Building an RSS app that draws from multiple feeds

[mnida]

Hi all,

Last night, I built my first ever Boxee app (in fact my first app for any platform!) - a basic RSS app that draws its contents from a single feed, with a custom skin. I did this by hacking the example app provided by Boxee. Baby steps, but very proud!

Next, I'd like to build another RSS app that expand this a little. I'd like to incorporate multiple feeds, which the user can switch between. So rather than the example app's two columns (list of items on the left, metadata for each item on the right) we're looking at three columns - list of feeds on the left, item list for each feed in the centre, and metadata for each item on the right.

I assume this should be fairly simple, but I was wondering if someone could give me some pointers as to how I could do about doing it? Presumably I need to create a file that lists the various feeds I want to use, but how do I incorporate this as a third column in the main window?

Probably elementary questions, but I'm v new to this so all help welcome / appreciated!

Matt

[BoxeeBuilder]

Hi mnida,

Just make a feed of the feeds you want to include. Load that parent feed first. Instead of urls for the videos themselves, the URLs point to the other feeds. You include stuff like feed description, thumbnail image, title, etc. Then instead of calling the player on click, you create a new window for navigation through the second level feed which contains the videos of one of the actual feeds.

Boxee Builder

[mnida]

Many thanks BoxeeBuilder - that makes sense, and seems pretty easy to do!

So do I need to create an extra container for the individual feed item details, and if so, how to I label it? Or will individual feed item metadata just replace the list of feed items in the second window?

Many thanks, really appreciate this...

Matt

[MadDash]

Is there any way you can put a sample up of this parent feed? I've submitted an app to Boxee for approval and they've requested I break up my feed into categories and add a search box. I was originally working off a template since I'm not a developer and I'm really having trouble adding these items. I am using a video platform that generates the rss feeds but I don't have a way to make a master feed that is essentially a category list. Any help would be appreciated.