RSS and Calendar Feeds | Events Help

RSS and Calendar Feeds | Events Help
RSS and Calendar Feeds
Main navigation
Skip Secondary Navigation
Main content start
Create an RSS/XML feed
Really Simple Syndication (RSS) is an XML-based format that can be accessed with “news reader” applications, embedded in blogs, and used in other ways. Our
Events at Stanford
RSS feeds currently use RSS 2.0.
You’ll use
the Widget Builder
to create your custom RSS feed. The filtering controls in that tool allow you to get very fine-grained to display exactly what you need on your site. A couple of settings to take note of:
It does not matter which template you choose at the top of the form. RSS feeds do not make use of widget templates. You can leave that setting at Default.
By default, feeds only include the
next
instance for recurring events. If you’d like to include all instances within a date range then you can select the
Include All Matching Instances
option.
At the bottom of the form, click
Preview Widget
to make sure you’re displaying your desired results. This will open a new tab and show you your result in Widget form. In order to change the display from the HTML widget to an RSS feed, you’ll have to make a small change to the URL in your address bar. Look for
format=html
and change it to
format=rss
, then hit the
enter
or
return
on your keyboard to refresh the page.
Select and copy the URL. You’ll use this in your RSS reader, widget, or wherever else you’d like to display your custom feed.
You can further customize the URL; see
Localist’s documentation for widgets
for filter and output parameters.
Create and subscribe to a calendar feed
The Stanford Events calendar has tools that allow you to add a custom event feed to your own calendar, with support for Google Calendar, Outlook Calendar, and iCal, which is supported by several different calendar apps.
To build your custom calendar feed, click the
Filter
button found on the
events homepage
. You will find a list of filters you can use to narrow your selections: choose from Date range, Experiences, Event Types, Audience, and Subject. To test your results, you can click the
Apply Filters
button at the bottom. Adjust the filters as needed. Just above the Apply Filters button, you will see an area labeled
Subscribe to Displayed Results
. To build your calendar feed, click the calendar icon that corresponds to your app; when you hover over each you will see a tooltip telling you which app it is for. Clicking the icon will open a browser window or your calendar app, depending on how your system and apps are configured.
Group, Department, or Place Calendar Subscriptions
You can also add all of a Group, Department, or Place’s events to your calendar app of choice.
Visit the Group, Department, or Place’s landing page.
Click the “View full calendar” link at the bottom of the Upcoming Events list.
Click the Filter button to reveal the filter menu.
At the bottom, below the Subscribe to Displayed Results heading, click the icon of the calendar of your choice.
This should automatically open that (or your device’s default) calendar app and add a feed subscription to the calendar. Using this method, either 13 months of or the first 1,000 events will be added. Since this is a live feed from the website, changes to the events should reflect on your personal calendar as well.