I stumbled upon something yesterday that I thought could be really useful, at least to me. Many people have suggested and explored the idea of XHTML syndication. Some have come from big names such as Anil Dash and Tantek. However, there is very little implementation.
If every blog/CMS could have its own link for a file that spits out formatted XHTML code, life would be easier. For example, if I wanted to provide a little feed of my weblogtoolscollection, I would simply include a file from that blog that would spit out pre-formatted, pre determined code. No messing with XML, no tags to worry about or feeds to validate and then parse. The div tags etc could be defined in simple, easy to understand terms and would allow simple CSS formatting as well. A couple of different methods could be used to generate and then serve the file. WordPress could include a synd.php (or anything else) which could be included as a php file inside another weblog which resided on the same server and had real path access. Another file called extern_synd.php (or anything else) could do a document.write to spit out the files in XHTML format inside a script tag.
Would there be any interest in this sort of thing? Here is the little peice of code which led me to this. I was writing a simple recent thumbnails for my Pictorialis and this is what I have so far. This is a simple modification of Alex King’s wp-mobile hack. I got sidetracked before I could finish it! 🙂
Well, the whole concept of rss syndication is precisely that *you* control how it displays. Syndicating XHTML would expose your site to display ugly crap
(by the way, moderator, check here : http://wordpress.org/support/11/4881 )
I agree with you in some respects. But, its a tradeoff. In order to keep “ugly crap” from displaying, you have this jamboree of standards, validations and confusion of code which is not helping the task at hand. It is still very difficult to have a good online syndication of sites.
In excess of that, non-coders are still limited by the “ugly crap” of the syndication software and by the format that the syndication software decides to put out. So this would give the syndication software lesser control of the layout for the content and would let the owner of the feed determine their own “ugly crap”.
Good point. The new.gif image has been fixed. If there is something else amiss, please feel free to let me know. 🙂
Thanks
Are you willing to share the source of “what you have so far” ? 🙂
I’m looking for a simple solution to show the last 3 thumbnails in the side of my main blog and this would be just that!