How to provide an RSS feed of comments under Nucleus CMS
2007-06-01
So I managed it, and it didn't work quite like I expected. If you're interested, here's how.
Latest Comments
First, go and grab the Latest Comments plugin. If you already have it you're probably going to want a second instance, since its options can only be set site-wide. Make a copy, change it's name (to NP_LatestComments2.php is plenty) and change the class name in the file to match.
While I was tinkering in that file I made a couple of small changes:
Skins and Templates
Clone the 'feeds/rss2' skin, and rename the clone to something like 'feeds/rss2comments'. Now have a look at the 'Main Index' (which is the only part of this skin). The changes I made here were mainly cosmetic and you may want to customise them, but my end result was this:
The crucial part here is that rather than the blog skinvar we're calling the LatestComments2 plugin (or whatever you renamed it to, assuming you did). I left it without arguments since only one of the blogs on my site is open to comments, but you may need to check its documentation for the correct arguments to specify a blog and so on.
Although I initially made one and worried about how to edit it, since nothing here calls a template, you don't need one. The look of individual comments must be customised in the plugin options, as per the next section.
Configuring the LatestComments plugin
Go and examine the 'feeds/rss20' template, and get the 'Item Body' section on the clipboard. Since LatestComments2 stores its format details in its options rather than calling a real template, you'll want to modify this and paste it into the plugin options (although not in that order, necessarily).
Mine looks like this:
Note that the %U substitution is the one I put in while modifying the LatestComments2 plugin and isn't available in the normal version.
Providing a URL
So, we have a skin which - in conjunction with the plugin and its configuration - will provide an RSS feed of the latest comments on all blogs (or the specified blog, if you changed the skinvar call properly). Now for a URL.
In the root folder of the Nucleus installation, make a copy of xml-rss2.php. Call it something like 'xml-rss2-comments.php'. Open it up. You should probably change the $CONF['Self'] entry, although I must admit that I forgot that initially, and it made no difference I could see. The main thing to change is the selectSkin function call, which needs its argument changed to the comments skin you made.
At the bottom of the file is an empty RSS template which is sent if the site is disabled. I left this as it was, but it's another place where the perfectionists among you may want to change things.
That's all that needs doing here. Since the template specifies which blog(s) it includes there's nothing else to say here.
Testing
As I have moaned about before, some feed readers cache very aggressively, so it's a good idea to do some testing now, before your visitors work out what's going on. Make sure your browser isn't set to subscribe to feeds automatically, and visit the xml-rss20-comments.php page. Compare it to your xml-rss2.php. If it looks OK to you, the chances are it'll be fine to feed readers and their users.
Finishing touch
Go and edit the HTML head of your main blog skin. I used the Skin Files plugin to go and edit head.inc, and if that doesn't work the chances are that you know better than I do.
Below the line:
I added
to make the extra feed available as an option when people click the little RSS icon in their browser (or equivalent).
Alternatives and things
I've made a straight feed of everything on the site, since I only have one blog that receives comments. One way to fix it to a particular blog is to add a blog as an argument to the LatestComments2 call in the skin. Another that should work but that I haven't tested is to set the optional second LatestComments argument to 'actual' then use selectBlog('someBlog'); in the xml-rss2-comments.php file; if that works it would allow multiple files referring to the same skin but showing comments for different blogs, which could be helpful.
I chose my feed filename to fit with the blog feed that is there by default; I see no reason why it would need that name, or even need to be in the root directory. If you've got multiple blogs with comments try using extra copies of these files, either with extra templates or the blog selecting tip above.
If you have any questions about the instructions, want to see the source for anything, or want to relate your experiences with this or something similar, drop me a comment.
Latest Comments
First, go and grab the Latest Comments plugin. If you already have it you're probably going to want a second instance, since its options can only be set site-wide. Make a copy, change it's name (to NP_LatestComments2.php is plenty) and change the class name in the file to match.
While I was tinkering in that file I made a couple of small changes:
- I added a new text substitution to insert the link to the commenter's site, taking the site/e-mail/member-page logic from the plugin I wrote to generate the commenter links in the blog proper. That needed the 'cmail' field added to the SELECT, and a new paragraph of playing with strings.
- Straight after the HTML tags are stripped, I added a string replace for "\n"->"<br />", similar to the one that happens in the blog proper.
