...

Panda Internet Security has its own official removal tool to help users to completely uninstall the product from their computers. The best time to use this removal tool is after failing on the uninstallation attempt using the Windows built-in uninstaller, Add/Remove Programs. The uninstaller is provided for free for all of its users and...
Published: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:44:01 GMT
URI:http://www.artima.com/forums/flat.jsp?forum=196&thread=285142
14. Summary Box: Players strum real strings on latest music vi...

more images more images Summary Box: Real strings on new guitar game THE NEXT LEVEL: The small studio behind "Power Gig: Rise of the SixString" hopes to compete with the bigwigs behind "Guitar Hero" and "Rock Band" by having players strum real string, not buttons, to play. THE CHALLENGE: The music video game genre, though popular, faltered last...
Published: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:44:01 GMT
URI:http://www.artima.com/forums/flat.jsp?forum=196&thread=285140
15. iPhone/iPad OS 3.2 SDK Officially Available to Developers

For those of you that have been waiting for the latest version of the iPhone/iPad OS 3.2 Beta 4 SDK, you will be happy to know that Apple today made it available through http://developer.apple.com/iphone/. This is build 10M2144 and comes in at 2.5 GB. Stay posted to BlogsDNA to learn more about anything we might [...]
Published: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 09:44:01 GMT
URI:http://www.artima.com/forums/flat.jsp?forum=196&thread=285138