Add
TheSouthern.com's Headlines to Your Web Page or
Desktop! 
We
offer a free RSS feed of the headlines from our
site that you may include in your own web page or on
your computer desktop. This feed is automatically
updated
as stories are added to our site, so no maintenance
or updating is required on your part to keep the
latest
news from the Southern Illinois region coming your
way.
To
add TheSouthern.com's news feed to your website, follow
these steps:
Use
the following link as a server-side include on your
web page where you would like the news feed to appear:
http://www.thesouthern.com/rednews/xml/rss_viewer.php
Note:
you must have server-side includes enabled on your
server, or the include files above will not work.
The
appearance and format of the data from the feed are
customizable using style sheets and parameters within
the include query string. Click
here or scroll down this page for more information
on
customizing the way the feed appears on your website.
To
add TheSouthern.com's news feed to your desktop, follow
these steps:
Click
here to see a list of a few programs
that allow you to view RSS feeds on your desktop
(you can find
more viewers by typing "rss viewer", "rss
reader" or "rss aggregator" into a
web search). Once you find a program you like, download
it and follow the instructions included with the program.
The link to TheSouthern.com's RSS feed is:
http://www.thesouthern.com/rednews/xml/rss.xml
Customizing
the RSS Feed on Your Site TheSouthern.com's
RSS feed can be customized on your site by using style
sheets or by including parameters
within the line of code that points to the feed (the
URL query string). Or a combination of both.
Note:
To use inline or external styles, you must include
the "usecss" parameter in the include query
string as follows:
http://www.thesouthern.com/rednews/xml/rss_viewer.php?usecss=1
This
will tell the script that you would like to use your
personal inline or external styles rather than the
ones built
in. Styles
This
style information should be included somewhere within
the <HEAD></HEAD> section of your
web page.
Here's
an example:
<HEAD>
<style type="text/css">
<!--
.rssbox {font: 8pt verdana, arial, helvetica,
sans-serif;}
.rssboxitem {font: 7pt/10pt geneva, arial, sans-serif;}
//-->
</style>
</HEAD>
This
modifies the appearance of the font used for each "story"
and the font used for the channel description at the
end.
All
the attributes are:
.rssbox
-- the entire box holding the feed
.rssboxhead -- the box
header
.rssboxheadlink -- the links within the box header
.rssboxtitle -- the box
title
.rssboxtitlelink -- the box title link
.rssboxitem -- each news item
Note:
Netscape 4.x doesn't seem to support the style
definitions above, but IE 4+ does. Click here or scroll down to the
list of parameters for more information on Netscape-compatible
feeds.
Parameters
You
can also optionally control some aspects of the feed
by specifying parameters within the request.
An
example:
http://www.thesouthern.com/rednews/xml/rss_viewer.php?maxitems=10&showdescs=0&tabwidth=200
Make
sure the tag above appears on one line, with no breaks.
Here
you can see that the link to TheSouthern.com's feed
is followed by "?maxitems=10&showdescs=0&tabwidth=200px".
This tells the script to show only 10 items, no descriptions,
and to display in a 200 pixel-wide table.
Here
is a list of available parameters:
| Attribute |
Description |
|
|
| showtitle |
Specify
whether to show the feed's title (0=show, 1=hide) |
|
| showimg |
Specify
whether to show the feed's default logo image
(0=show, 1=hide) |
|
|
| xmlbtn |
Specify
whether to show the xml link button (0=show,
1=hide) |
|
|
| maxitems |
Specify the maximum number of items to display
(0 = show all) |
|
|
| showdescs |
Specify
whether to show each item's description text
(0=show, 1=hide) |
|
|
| titletrim |
Limit title text to x characters...(0 = show
all) |
|
|
| titlemax |
...if the title is over x characters |
|
|
| desctrim |
Limit description text to x characters...(0 =
show all) |
|
|
| descmax |
...if the description is over x characters |
|
|
| tabwidth |
Specify
the main table width (in pixels or percentage,
example: tabwidth=300px or tabwidth=100%) |
|
|
| linktarget |
Specify the way clicked links should open (_top,
_blank, _parent, _self) |
|
|
| cssurl |
Link to external style sheet (specify URL) |
|
|
| usecss |
Tells
the script to use your personal inline or external
styles rather than the ones built in |
|
|
| bordercol |
Specify the table border color (example %23000000,
see below) |
|
|
| headbgcol |
Specify the header background color (example
%23000000, see below) |
|
|
| headtxtcol |
Specify the header font color (example %23000000,
see below) |
|
|
| titlebgcol |
Item title background color (example %23000000,
see below) |
|
|
| titletxtcol |
Item title text color (example %23000000,
see below) |
|
|
| itembgcol |
Item background color (example %23000000,
see below) |
|
|
| itemtxtcol |
Item text color (example %23000000,
see below) |
|
|
| Note:
When specifying a color in #rrggbb format,
replace "#" with
the html-friendly "%23". Example: white
= "%23FFFFFF" rather than "#FFFFFF" |
To
see a few examples of how the RSS feed can be customized
using the above methods, click here
|
.gif)
Job
Listings
Automotive
Housing
Southern
Business Journal
