Integrating FeedLand with other platforms

[manton]

Hi @scripting, I'm dusting off the integration I started with Micro.blog and FeedLand. Thought I would add a thread here for discussion, if that's okay.

First question is simple: should we be using feedland.org or feedland.com? It looks like each has its own database, so if we want to pull someone's OPML, it matters which one we point people to.

I'm also going to be referencing your JS such as code.scripting.com/blogroll/blogroll.js. Hopefully that's still the right way to do things, like if someone wants to embed a blogroll on their blog.

[scripting]

this is great news manton. i will help any way i can.

re which server to hook up to, i suggest using feedland.com, it's the one that can scale. feedland.org will be for testing and experimentation.

also where you depend on that, if you can, let the user provide a url for their opml file. for example, this is the url of my blogroll opml file. my method for adding a feed is just subscribe to it in my blogroll category and it's automatically part of the opml.

the way you find the url is:

1. in feedland, open the Cats menu, choose the sub-menu for the category you're looking for, and choose Feed list.
2. click on the orange xml icon to view the OPML. that's the URL the user should give you.

[manton]

Great, thanks! I've finished a first version of the plug-in for Micro.blog. It let's you embed a FeedLand blogroll on a page on your blog, or as a sidebar, although that currently requires some theme editing. Will get some feedback from folks and then see what other improvements I can make.

[scripting]

@manton -- is there a place where you're discussing this?

[scripting]

@manton -- another api worth looking at

https://github.com/scripting/feedlandSocket

it's the firehose from any feedland server over standard websocket connection.

this is what my blogroll software builds on, how it gets notified of new stuff for a given blog, how it knows to move it to the top of the list.

includes javascript code for the client side. 

if you know that the user's list is coming from feedland, then you know we're keeping up to date on the feed, and you will get notifications over the socket connection. 

works server-to-server too, which is what i expect you'd need.

[manton]

@scripting That firehouse looks very useful. Thanks.

There's not really a discussion for the FeedLand plug-in for Micro.blog yet, but there is a GitHub repo for the code: https://github.com/microdotblog/plugin-feedland

For the first version, it's for embedding a blogroll on your blog hosted on Micro.blog. You specify your FeedLand username and it does the rest. But it does require some editing of HTML templates or pages, so there's room to make it easier to use in the future.

[scotthansonde]

@manton I can help try this out, if you like. I have my own FeedLand instance where I do my reading, but I have an account on feedland.com as well.

[scripting]

@manton -- just want to verify -- you're using the feedland blogroll in micro.blog? if so, that's so cool. i think when people understand what it's doing a lot of them will want it and then we can get started building networks of blogs in new ways.

[manton]

@scotthansonde Thanks, that would be great! The easiest way to try it is to install the plug-in under Plug-ins, then create a page under Pages and type in the shortcode with your FeedLand.com username:

{{< feedland username="your-username" >}}

When your blog publishes, you should see the blogroll on that page. No way to point to another FeedLand instance yet, but there probably should be.

[manton]

@scripting Yep, exactly.

[scotthansonde]

@manton That was easy. It's not pretty (yet), but it works. https://scotthanson.eu/blogroll/

If you're not familiar with the WordPress plugin for FeedLand blogrolls, here are the settings it offers: