podcastparser¶

podcastparser is a simple and fast podcast feed parser library in Python. The two primary users of the library are the gPodder Podcast Client and the gpodder.net web service.

The following feed types are supported:

Really Simple Syndication (RSS 2.0)
Atom Syndication Format (RFC 4287)

The following specifications are supported:

These formats only specify the possible markup elements and attributes. We recommend that you also read the Podcast Feed Best Practice guide if you want to optimize your feeds for best display in podcast clients.

Where times and durations are used, the values are expected to be formatted either as seconds or as RFC 2326 Normal Play Time (NPT).

Example¶

import podcastparser
import urllib

feedurl = 'http://example.com/feed.xml'

parsed = podcastparser.parse(feedurl, urllib.urlopen(feedurl))

# parsed is a dict
import pprint
pprint.pprint(parsed)

Supported XML Elements and Attributes¶

For both RSS and Atom feeds, only a subset of elements (those that are relevant to podcast client applications) is parsed. This section describes which elements and attributes are parsed and how the contents are interpreted/used.

RSS¶

rss@xml:base: Base URL for all relative links in the RSS file.
rss/channel: Podcast.
rss/channel/title: Podcast title (whitespace is squashed).
rss/channel/link: Podcast website.
rss/channel/description: Podcast description (whitespace is squashed).
rss/channel/image/url: Podcast cover art.
rss/channel/itunes:image: Podcast cover art (alternative).
rss/channel/atom:link@rel=payment: Podcast payment URL (e.g. Flattr).
rss/channel/item: Episode.
rss/channel/item/guid: Episode unique identifier (GUID), mandatory.
rss/channel/item/title: Episode title (whitespace is squashed).
rss/channel/item/link: Episode website.
rss/channel/item/description: Episode description (whitespace is squashed).
rss/channel/item/itunes:subtitle: Episode subtitled / one-line description (whitespace is squashed).
rss/channel/item/content:encoded: Episode description in HTML.
rss/channel/item/itunes:duration: Episode duration.
rss/channel/item/pubDate: Episode publication date.
rss/channel/item/atom:link@rel=payment: Episode payment URL (e.g. Flattr).
rss/channel/item/atom:link@rel=enclosure: File download URL (@href), size (@length) and mime type (@type).
rss/channel/item/media:content: File download URL (@url), size (@fileSize) and mime type (@type).
rss/channel/item/enclosure: File download URL (@url), size (@length) and mime type (@type).
rss/channel/item/psc:chapters: Podlove Simple Chapters, version 1.1 and 1.2.
rss/channel/item/psc:chapters/psc:chapter: Chapter entry (@start, @title, @href and @image).

Atom¶

For Atom feeds, podcastparser will handle the following elements and attributes:

atom:feed: Podcast.
atom:feed/atom:title: Podcast title (whitespace is squashed).
atom:feed/atom:subtitle: Podcast description (whitespace is squashed).
atom:feed/atom:icon: Podcast cover art.
atom:feed/atom:link@href: Podcast website.
atom:feed/atom:entry: Episode.
atom:feed/atom:entry/atom:id: Episode unique identifier (GUID), mandatory.
atom:feed/atom:entry/atom:title: Episode title (whitespace is squashed).
atom:feed/atom:entry/atom:link@rel=enclosure: File download URL (@href), size (@length) and mime type (@type).
atom:feed/atom:entry/atom:link@rel=(self|alternate): Episode website.
atom:feed/atom:entry/atom:link@rel=payment: Episode payment URL (e.g. Flattr).
atom:feed/atom:entry/atom:content: Episode description (in HTML or plaintext).
atom:feed/atom:entry/atom:published: Episode publication date.
atom:feed/atom:entry/psc:chapters: Podlove Simple Chapters, version 1.1 and 1.2.
atom:feed/atom:entry/psc:chapters/psc:chapter: Chapter entry (@start, @title, @href and @image).

The `podcastparser` module¶

Simplified, fast RSS parser

exception podcastparser.FeedParseError(msg, exception, locator)¶

Exception raised when asked to parse an invalid feed

This exception allows users of this library to catch exceptions without having to import the XML parsing library themselves.

podcastparser.file_basename_no_extension(filename)¶

Returns filename without extension

>>> file_basename_no_extension('/home/me/file.txt')
'file'

>>> file_basename_no_extension('file')
'file'

podcastparser.is_html(text)¶: Tests whether the given string contains HTML encoded data

podcastparser.normalize_feed_url(url)¶

Normalize and convert a URL. If the URL cannot be converted (invalid or unknown scheme), None is returned.

