FLEB
Jan 5th, 2005, 08:40 AM
Just an idea I wanted to throw out for index sites like this one, iPodder.org, etc. I listen at work (to stave off the drudgery of my staring-at-the-screen-all-day job), in a large corporate environment, which means that I'm quite limited in the software I can use to listen. It's basically plain-vanilla OS audio player (WMP) or nothing, so I need to grab MP3 links off HTML sites as opposed to RSS feeds.
While the index sites like this and iPodder.org are useful, it takes the extra steps of going to the site and tracking down a (sometimes well-hidden) URL in order to get my fix. What I would love to see, along with the current "Comments | Get Podcast | Website" options, is a "Get Latest" option, which would directly link me to the latest posted enclosure in the RSS file listed, without actually having to have anything that reads RSS.
The way I see this being accomplished: The "latest" listing is simply two more entries in the database -- Last Checked Time and Latest URL. When someone clicks the "Get Latest" link, the backend script first checks the Last Checked Time to see if it is polite to check the source RSS again. If not, it 301-redirects to the URL in the (locally held) "Latest URL". If it is polite to check again (Last Check being 30min ago or so?), it checks the RSS feed, compares the newest enclosure to the local listing, updates as necessary, then 301s to the newest enclosure.
...hmm...
Another way I just thought of as I was writing this would be to use my favorite cross-platform "kludge" method, a bookmarklet. (I'll have to try writing it out sometime soon here). I imagine that a small bit of JavaScript, put into a Favorite, could auto-bounce you to the newest enclosure when you click on it with an RSS file onscreen. Still though, that's just a stopgap.
Thoughts?
While the index sites like this and iPodder.org are useful, it takes the extra steps of going to the site and tracking down a (sometimes well-hidden) URL in order to get my fix. What I would love to see, along with the current "Comments | Get Podcast | Website" options, is a "Get Latest" option, which would directly link me to the latest posted enclosure in the RSS file listed, without actually having to have anything that reads RSS.
The way I see this being accomplished: The "latest" listing is simply two more entries in the database -- Last Checked Time and Latest URL. When someone clicks the "Get Latest" link, the backend script first checks the Last Checked Time to see if it is polite to check the source RSS again. If not, it 301-redirects to the URL in the (locally held) "Latest URL". If it is polite to check again (Last Check being 30min ago or so?), it checks the RSS feed, compares the newest enclosure to the local listing, updates as necessary, then 301s to the newest enclosure.
...hmm...
Another way I just thought of as I was writing this would be to use my favorite cross-platform "kludge" method, a bookmarklet. (I'll have to try writing it out sometime soon here). I imagine that a small bit of JavaScript, put into a Favorite, could auto-bounce you to the newest enclosure when you click on it with an RSS file onscreen. Still though, that's just a stopgap.
Thoughts?