This is a quick guide how to make an automator script that creates an offline RSS reader for the iPhone/iPod Touch. As long as the App Air Sharing is still free this involves no extra costs, you only need a Mac. I have done this on OSX 10.5 (Leopard), I don't have an older version of OSX installed, so I can't tell if this works.

Requirements

• Mac with OSX 10.5 (lower versions might work, but I haven't tried)
  
• iPhone/iPod Touch App that allows transfer of files via WiFi and that can view HTML files. I tried DataCase and Air Sharing and both work.

Limitations

• This script downloads only the HTML part of a website, so the website might not look pretty when you are offline, because all the pictures are missing and the fonts might be wrong because the CSS files are also missing.
  When you are online with you iPhone/iPod Touch all the pictures etc. will be downloaded and displayed.
  
  The good thing about this is, it's very fast and does not need much memory.
  
  
• All RSS feeds will be saved in the same folder, but you can make several automator scripts for different feeds which save to different folders.

The Automator Script

The easiest is you download my Automator script here and modify it to your needs and feeds. Here is a screenshot how it should look like.

The automator script consists of this parts:

Delete old items

These 3 modules delete the old HTML files, if you want to keep everything or delete the files manually remove these 3 items.

• Get Specified Finder items: You need to change the folder.
  
• Get Folder Contents
• Move Finder Items to trash

Download RSS Articles

• Get Feeds from Mail, I use Apple Mail for the feeds I want to download, but you can replace this module against Get Feeds from Safari, if you use Safari.
  
• Filter Articles: You can adjust the filters depending on your feed
  
• Mark Articles, mark articles read.
  
• Get Permalinks of Articles
• Download URLs, you must adjust the folder.

Copy Articles to iPhone/iPod Touch

• Get Specified Finder Items: You must adjust the folder.
  
• Copy Finder Items: Here you must enter the Folder of your iPhone/iPod Touch. So start DataCase, Air Sharing etc. and connect your Mac to your iPhone/iPod Touch

I did not include an automatic delete for the files on the iPod/iPod Touch, but you can add this in a similar way as above shown under "Delete old items".

When you have finished your script you can also save it as an Application, so no need to start Automator each time, just choose "File Save as", File format "Application".

Usage

1. Start iPhone/iPod Touch and your App for storing files, e.g. DataCase or Air Sharing.
2. Start your Automator script
3. Wait
   
4. Finished.

Comments

Add New Search RSS

Kyle  - Automator RSS for Dummies   |97.114.74.xxx |2008-12-23 14:01:50 This sounds like a great program and much more versatile than the paid apps. I am new to Mac however and have no experience with Applescripts or Automator. I can't make much of your brief page directions and I'm afraid it's going to take days of help files and online directions to make your hard work useful. Any suggestions? Reply | Quote 0   0

Thomas   |123.203.89.xxx |2008-12-24 02:39:22 Kyle, thanks for the Feedback. You can download the Automator script (the link is in the above article). Doubleclick on it and modify as above mentioned. Tis script might be interesting, but has some limitations. To view RSS feeds offline on the iPhone/iPod Touch I think "Byline" (http://thomas.infoxenter.com/apps?Name=byline) from the App Store is the much better solution. Reply | Quote 0   0

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