Skins and Templates
Clone the 'feeds/rss2' skin, and rename the clone to something like 'feeds/rss2comments'. Now have a look at the 'Main Index' (which is the only part of this skin). The changes I made here were mainly cosmetic and you may want to customise them, but my end result was this:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
<rss version="2.0">
<channel>
<title><%blogsetting(name)%> Comments</title>
<link><%blogsetting(url)%></link>
<description>Comments feed for <%blogsetting(name)%></description>
<language>en-gb</language>
<generator><%version%></generator>
<copyright>©2007 QE</copyright>
<category>Weblog</category>
<docs>http://backend.userland.com/rss</docs>
<image>
<url><%blogsetting(url)%>/nucleus/nucleus2.gif</url>
<title><%blogsetting(name)%> Comments</title>
<link><%blogsetting(url)%></link>
</image>
<%LatestComments2(30)%>
</channel>
</rss>The crucial part here is that rather than the blog skinvar we're calling the LatestComments2 plugin (or whatever you renamed it to, assuming you did). I left it without arguments since only one of the blogs on my site is open to comments, but you may need to check its documentation for the correct arguments to specify a blog and so on.
Although I initially made one and worried about how to edit it, since nothing here calls a template, you don't need one. The look of individual comments must be customised in the plugin options, as per the next section.
Configuring the LatestComments plugin
Go and examine the 'feeds/rss20' template, and get the 'Item Body' section on the clipboard. Since LatestComments2 stores its format details in its options rather than calling a real template, you'll want to modify this and paste it into the plugin options (although not in that order, necessarily).
Mine looks like this:
<item>
<title><![CDATA[Comment on '%p']]></title>
<link>http://www.quixoticevil.com/%l</link>
<description><![CDATA[<b>%U</b> wrote:<br /><br />%c]]></description>
<category>Comment</category>
<comments>%l</comments>
<pubDate>%t</pubDate>
</item>Note that the %U substitution is the one I put in while modifying the LatestComments2 plugin and isn't available in the normal version.
Providing a URL
So, we have a skin which - in conjunction with the plugin and its configuration - will provide an RSS feed of the latest comments on all blogs (or the specified blog, if you changed the skinvar call properly). Now for a URL.
In the root folder of the Nucleus installation, make a copy of xml-rss2.php. Call it something like 'xml-rss2-comments.php'. Open it up. You should probably change the $CONF['Self'] entry, although I must admit that I forgot that initially, and it made no difference I could see. The main thing to change is the selectSkin function call, which needs its argument changed to the comments skin you made.
At the bottom of the file is an empty RSS template which is sent if the site is disabled. I left this as it was, but it's another place where the perfectionists among you may want to change things.
That's all that needs doing here. Since the template specifies which blog(s) it includes there's nothing else to say here.
Testing
As I have moaned about before, some feed readers cache very aggressively, so it's a good idea to do some testing now, before your visitors work out what's going on. Make sure your browser isn't set to subscribe to feeds automatically, and visit the xml-rss20-comments.php page. Compare it to your xml-rss2.php. If it looks OK to you, the chances are it'll be fine to feed readers and their users.
Finishing touch
Go and edit the HTML head of your main blog skin. I used the Skin Files plugin to go and edit head.inc, and if that doesn't work the chances are that you know better than I do.
Below the line:
<link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" title="RSS" href="xml-rss2.php" />I added
<link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" title="RSS Comment Feed" href="xml-rss2-comments.php" />to make the extra feed available as an option when people click the little RSS icon in their browser (or equivalent).
Alternatives and things
I've made a straight feed of everything on the site, since I only have one blog that receives comments. One way to fix it to a particular blog is to add a blog as an argument to the LatestComments2 call in the skin. Another that should work but that I haven't tested is to set the optional second LatestComments argument to 'actual' then use selectBlog('someBlog'); in the xml-rss2-comments.php file; if that works it would allow multiple files referring to the same skin but showing comments for different blogs, which could be helpful.
I chose my feed filename to fit with the blog feed that is there by default; I see no reason why it would need that name, or even need to be in the root directory. If you've got multiple blogs with comments try using extra copies of these files, either with extra templates or the blog selecting tip above.
If you have any questions about the instructions, want to see the source for anything, or want to relate your experiences with this or something similar, drop me a comment.
Comments