Sorting Data Source Record Sets together from more than 1 RSS Data Source

(Steve Scamp) #1

My question: Is it possible to sort the Data Source Record Sets from more than one RSS Data Source into a single, intertwined list?

 

We host a number of blogs (quite a number, in fact). At present we use an RSS Data Source and Asset Listing to display a 'feed' listing of the latest posts from just one of those blogs (http://blogs.slq.qld.gov.au/jol) on our main site home page (http://www.slq.qld.gov.au).

 

We'd really like to put a listing of posts from several of the blogs, sorted together, on our main site home page.

 

So I've tried setting up an RSS Data Source for each of three of the blogs, then pulling in and listing the resulting Record Source Data Sets together on the one Asset Listing. However, no matter how I try to configure it, each Record Source Data Set is displayed separately in the list, one after the other, i.e. 10 entries from the one set, then 10 entries from another set, then 10 entries from a third set, and so forth. There doesn't seem to be any way to make them list together into the one sequence, sorted with latest post publication dates at the top, i.e. regardless of which blog the post comes from.

 

There's an old, related topic at http://forums.squizsuite.net/index.php?showtopic=4111. It seems to be sort-of suggesting that it's not possible to sort Record Source Data Sets together into one, intertwined sequence. I was just wondering if things have changed since 2007, though?

 

I'm guessing that what I want to do remains impossible, but I'd be interested in knowing if anybody has discovered another way of doing such a thing, using standard Matrix functionality?

 

Thanks, folks.  :)

 

Steve

(Nic Hubbard) #2

What I have always understood is that shadow assets will get listed how they appear in the asset map. So, if you choose multiple sources for these they are just going to be listed in groups like you have found.

(Steve Scamp) #3

What I have always understood is that shadow assets will get listed how they appear in the asset map. So, if you choose multiple sources for these they are just going to be listed in groups like you have found.

 

Ah, is that how they work? I was afraid it would be something like that. 

 

Oh well, I'll keep looking for some kind of alternative, then. Maybe I can start with a third-party feed aggregator of some sort and just pull that in, instead of pulling in the feeds separately.

 

Thanks for the quick reply, Nic.

(Nic Hubbard) #4

Ah, is that how they work? I was afraid it would be something like that.   
Oh well, I'll keep looking for some kind of alternative, then. Maybe I can start with a third-party feed aggregator of some sort and just pull that in, instead of pulling in the feeds separately.
 
Thanks for the quick reply, Nic.


You could always use JavaScript, but wasn't sure you wanted to do that.
(Steve Scamp) #5

You could always use JavaScript, but wasn't sure you wanted to do that.

 

True, I hadn't thought of that. I'm not particularly skilled with JavaScript, but I'll have a look around and see what's available.

 

Just for interest, I've managed just now to set up a Feedkiller combined feed (

 

So I'd better look around and see what JS can offer. If you happen to know of any readymade scripts that could perhaps be adopted for this purpose I'd greatly appreciate knowing about them.

 

Many thanks again, Nic.

(Nic Hubbard) #6

 

True, I hadn't thought of that. I'm not particularly skilled with JavaScript, but I'll have a look around and see what's available.

 

Well, I don't think there is really any out of the box thing available.

 

What I meant was have the Asset List create a javascript array of objects. Then sort that by whatever field you want, then build your HTML from that.

(Greg Sherwood) #7

Have you tried sorting the results by a keyword value? If all your RSS shadow assets have the same keyword for date, as an example, then you should be able to use that keyword to sort the results by date. They will be sorted as strings though, so you'd want a date in the form yyyy-mm-dd etc.

(Steve Scamp) #8

Have you tried sorting the results by a keyword value? If all your RSS shadow assets have the same keyword for date, as an example, then you should be able to use that keyword to sort the results by date. They will be sorted as strings though, so you'd want a date in the form yyyy-mm-dd etc.

 

Hi Greg. I'll give that a try too - I did try sorting on %ds__pubdate% earlier, but without formatting the date, which may have been why it didn't work! 

 

Thanks muchly.

(Steve Scamp) #9

 

Well, I don't think there is really any out of the box thing available.

 

What I meant was have the Asset List create a javascript array of objects. Then sort that by whatever field you want, then build your HTML from that.

 

Sounds interesting, Nic. And it might even be within my scripting capabilities! I'll give that a try too - it would certainly be better to keep the whole thing 'in-house' rather than use anything third-party such as Feedkiller.

 

Cheers!

(Charlotte Westney) #10

Hi Scampus,

 

I'm pretty sure that this is exactly what I have on my news page, so the answer is Yes, and Greg's on the money with sorting by keyword.

 

I bring in about 10 different RSS feeeds from different National Park sites into shadow asset lists, and then have one asset list that lists them all. On the asset list sorting I use 'Sorting by asset keyword value' and have 'pubdate' as the value to sort by. Each data source record set has an attribute pubdate in this format:

pubdate Tue, 23 Jul 2013 09:09:46 +0100

 

So I get all the news items listed in date order.

 

Works perfectly! (Although I will admit the page is a little slow to load - note to self to look at cache settings!)

http://www.nationalparks.gov.uk/aboutus/news

 

Hope that helps,

Charlie.

(Nic Hubbard) #11

I love how I have used keyword sorting many times for Shadow Assets, but I totally forgot about it for this post. Sorry to have failed everyone. :)