Back in late 2005 I created a system which I'm now calling the Data Feed Framework (DFF) to greatly simplify the creation of RSS feeds and the aggregation of RSS and Atom feeds on web sites. The goal of the feed creation portion of the system was to allow developers and IT professionals to create RSS feeds with little to no work at all thereby allowing them to use RSS for purposes other than blogging or news. The goal of the aggregator portion of DFF was to the integration of information into ASP.NET 2.0 pages.

The Data Feed Framework has two primary components :

Using the FeedCreation mechanism, developers and IT professionals can quickly create RSS feeds to monitor internal SQL databases, create sales RSS feeds for management, or monitor whatever else they wanted. The aggregator portion of the system, called InfoBlocks, allows web developers to declare a control in ASP.NET 2.0, give it an RSS or Atom feed and walk away having an InfoBlock on their page containing a list of feed entries for the RSS feed.

The two portions of the system work together, but can also be used separately.

To make explaining this a bit easier, below is a link to my documentation for the system. Below that are the links for the source of the system as well as screen shots. I'll soon be creating a video to go over the basic concepts of this system.

I can't over emphasis how simply this system makes RSS creation and RSS/Atom aggregation. It's literally a matter writing a SQL statement. Absolutely no more work than that is required. The simplicity is very much like that simplicity in WCF. Where WCF relies primarily on attributes and a config file, I rely simply on a SQL Server 2005 table called "FeedCreation". You literally write a SQL statement and give it a name and you have a complete RSS feed ready for corporate or public distribution. I'm planning on incorporating this system into the core of Minima in the next CTP.

The license for this is simple: use it all you want for whatever you want, customize it to your own needs, but 1) ALWAYS keep the copyright notice in there and 2) I nor my companies are liable for anything. The typical stuff...

Update: This project has been renamed to SQL RSS Services and has been updated for .NET 3.5 using LINQ and the syndication feed support in WCF.

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