How to display RSS/XML news feed in ASP/ASP.NET using RSS2HTML.ASP script

Looking for ASP script with mutiple RSS2HTML and better keywords filtering ?
Check our RSS2HTMLPro.ASP script for ASP/ASP.NET

This page provides quick guide for displaying of RSS/XML feed using free RSS2HTML ASP script in ASP or ASP.NET environment. This script can be used free of charge on any ASP or ASP.NET web-server and generate HTML from RSS feed.

This free ASP script uses MSXML to load RSS feed from URL and display it. You can use it standalone or call from script on HTML page to generate HTML content from RSS feed and then display on your HTML page.

Frequently Asked Questions new

<%
Response.Expires = -1

' =========== RSS2HTML.ASP for ASP/ASP.NET ==========
' copyright 2005-2008 (c) www.Bytescout.com
' version 1.27, 16 August 2008
' =========== configuration =====================
' ##### URL to RSS Feed to display #########
URLToRSS = "http://feeds2.feedburner.com/Bytescout"

' ##### max number of displayed items #####
MaxNumberOfItems = 7

' ##### Main template constants
MainTemplateHeader = "<table>"
MainTemplateFooter = "</table>"
' #####

' ######################################
Keyword1 = "" ' Keyword1 = "tech" - set non-empty keyword value to filter by this keyword
Keyword2 = "" ' Keyword1 = "win" - set non-empty keyword value to filter by this 2nd keyword too
' #################################

' ##### Item template.
' ##### {LINK} will be replaced with item link
' ##### {TITLE} will be replaced with item title
' ##### {DESCRIPTION} will be replaced with item description
' ##### {DATE} will be replaced with item date and time
' ##### {COMMENTSLINK} will be replaced with link to comments (if you use RSS feed from blog)
' ##### {CATEGORY} will be replaced with item category
ItemTemplate = "<tr><td><strong>{DATE}</strong><br/><strong>{CATEGORY}<br/></strong><a href=" & """{LINK}""" & ">{TITLE}</a><BR>{DESCRIPTION}</td></tr>"

' ##### Error message that will be displayed if not items etc
ErrorMessage = "Error has occured while trying to process " &URLToRSS & "<BR>Please contact web-master"

' ================================================

Set xmlHttp = Server.CreateObject("MSXML2.ServerXMLHTTP.3.0")
xmlHttp.Open "GET", URLToRSS, false
xmlHttp.Send()
RSSXML = xmlHttp.ResponseText

Set xmlDOM = Server.CreateObject("MSXML2.DomDocument.3.0")
xmlDOM.async = False
xmlDOM.validateOnParse = False
xmlDom.resolveExternals = False

If not xmlDOM.LoadXml(RSSXML) Then
ErrorMessage = "Can not load XML:" & vbCRLF & xmlDOM.parseError.reason & vbCRLF & ErrorMessage
End If

Set xmlHttp = Nothing ' clear HTTP object

Set RSSItems = xmlDOM.getElementsByTagName("item") ' collect all "items" from downloaded RSS

RSSItemsCount = RSSItems.Length-1

' if not <item>..</item> entries, then try to get <entry>..</entry>
if RSSItemsCount = -1 Then
Set RSSItems = xmlDOM.getElementsByTagName("entry") ' collect all "entry" (atom format) from downloaded RSS
RSSItemsCount = RSSItems.Length-1

End If

Set xmlDOM = Nothing ' clear XML

' writing Header
if RSSItemsCount > 0 then
Response.Write MainTemplateHeader
End If

j = -1

For i = 0 To RSSItemsCount
Set RSSItem = RSSItems.Item(i)

' fix for the issue when a description from a previous item
' is used if current item description is empty provided by George Sexton
RSSdescription="&nbsp;"
RSSCommentsLink="&nbsp;"

for each child in RSSItem.childNodes

Select case lcase(child.nodeName)
case "title"
RSStitle = child.text
case "link"
If child.Attributes.length>0 Then
RSSLink = child.GetAttribute("href")
if (RSSLink <> "") Then
if child.GetAttribute("rel") <> "alternate" Then
RSSLink = ""
End If
End If
End If ' if has attributes
If RSSLink = "" Then
RSSlink = child.text
End If
case "description"
RSSdescription = child.text
case "content" ' atom format
RSSdescription = child.text
case "published"' atom format
RSSDate = child.text
case "pubdate"
RSSDate = child.text
case "comments"
RSSCommentsLink = child.text
case "category"
Set CategoryItems = RSSItem.getElementsByTagName("category")
RSSCategory = ""
for each categoryitem in CategoryItems
if RSSCategory <> "" Then
RSSCategory = RSSCategory & ", "
End If

