Displyaing RSS Feeds on Your Web Page
RSS feeds have made it very convenient to syndicate information
from various sources. Most of websites and services that publish
fresh content, such as ezines, press release, new agencies,
blogs make their content available thru RSS feeds. As new
content is published the RSS feed gets updated automatically.
Adding RSS feeds to web pages has many advantages. Let us say
you have added RSS feeds from a popular ezine on one of your web
pages.
* The content of the web page is automatically updated as the
ezine makes new content available via RSS feeds. Every time
search engine spiders crawl your web page they are likely to
find the web page updated.
* The visitors to your web site will also find new content on
every visit and they might be tempted to visit your web page
more often.
* You do not have to bother about writing fresh content as RSS
feeds are updated automatically.
Earlier I had written an article on adding RSS feeds to a web
page using java script. While this method makes fresh content
available to the readers, the content of the feed cannot be
"read" by search engine spiders. Therefore the web page does not
get the benefit of changing content from the search engines.
On the other hand php based installation makes it possible for
spiders to notice the changing content of the web page. This
article is a follow-up of my previous article which outlines
simple steps to put RSS feeds on a web page.
For the purpose of this article I have chosen the free version
of software available from CaRP. The software can be downloaded
from this site:
http://www.geckotribe.com/rss/carp/
The instruction manual which comes with the package gives
detailed instructions for installing and running the software.
Additional information is available from the site. While there
are several options available for using the software, I am
showing here the simplest steps to load and run the software:
1. Download the software on your computer. It comes in a zip
file. After unzipping save the available folders and files on
your computer. These files and folders will be available - carp
(folder), img (folder), carpsetup.php, README.html .
2. Upload all the files and folders to the root directory of
your website. This can be done by using FTP. If uploading is
done file by file, ensure that the names of the files and
folders, and location of files in their folders do not change.
3. Create a new mySQL database.
4. Run the setup file carpsetup.php from you web browser.
5. A new page will be displayed. On this page select mySQL
database option which is easier of the two options given there.
6. Another new page will open in which you have to fill the
details of mySQL database. Click on "Create Database Tables".
7. The page which opens now will have code which has to be put
on the web page where you want to show RSS feed. The code will
be displayed in a gray box.
8. Within the code there is "setup code". This setup code should
be pasted into a file called carpconf.php . The file will be
available in carp directory. On the html script of this file
locate the line "//Add configuration code that applies to all
themes here" . Just below this line paste the setup code.
9. Choose a web page where RSS feed has to be displayed. The
file name of the page should have .php extension. If your page
has .html or .htm extension, you can try replacing only the
extension with .php . Normally this should not change the way
the page appears in a web browser. If you encounter any problem
you could make a new web page with .php extension.
10. At appropriate location of the web page, where you want RSS
feed to be displayed, paste the code in the html script of the
page. From there you can remove the setup code. It is not
required to be added to all pages once it has been added to
carpconf.php page in step 8 above.
11. If you now open your web page in the web browser it will
start showing the RSS feed which comes along with the package.
For changing this to RSS feed of your choice you will need to
make changes in the code you have entered in step 10. In the
code there is a URL after CarpCasheShow. Change this URL with
the URL of RSS feed you wish to display.
Now the web page will display the RSS feed of your choice. You
can choose to display more feeds on the same page or have
separate pages for RSS feeds for different sources.
You can see this page on my website on which RSS feeds have been
added using exactly the steps shown here.
http://www.sanjay-j.com/RSSFILE/homebusinesspop.php
You can see some more pages from the links on left column of
this page.
I have tried to make the process easy to follow. You can always
refer to more detailed instructions which come with the package.
Take advantage of the free content available and use them to
boost your page positioning and traffic to your website.