Pausing RSS scroller: Death on my web

[ddadmin]

Hmmm the URL http://zappsinc.awardspace.com/lastr...dge.php?id=cnn now correctly returns a JavaScript array of RSS contents in Firefox, and for demo.htm, at least the first scroller now displays the feeds. In IE though, viewing scrollerbridge.php causes the browser to prompt that it doesn't recongnize the file type being returned (should be JavaScript).

Without more info I'm not sure what else to suggest, though it seems to be the problem is with your server configuration, either not running PHP in a stable fashion, or configured to recongize the JavaScript minetype correctly...

[nelsontimken]

I had the same problem, and as I said before, the problem was that certain comments in the lastRSS PHP file, namely fopen's were disabled.

[dynamiczed]

Ahhh... so the server's capabilities are at fault then? It's a free one, so I wouldn't be surprised if their php support is a little sketchey.

Nelson, how did you solve your problem? When you say the 'fopen' comments were 'disabled' - who disabled them; an error in the php file, or something to do with the server?

Thanks, both of you!

[ddadmin]

Well, fopen is just a PHP function, though if your server's PHP is running under Safe Mode, it may not allow fopen to fetch external pages (from outside domains). So in a way, if that's in fact the problem, your web host has limited the ability of PHP's fopen.

[dynamiczed]

Ahhh right.

I've had a look in my server's settings, and under the PHP specifics, it says "allow_url_fopen = On" along with lots of other settings. So, I expect that means that the fopen command is allowed?

Is there anything else that could be wrong?

[nelsontimken]

When fopen and similar commands that fetch URLs from outside sources are disabled by your web host, which is done, so they say, for security reasons, fopen and get commands do not function.

My server, Dreamhost, has these commands disabled. Apparently, the only way around it is for someone to rewrite the PHP script lastRSS, using cURL commands, which I, being a noob, have no idea how to do.

Dreamhost also says that using the allow_url_fopen=on command will NOT override their security patch.

You will have to ask your webhost for specifics.

In the meantime, DDadmin, can anyone out there re-write this script using cURL commands so us newbies can have this nice RSS feed script on our sites?

Nelson

[dynamiczed]

Ooh yes please... this is such an amazing script, and if someone could rewrite part of it to make it work on our annoying hosts, then we'd bestow you with bucketfulls of good karma.

Also, can anyone reccomend a good (free?) host which supports php well?

Thanks!
DZ

[ddadmin]

I probably won't be rewriting LastRSS itself, as it just complicates things when it comes to supporting this script. However, I have been thinking of using MaggieRSS as the backend for the next RSS related DHTML script. I haven't looked into whether MaggieRSS uses cURL, though it might even support both methods of URL retrival.

[nelsontimken]

DDadmin:

Magie RSS may work - one of the features I note is:

"Does not use fopen(), work even if allow_url_fopen is disabled."

This may allow those of us on servers with fopen disabled to use RSS feeds. I look forward to this edition of the RSS scroller.


Nelson