RSSCategory = RSSCategory & categoryitem.text
Next
End Select
next

' now check filter
If (InStr(RSSTitle,Keyword1)>0) or (InStr(RSSTitle,Keyword2)>0) or (InStr(RSSDescription,Keyword1)>0) or (InStr(RSSDescription,Keyword2)>0) then

j = J+1

if J<MaxNumberOfItems then
ItemContent = Replace(ItemTemplate,"{LINK}",RSSlink)
ItemContent = Replace(ItemContent,"{TITLE}",RSSTitle)
ItemContent = Replace(ItemContent,"{DATE}",RSSDate)
ItemContent = Replace(ItemContent,"{COMMENTSLINK}",RSSCommentsLink)
ItemContent = Replace(ItemContent,"{CATEGORY}",RSSCategory)

Response.Write Replace(ItemContent,"{DESCRIPTION}",RSSDescription)
ItemContent = ""
RSSLink = ""
End if
End If

Next

' writing Footer
if RSSItemsCount > 0 then
Response.Write MainTemplateFooter
else
Response.Write ErrorMessage
End If

' Response.End ' uncomment this for use in on-the-fly output
%>

2) Save RSS2HTML.asp and place "RSS2HTML.asp" into root folder of your web-server. (This folder is C:\Inetpub\wwwroot\ by default if you use Internet Information Service (IIS) on Windows 2000 and XP)

 
3) Now open "http://localhost/RSS2HTML.asp" (or "http://<your_webserver_name>/RSS2HTML.asp") in Internet Explorer browser. You will see HTML page generated from RSS provided in URLtoRSS varaiable in RSS2HTML.ASP script above:

To include this script into existing page use virtual include ASP command. For example you can include generated HTML it into MyPage.asp like this:

< html>
< body>
< p>My Page</p>
< p>RSS content is displayed below:</p>
< hr>
< !--#include virtual="RSS2HTML.asp"-->
< hr>
< /body>
< /html>

You can download the source code of this example here: asp_rss2html.zip

If you want to display filtered RSS feeds using customizable keywords please check RSS2HTML Scout library for ASP and ASP.NET

If you like our free RSS2HTML script for ASP and you use it we would appreciate if you will place link to this page somewhere on your web-site so another ASP web-masters will be able to find this free script.

If you like RSS2HTML.asp script then spread the word by copying and pasting this HTML code below:

Looking for ASP script with mutiple RSS2HTML and better keywords filtering ?
Check our RSS2HTMLPro.ASP script for ASP/ASP.NET

Frequently Asked Questions: new

Q: How to display items in backward order? new
A: Try to replace  

For i = 0 To RSSItemsCount

with

For i = RSSItemsCOunt To 0 Step -1

Q: I have RSS feed and it worked fine. But suddenly script returns errors new
A: Our script relies on MSXML control library. So do the following steps:
- check if you have the latest MSXML installed: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=3144b72b-b4f2-46da-b4b6-c5d7485f2b42&DisplayLang=en
- check if RSS feed is error free. Check RSS feed using these free RSS feed validation services:
http://feedvalidator.org/ | http://www.ldodds.com/rss_validator/1.0/validator.html | http://validator.w3.org/feed/
Inform web-master of RSS feed to fix errors in RSS feed.

Q: How to open links in new browser window?
A: Change ItemTemplate like this

ItemTemplate = "<tr><td><font size=1><a href=" & """{LINK}""" & " target='_blank'>{TITLE}</a></font><BR><font size=-2>{DESCRIPTION}</font></td></tr>"

Q: How to change font size for the displayed items?
A: Change ItemTemplate. For example:

ItemTemplate = "<tr><td><font size=1><a href=" & """{LINK}""" & ">{TITLE}</a></font><BR><font size=-2>{DESCRIPTION}</font></td></tr>"

Q: How to filter items using predefined keywords?
A: Modify script like this

Please try to modify RSS2HTML.asp script to something like this:

MyKeyword = "Computer"

....
For i = 0 To RSSItemsCount
Set RSSItem = RSSItems.Item(i)

for each child in RSSItem.childNodes
Select case lcase(child.nodeName)
case "title"
RSStitle = child.text
case "link"
RSSlink = child.text
case "description"
RSSdescription = child.text
End Select
next

bSkip = FALSE

' checking title
if inStr(UCase(RSSTitle), UCase(MyKeyword))=0 Then
bSkip = TRUE
End If

' checking title
If bSkip Then
if inStr(UCase(RSSDescription), UCase(MyKeyword))>0 Then
bSkip = False
End If
End If

If Not bSkip Then

j = J+1

if J<MaxNumberOfItems then
ItemContent = Replace(ItemTemplate,"{LINK}",RSSlink)
ItemContent = Replace(ItemContent,"{TITLE}",RSSTitle)
Response.Write Replace(ItemContent,"{DESCRIPTION}",RSSDescription)
ItemContent = ""
End if

End If

Next

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