How to ... load RSS and ATOM feeds?

What?

In addition to "normal" web pages to be viewed in a web browser, some sites also provide news or other information in a format known as RSS (Really Simple Syndication). Links to such "RSS feeds" often look like XML or RSS.

RSS feeds have a special format that doesn't look very readable when opened in a normal browser, but there are special "RSS readers" that can present such feeds in a clearly arranged way.

As the structure of "RSS feeds" is very similar to that of newsgroups (feed=newsserver, channel=newsgroup, item=message), Hamster Playground has a script command to load RSS feeds and convert them into newsgroup messages. The resulting messages can then be read with your normal newsreader, without the need for a special RSS reader.

How?

RSS feeds are loaded with script command "HamWebReader".

If you are familiar with Hamster's scripting language, just add an appropriate HamWebReader line for every every RSS feed in your transfer scripts (see description and examples at: HamWebReader).

If you are not familiar with Hamster scripts, no need to worry and no need to learn it: There are two demo scripts installed with Hamster Playground that are "ready to run" and can easily be modified or extended.

First script is Demo-RSS-Simple.hsc - it will load some example feeds for categories "World News", "Science" and "Security" whenever it is started. Second script is Demo-RSS-Advanced.hsc - it loads the same feeds but additionally makes sure that the feeds are only loaded once in a given period.

If you open these scripts in HControl (or Notepad), you will find lines starting with "LoadRss":

Each of these "LoadRss" lines loads one feed, its only parameter is the link of the feed.

To get rid of one of the example feeds, just remove the accompanying line. To add a new feed, just add such a LoadRss line with the link of the feed.

Notes:

• Be sure to rename or copy the demo scripts before changing them (e. g. rename it to "MyRssReader.hsc"), as these demo scripts might be overwritten when updating Hamster.
   
• As already said, these demo scripts are "ready to run". To try it, just connect to the internet, select the wanted script on the "Scripts" page in HControl and start menu item "Scripts, Start Selected Script". The resulting messages are stored in newsgroup "internal.misc" by default, so just subscribe to this group with your newsreader to see them.
    
• You're missing the HamWebReader command mentioned above? It is there, but embedded in a function called LoadRss at the very end of the scripts. It is just to simplify adding and removing feeds, as other parameters can be set at the very beginning of the script (see comments within script).

[www.elbiah.de Hamster Playground Documentation]