RSS proxy
I've written a small web-app that acts as an RSS proxy, providing ability to read protected feeds from an RSS aggregator that does not support authentication. Here's how it works:
1. The user registers with his username and password (only LJ is supported at this time, but other sources of feeds can be easily added)
2. The user is then given an option to either register a single feed, or to download an OPML file with several feeds (either all of user's LJ friends, or any custom group per user's choice).
3. The user then adds those feeds to Google Reader - either by clicking on a button (in case of a single feed) or by uploading the OPML file (in case of all friends or a custom group)
4. The feeds thus generated point back to the RSS proxy, and their URLs contain all the information necessary for the proxy to regenerate the user's credentials (that are kept on the server in an encrypted manner) and to serve the feed in an authenticated manner.
5. In addition, one can specify that:
a. the feeds thus created only contain protected items (so that one can subscribe separately to someone's public and private entries)
b. the protected entries are marked as such in the feed (so as to prevent their sharing, for example).
The proxy is written in Python, using the Django web framework, and it uses Apache2 and MySQL DB. It's sources are available here. A deb package is available for download here.
What's next? Ofcourse, anyone is free to download it and to try it wherever one wants (I have it running on my home PC right now off my private ADSL line, serving myself and 9 of my friends). However, I would like to have an installation on which to test it more thoroughly and to make it available there for the general public. And the first question to ask is whether this is interesting for anyone at all. If so - can anyone help me with the hosting?
1. The user registers with his username and password (only LJ is supported at this time, but other sources of feeds can be easily added)
2. The user is then given an option to either register a single feed, or to download an OPML file with several feeds (either all of user's LJ friends, or any custom group per user's choice).
3. The user then adds those feeds to Google Reader - either by clicking on a button (in case of a single feed) or by uploading the OPML file (in case of all friends or a custom group)
4. The feeds thus generated point back to the RSS proxy, and their URLs contain all the information necessary for the proxy to regenerate the user's credentials (that are kept on the server in an encrypted manner) and to serve the feed in an authenticated manner.
5. In addition, one can specify that:
a. the feeds thus created only contain protected items (so that one can subscribe separately to someone's public and private entries)
b. the protected entries are marked as such in the feed (so as to prevent their sharing, for example).
The proxy is written in Python, using the Django web framework, and it uses Apache2 and MySQL DB. It's sources are available here. A deb package is available for download here.
What's next? Ofcourse, anyone is free to download it and to try it wherever one wants (I have it running on my home PC right now off my private ADSL line, serving myself and 9 of my friends). However, I would like to have an installation on which to test it more thoroughly and to make it available there for the general public. And the first question to ask is whether this is interesting for anyone at all. If so - can anyone help me with the hosting?