$Id$


"It feeds"


FEEDS
=====

An import and aggregation framework for Drupal.
http://drupal.org/project/feeds

Features
========

- Pluggable import configurations consisting of fetchers (get data) parsers
  (read and transform data) and processors (create content on Drupal).
-- HTTP upload (with optional PubSubHubbub support).
-- File upload.
-- CSV, RSS, Atom parsing.
-- Creates nodes or terms.
-- Creates lightweight database records if Data module is installed.
   http://drupal.org/project/data
-- Additional fetchers/parsers or processors can be added by an object oriented
   plugin system.
-- Granular mapping of parsed data to content elements.
- Import configurations can be piggy backed on nodes, thus using nodes as
  importers ("feed as node" approach) or they can be used on a standalone form.
- Unlimited number of import configurations.
- Export import configurations to code.
- Optional libraries module support.

Requirements
============

- CTools 1.x
  http://drupal.org/project/ctools
- Drupal 6.x
  http://drupal.org/project/drupal
- PHP 5.2.x recommended

Installation
============

- Install Feeds, Feeds Admin UI and Feeds defaults.
- Make sure cron is correctly configured http://drupal.org/cron
- Navigate to admin/build/feeds.
- Enable one or more importers, create your own by adding a new one, modify an
  existing one by clicking on 'override' or copy and modify an existing one by
  clicking on 'clone'.
- Go to import/ to import data.
- To use SimplePie parser, download SimplePie and place simplepie.inc into
  feeds/libraries.
  http://simplepie.org/

PubSubHubbub support
====================

Feeds supports the PubSubHubbub publish/subscribe protocol. Follow these steps
to set it up for your site.
http://code.google.com/p/pubsubhubbub/

- Go to admin/build/feeds and edit (override) the importer configuration you
  would like to use for PubSubHubbub.
- Choose the HTTP Fetcher if it is not already selected.
- On the HTTP Fetcher, click on 'settings' and check "Use PubSubHubbub".
- Optionally you can use a designated hub such as http://superfeedr.com/ or your
  own. If a designated hub is specified, every feed on this importer
  configuration will be subscribed to this hub, no matter what the feed itself
  specifies.

Libraries support
=================

If you are using Libraries module, you can place external libraries in the
Libraries module's search path (for instance sites/all/libraries. The only
external library used at the moment is SimplePie.

Libraries found in the libraries search path are preferred over libraries in
feeds/libraries/.

API Overview
============

See "The developer's guide to Feeds":
http://drupal.org/node/622700

Testing
=======

See "The developer's guide to Feeds":
http://drupal.org/node/622700

Debugging
=========

Set the Drupal variable 'feeds_debug' to TRUE (i. e. using drush). This will
create a file /tmp/feeds_[my_site_location].log. Use "tail -f" on the command
line to get a live view of debug output.

Note: at the moment, only PubSubHubbub related actions are logged.

Performance
===========

Use Drupal Queue to improve Feeds' performance when scheduling many very active
feeds. An example for "many very active feeds" would be 300 news feeds with an
average of four items a day.
http://drupal.org/project/drupal_queue

Hidden settings
===============

Hidden settings are variables that you can define by adding them to the $conf
array in your settings.php file.

Name:        feeds_debug
Default:     FALSE
Description: Set to TRUE for enabling debug output to
             /DRUPALTMPDIR/feeds_[sitename].log

Name:        feeds_importer_class
Default:     'FeedsImporter'
Description: The class to use for importing feeds.

Name:        feeds_source_class
Default:     'FeedsSource'
Description: The class to use for handling feed sources.

Name:        feeds_scheduler_class
Default:     'FeedsScheduler'
Description: The class to use for scheduling feed refreshing.

Name:        feeds_worker_time
Default:     15
Description: Execution time for a queue worker, only effective if used with
             drupal_queue.

Name:        feeds_schedule_num
Default:     5
Description: The number of feeds to import on cron time.
             Only has an effect if Drupal Queue is *not* enabled.
             http://drupal.org/project/drupal_queue

Name:        feeds_schedule_queue_num
Default:     200
Description: The number of feeds to queue on cron time. Only has an effect if
             Drupal Queue is enabled.
             http://drupal.org/project/drupal_queue

Name:        feeds_data_$importer_id
Default:     feeds_data_$importer_id
Description: The table used by FeedsDataProcessor to store feed items. Usually a
             FeedsDataProcessor builds a table name from a prefix (feeds_data_)
             and the importer's id ($importer_id). This default table name can
             be overridden by defining a variable with the same name.

Name:        feeds_node_batch_size
Default:     50
             The number of nodes feed node processor creates or deletes in one
             page load.

Glossary
========

See "Feeds glossary":
http://drupal.org/node/622710