Support for Composite News Feeds

News feeds allow the specification of multiple external URLs to create a composite news feed from multiple sources.

A new parameter may be added to /_resources/data/news.pcf named external-xml-urls (labelled External XML URLs) which accepts a comma-separated list of news feed URLs. Each URL is expected to be the absolute path to a news feed on another Crimson site.

The news.pcf will combine the external news feeds with the local news articles to create a composite news feed, eliminating duplicates (as indicated by the full absolute URL of the article). Note that query strings that are included in the feed will be included in the attempt to match the URLs and the feed will not resolve redirects when attempting to find duplicates.

Action Required

If your site includes articles which use external URLs, please review these articles to ensure they are not using optional query strings or old URLs which might be redirecting (e.g. newscenter.sdsu.edu or go.sdsu.edu).

New sites will include this new parameter by default. If you would like support for multiple feeds added to one or more of your existing Crimson websites, open a General Site/Page Update Request (in ServiceNow navigate to Request a Service > Web Services > Modern Campus CMS and use the link for General Site/Page Update Request - Modern Campus CMS).

Please note that if your site already includes a field labelled External XML URL (without the s on URLs), this is a different field which does not support multiple URLs. This field will continue to work, but we recommend upgrading to the new field.