Essential Blogging

Aggregating RSS with Blagg

Blagg (short for Blossom Aggregator) affords Blosxom the ability to aggregate (i.e., read and blog) RSS syndicated feeds of many flavors (0.9, 0.91, 0.92, 1.0) via a simple, command-line interface. Blagg builds on the simple, lightweight framework of Blosxom, interspersing aggregated stories amongst original entries.

Blagg is maintained as a separate project from Blosxom, because while it was designed with Blosxom in mind and is indeed fully integrated, it has its own place as the basis for just about anything needing a simple, lightweight RSS reader/aggregator. Indeed, this is already the case: via plugins (Blaggplugs), Blagg is able to push aggregated RSS to email recipients, instant messenger buddies, and to weblog software such as of MovableType and Blogger.

Blagg has two modes: interactive and automatic. Interactive mode occurs when Blagg is run from the command line. It picks up, displays, and prompts you for inclusion of individual stories from elsewhere into your weblog.

The automatic mode is designed to be run untended on a regular basis from a service such as cron. The aggregator simply drops new stories from your favorite feeds into your weblog. One use of automatic aggregation is to create a “daily dose” of your favorite feeds in one place to be read at your leisure. A group of like-minded individuals could produce a weblog composed of entries from their individual weblogs. An author can have her main weblog reflect the writing she does across ...