the-spot.net

For those that don't know what an RSS Feed is, perhaps you've heard of Rueters, or CNN, or MSNBC news headlines that show up on pages and various other places...like the Longhorn Desktop Sidebar.

Well, with a little bit of xml hacking from microsoft, and a little bit of programming knowledge and a little bit of webpage knowledge, we now have an rss feed!

I mainly did it because I want to incorporate it into the forums, to send the latests posts on the site straight to my [your's too] desktop while I am at work, so I don't have to check the site.

The hard part about that is that the page is written in xml...this site is written in php. I have to interface the two, combined with authentication rights, to display the proper new posts and links to them accordingly.

However, the initial hill has been conquered...and that's getting the right code for the feed in the first place. The rest is just some trial and error and code compilations.

tsnV - "Taking innovation and creativity down a notch."

Dude...that just sounds freakin amazing. That'd be awesome to have that. But just to make sure...so that I understand correctly...I won't have to have IE open? I can just see new posts pop up on some window on my desktop? That's sweet.

Yes, that's right. In fact I am typing this post through my Desktop Sidebar right now. I linked the My Spot page to the Sidebar also, and I can check the site and sign in and everything in a small window on the side of my screen...that will fade away after a while to cycle through news headlines, and then come back so I can check the site.

I think for this purpose, and also browsing through a PDA, I will bring back the PDA version of the site with tsnV.

Double post, I know...but you can find the link to the desktop sidebar in the ISA forum, and the link to the rss feed if you want to use it in some other program is here: http://www.the-spot.net/rssfeed/rssfeed2.xml

I have decided to run two feeds. One is the rssfeed2.xml the other is rssfeed.xml.

The one without the number 2 is going to be the one I work with to create the new posts feed, and I've just about figured out (in my head) how to do it. But the rssfeed2.xml, I will actually use for news on the site. I've already put 3 more headlines on there since it was first released.

I like this...innovation and progress...by means of chance, and h4x0rz.

I hate to say it, but ALL of this just went over my head.

You're talking in a language that I don't know.


Can you summerize this in a simpler way?

First of all...none of this really matters unless you have some software that you use to read newsheadlines. It doesn't matter until I incorporate it into the My Spot page, that is. However, you can do as a couple people have already done, and go get the Desktop Sidebar (because it's pretty sweet, and free, and no adware or anything) and use that.

Secone, basically, I have added two new news headline files to the list of this site's features. One is going to be used to show the new posts and their contents right on your desktop [sidebar] or in a window that I will create so you don't have to have the sidebar. The second is going to be used for actual news stories that I write about the site and upcoming events. Something similar to the TSN special Report forum, but more professional.

Other than that, I don't know how else to break it down. If you don't want to do the sidebar thing, then just wait until I get it on the My Spot page, and use that.

Oh! okay!

Well, that's pretty cool!
Thank you, Neo for explaining that for me

No problem.

For those that are curious...these new innovations are basically to prepare the site to be compatible with the next verison of Windows due out next year...but why wait until then to make them, when I can learn now, and make it better by that time, eh?

Ok, good news...I now have the rss feed for New Posts on TSN.

Add http://www.the-spot.net/rss.php to your rss feed as an html page, and it will show you the latest 15 posts. After school is out, I will be working on an upgraded version of that to get some backgrounds and stuff in it, to make it look like the site.

All right...one warning about this new rss feed...it takes away your newest posts on tsnIII...and you have to be automatically logged in if you have access to certain forums that most others don't.

However, it will still work if you're not automatically logged in...you just won't see those forums' posts that a guest is not authorized to see.

I am testing the one for tsnV to see if it does the same thing...and I hope it doesn't...because that would mean some unfortunate side effects.

Good news...it does not take away the newest posts in tsnV. That's probably one of the best features about tsnV, is that you don't lost your newest posts, until you tell it to mark the forum read (if you choose not to read something).

You're probably not going to believe this, if I told you...but we've got a NEW rssfeed now.

This one is for Private Messages. It takes your private messages, the title, sender, time, and message, and brings it right to your desktop.

This rss feed is: http://www.the-spot.net/export_privmsgs.php . Add it as an HTML/URL Feed.

Ok, after some testing on this feed, I have made the conclusive discovery that it does exactly what it says...exports private messages to an xml file...for the main reason of back up.

I am working on a new code that actually delivers them in real-time like the new posts does. So we'll just not worry about this rssfeed link because it's not one (although your reader can read it). And there is a link to the Export Private messages in the Private Message pages.