PHP DIY – How to Add RSS Feeds to Any Website/Blog using Magpie RSS Parser!

max — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 16:31:47 +0000

One of the most common things we do in today’s Web2.0 programming are RSS feeds. Now there’s a bunch of ways you can add RSS feeds to your website but let me tell you the BEST way using PHP.

1) Download and unzip Magpie RSS in your website root directory somewhere.

2) Anywhere in your PHP code, add the following line, while making sure the full directory path is specified. (I usually like to put it in directory such as “magpie”)

require('rss_fetch.inc');
$myurl="http://zedomax.com/blog/feed";
$rss = fetch_rss($myurl);
        $ct=0;
foreach ($rss->items as $item ) {
           $title = $item[title];
           $desc = $item[description];
           $url   = $item[link];
           echo ''.$title.'';
           if($ct==9) break;
           $ct++;
}

This will output the latest 10 RSS items. You can of course, change values and also do much more with more configuration. Refer to Magpie RSS Documents here.

There, you can probably do this in 5 minutes. I find it better to use this over any other Wordpress RSS plugin because it’s simple and it works. I used to use a plugin that kept dying on me or was simply too slow.

Using straight Magpie RSS is really fast and great for making some custom RSS sites.

Of course, couple it with PHP caching and you already got a website that can handle a LOT of traffic.

Brought to you by: Zedomax.com

PHP DIY – How to Add RSS Feeds to Any Website/Blog using Magpie RSS Parser!

PHP DIY – How to Add Caching to ANY website!

max — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 16:16:23 +0000

In my recent ventures, I have resorted to finding great PHP code to cache my website.

Even if you are not using Wordpress, you can still make a simple PHP caching mechanism without the use of Wordpress Super Cache. (Well, all Wordpress Super Cache is a PHP cache with user-friendly menus.)

Here’s how to add caching to your website:

Copy and paste the following code and save as “cache.php” in your website root directory:

// Settings
$cachedir = ‘cache/’; // Directory to cache files in (keep outside web root)
$cachetime = 600; // Seconds to cache files for
$cacheext = ‘cache’; // Extension to give cached files (usually cache, htm, txt)

// Ignore List
$ignore_list = array(
‘addedbytes.com/rss.php’,
‘addedbytes.com/search/’
);

// Script
$page = ‘http://’ . $_SERVER['HTTP_HOST'] . $_SERVER['REQUEST_URI']; // Requested page
$cachefile = $cachedir . md5($page) . ‘.’ . $cacheext; // Cache file to either load or create

$ignore_page = false;
for ($i = 0; $i < count($ignore_list); $i++) {
$ignore_page = (strpos($page, $ignore_list[$i]) !== false) ? true : $ignore_page;
}

$cachefile_created = ((@file_exists($cachefile)) and ($ignore_page === false)) ? @filemtime($cachefile) : 0;
@clearstatcache();

// Show file from cache if still valid
if (time() – $cachetime < $cachefile_created) {

//ob_start(‘ob_gzhandler’);
@readfile($cachefile);
//ob_end_flush();
exit();

}

// If we’re still here, we need to generate a cache file

ob_start();

?>

Then copy and paste the following and save as “endcache.php“:

// Now the script has run, generate a new cache file
$fp = @fopen($cachefile, ‘w’);

// save the contents of output buffer to the file
@fwrite($fp, ob_get_contents());
@fclose($fp);

ob_end_flush();

?>

In you .htaccess file, add:

php_value auto_prepend_file /home/httpd/vhosts/stattt.com/httpdocs/cache.php
php_value auto_append_file /home/httpd/vhosts/stattt.com/httpdocs/endcache.php

You can always comment these lines out if you want to turn off caching.

For deleting cache, you can copy and paste the following as save as “clear.php“:

// Settings
$cachedir = ‘cache/’; // Directory to cache files in (keep outside web root)

if ($handle = @opendir($cachedir)) {
while (false !== ($file = @readdir($handle))) {
if ($file != ‘.’ and $file != ‘..’) {
echo $file . ‘ deleted.
’;
@unlink($cachedir . ‘/’ . $file);
}
}
@closedir($handle);
}

?>

Now, make sure your cache directory is CHMODded to 777 and you should start caching your website.

Also, you can schedule a CRON job for the clear.php to clear cache once a day or how often you’d like to.

This caching worked like a charm for Stattt.com, a stats website coded from scratch.

I did find this from Addedbytes.com, thanks to the author!

Brought to you by: Zedomax.com

PHP DIY – How to Add Caching to ANY website!

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PHP DIY – How to Add RSS Feeds to Any Website/Blog using Magpie RSS Parser!

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