The RSS Feeds block allows you to place the most recent news items from one or more RSS feeds defined in the Aggregator configuration.

Headline

Use the headline field to add a heading element for the RSS Feed items, for example "Recent News." 

NOTE: You have the ability to hide the headline field if you still wish to add a descriptive title yet not have it display on the page. Think of it more as an ‘Administrative Label’ if you wish to implement it this way

Headline Size

You have the ability to select the font size of the RSS Feeds block headline. Heading 2 is set by default, but may need to be adjusted depending on where you nest the RSS Feeds block within the page. 

Headline Style

Default, bold serif, Bold serif and Bold serif, highlighted (which will underline the headline text)

Feeds

Select one or more feeds to show items from. Feed items are sorted by most recent post date. The feeds must be defined in the aggregator configuration to show up in the dropdown list. Please contact your webmaster if you do not have access to the aggregator configuration.

Number of Items

Select the number of items to display in total. For example, embedding three feeds and showing three items will display the three most recent posts from all of those feeds and not three items from each feed.

No Results Text

This text allows you set some text with minimal formatting in the case that there are no posts to display. This might happen if feed items are deleted after the 6 month limit or if there are technical issues that prevent the feed from updating.

Display Options

These options change the individual feed items, not the block itself.

Background: White (default), Gray, Gold, Black and - None - (card is transparent)

Image position: Stacked (image displays above card content), Left (default) or Right 

NOTE: If the Image position is ‘Left’ or ‘Right’, you have the ability to change the Image size

Image format: Widescreen (16:9), circle (default) or square

NOTE: With the ‘circle’ and ‘square’ image format, you have the ability to change the Image size

Content Alignment: Left (default) or Center

Display list as: List (default), Grid

NOTE: With the grid display option you have the ability to choose between 2 column and 3 column.

When "Grid" is selected, when possible based on layout column size and viewport size (e.g. mobile/desktop), it will attempt to display as either a 2 column or 3 column grid. For best results, use a one-column section layout.

Styles: Card: Border, Hide Images, Hide Details, Hide Descriptions

You can optionally hide images, details, and descriptions that are displayed if the content exists.

Block Restrictions

The RSS Feeds block is available in the following section layouts:

  • One column
  • Two column
  • Three column
  • Four column

  • Page w/ left sidebar

Aggregator

Other roles can place RSS feeds on pages but the Aggregator configuration is restricted to webmasters. 

Webmasters can add feeds under Configuration -> Web services -> Aggregator. Once added, the feed items can be imported manually or you can wait until the hourly system background process runs. Feed items with post dates within 6 months will be imported. Going forward, the system background process will update existing, import new and delete expired items (items older than 6 months).

Feeds

Feeds have a title, URL, image and update interval. The feed must adhere to the RSS 2.0 specification.

Title

This is what will display in the RSS Feeds block dropdown when adding a feed. 

URL

The fully-qualified URL to the RSS feed. The feed must be RSS 2.0 compatible. The W3C has an online validator to check feeds. If a feed you are trying to embed does not validate, please contact the owner of that website.

Image

This field provides a way to override the feed channel image that may be defined in the RSS feed URL. Either image, if set, will be displayed next to each feed item when embedded with the RSS Feeds block. The images can be hidden via the Display options on the block configuration.

Update Interval

This defines how often the feed will update. It is recommended to use the default setting (one hour) in most cases. For frequently updated feeds, you may want to to lower this. 

Purge Items

The base functionality of Aggregator is to keep all feed items it encounters over time. In some cases you want your feed block reflect only current content that is available in the feed (e.g. available job postings, etc.). When checked, this will delete all feed items from the database before fetching the feed. Because of the performance cost of this feature, it is recommended that the update interval is increased to a reasonable amount based on the content and the expectation it serves.