This will also normalize feed:// and itpc:// to http://.

>>> normalize_feed_url('itpc://example.org/podcast.rss')
'http://example.org/podcast.rss'

If no URL scheme is defined (e.g. “curry.com”), we will simply assume the user intends to add a http:// feed.

>>> normalize_feed_url('curry.com')
'http://curry.com/'

It will also take care of converting the domain name to all-lowercase (because domains are not case sensitive):

>>> normalize_feed_url('http://Example.COM/')
'http://example.com/'

Some other minimalistic changes are also taken care of, e.g. a ? with an empty query is removed:

>>> normalize_feed_url('http://example.org/test?')
'http://example.org/test'

Leading and trailing whitespace is removed

>>> normalize_feed_url(' http://example.com/podcast.rss ')
'http://example.com/podcast.rss'

Incomplete (too short) URLs are not accepted

>>> normalize_feed_url('http://') is None
True

Unknown protocols are not accepted

>>> normalize_feed_url('gopher://gopher.hprc.utoronto.ca/file.txt') is None
True

podcastparser.parse(url, stream, max_episodes=0)¶

Parse a podcast feed from the given URL and stream

Parameters:	url – the URL of the feed. Will be used to resolve relative links stream – file-like object containing the feed content max_episodes – maximum number of episodes to return. 0 (default) means no limit
Returns:	a dict with the parsed contents of the feed

podcastparser.parse_length(text)¶

Parses a file length

>>> parse_length(None)
-1

>>> parse_length('0')
-1

>>> parse_length('unknown')
-1

>>> parse_length('100')
100

podcastparser.parse_pubdate(text)¶

Parse a date string into a Unix timestamp

>>> parse_pubdate('Fri, 21 Nov 1997 09:55:06 -0600')
880127706

>>> parse_pubdate('2003-12-13T00:00:00+02:00')
1071266400

>>> parse_pubdate('2003-12-13T18:30:02Z')
1071340202

>>> parse_pubdate('Mon, 02 May 1960 09:05:01 +0100')
-305049299

>>> parse_pubdate('')
0

>>> parse_pubdate('unknown')
0

podcastparser.parse_time(value)¶

Parse a time string into seconds

See RFC2326, 3.6 “Normal Play Time” (HH:MM:SS.FRACT)

>>> parse_time('0')
0
>>> parse_time('128')
128
>>> parse_time('00:00')
0
>>> parse_time('00:00:00')
0
>>> parse_time('00:20')
20
>>> parse_time('00:00:20')
20
>>> parse_time('01:00:00')
3600
>>> parse_time(' 03:02:01')
10921
>>> parse_time('61:08')
3668
>>> parse_time('25:03:30 ')
90210
>>> parse_time('25:3:30')
90210
>>> parse_time('61.08')
61
>>> parse_time('01:02:03.500')
3723
>>> parse_time(' ')
0

podcastparser.parse_type(text)¶

“normalize” a mime type

>>> parse_type('text/plain')
'text/plain'

>>> parse_type('text')
'application/octet-stream'

>>> parse_type('')
'application/octet-stream'

>>> parse_type(None)
'application/octet-stream'

podcastparser.remove_html_tags(html)¶: Remove HTML tags from a string and replace numeric and named entities with the corresponding character, so the HTML text can be displayed in a simple text view.

podcastparser.squash_whitespace(text)¶

Combine multiple whitespaces into one, trim trailing/leading spaces

>>> squash_whitespace(' some           text  with a    lot of   spaces ')
'some text with a lot of spaces'

Unsupported Namespaces¶

This is a list of podcast-related XML namespaces that are not yet supported by podcastparser, but might be in the future.

Chapter Marks¶

rawvoice RSS: Rating, Frequency, Poster, WebM, MP4, Metamark (kind of chapter-like markers)
IGOR: Chapter Marks

Others¶

libSYN RSS Extensions: contactPhone, contactEmail, contactTwitter, contactWebsite, wallpaper, pdf, background
Comment API: Comments to a given item (readable via RSS)
MVCB: Error Reports To Field (usually a mailto: link)
Syndication Module: Update period, frequency and base (for skipping updates)
Creative Commons RSS: Creative commons license for the content
Pheedo: Original link to website and original link to enclosure (without going through pheedo redirect)
WGS84: Geo-Coordinates per item
Conversations Network: Intro duration in milliseconds (for skipping the intro), ratings
purl DC Elements: dc:creator (author / creator of the podcast, possibly with e-mail address)
Tristana: tristana:self (canonical URL to feed)
Blip: Show name, show page, picture, username, language, rating, thumbnail_src, license