Feature question regarding ReviewPost

[Chuck S]

What I am saying is their documentation and CONFIGURATION TOOLS require you to have a working wimpy player setup on your server which of course I do not.

Applying an XML playlist to the player:

Once you have created an XML playlist, upload the XML file to your server, then use the Customizer tool to "run wimpy off of" your XML playlist. An XML playlist is used in lieu of wimpy.php. Click here to access the Customizer tool.

You can run both Wimpy AV and Wimpy MP3 player off of an XML playlist.

IMPORTANT NOTE: When running wimpy off of an XML playlist, cerain features of the player will not be available. Features such as forceDownload, serveMP3 will not work -- since these options take advantage server-side scripting environments.

This is basically what your wanting but instead of saying here is the html you want to use your running through hoops trying to figure that out. Thats all I am looking for is the simple html examples that the configuration tool provides to see which one needs to be tailored to your specific situation. Podcast uses a database for there information specific to wimpy so thats not the one you want.

Basically I need to install wimpy and once I do that I can give you a more accurate answer. None of us here every heard of the software before yesterday

[pcoskat]

*silence is golden*

[Chuck S]

Sorry You did not understand the statement. The statement you quote above is taken right from the paragraph talking about jumping all around on the wimpy site looking for the pages we need. It is not directed at you at all.

[Michael P]

Pcoskat, what Chuck was saying was that if he had an actual example of an integration, not just a conceptual guide, then it would be easier for him to understand what would be required on the development side. Without actual data, it is difficult to visualize what is going in and what is going out in the process.

Saying it should be easy is one thing - spending the time to lay it all out and design it is something else; Chuck was looking for something that would jumpstart the process by removing the need for him to do the work to determine what needs to be done upfront before any committment to actually do the development was made.

Simply put, the time needed to design it would likely result in the code necessary to build it and as such could be covered under a development contract.

ReviewPost will get you close to what you want; but will require development to do exactly what you want; who does that development is up to you. Any discussions about further development should be taken offline.

[pcoskat]

It's always a pleasure when you step in - seriously!

Originally Posted by Michael P

Pcoskat, what Chuck was saying was that if he had an actual example of an integration...

What type of example?

- An example of actual code that was written to create the bridge?

or

- An example of how the integration would work from the end user standpoint? (ie what they should see when they click on the link...)

[Michael P]

What's unknown here is what kind of XML file your users would be uploading and what conversion would be necessary that would require a "conversion" script. If the XML file uploaded isn't the same as the XML which is provided to wimpy, then what needs to be changed? The documentation discusses what it needs, but that doesn't connect all the dots or provide us with a 'real world' example of what your users would be submitting.

I've done very little XML work, but assume it would mean changing the format a little - which makes me wonder why users wouldn't submit it in that format to begin with?

So, assuming that you don't want to reconvert an XML file every time the page loads, then you would upload an XML file, convert it and store it for use later. However, if you want the user to have the flexibility to edit the XML file and keep it stored on their local server, then you would write a converter that worked every time the page loads.

It's not the overview anyone is having trouble with - it's the actual design of the code that would need to be written and the time to lay it all out would need to be covered under some kind of development agreement.

It may sound 'simple', but the devil is in the details and while nothing sounds difficult; it still requires an investment of time to figure out the flow from start to finish. Alot of effort has already gone into just getting this far and what we do know is that this is a custom job and should be handled between the parties that will do the actual work.

[pcoskat]

Going back to the 'example' you need. Are you asking for an example of the actual code that someone wrote that allowed Wimpy to pull and read a feed from the MySql database?

Again, at the moment, I just unclear as to the specific type of example you need.

[Michael P]

What I'm saying is that in general we all agree it can be done; the next step would be that you would need to hire someone to do the work for you - which would involve analyzing the wimpy requirements more throughly, checkling the expected input data (the XML file) and then putting together a solution.

We're all just going off quick reads when what is really needed is an investment of time to figure it out since none of us is familiar enough with the items involved to give explicit answers.

[pcoskat]

Originally Posted by Michael P

What I'm saying is that in general we all agree it can be done; the next step would be that you would need to hire someone to do the work for you...

I'm aware I can hire people. My reason for posting in the first place was to figure understand whether or not any of the 'Post' products could be used in the manner I described. (I guess I missed the part where we all agreed it could be done )

I have 2 different programmers who understand the requirements and feel confident that they can do it. We were all kind of waiting to see if the customization could be done on this end, since you offer customization services...

Is this something your team can accomplish? If you need more time to analyze, that's fine (just let me know how long).

If it's not a customization job you wish to take on, that's fine too. Not a 'big' deal...as I mentioned, I originally posted to find out if what I was asking was even 'possible'.

[Michael P]

Gotcha, I think we've all been saying the same kind of things just not effectively. We do offer the custom services, that's Chuck's area; although I know that his plate is pretty full right now, so it would come down to timing. I will get with Chuck and contact you via PM to see what kind of timeframe we are looking at.

Cheers!

[pcoskat]

Originally Posted by Michael P

Gotcha, I think we've all been saying the same kind of things just not effectively. We do offer the custom services, that's Chuck's area; although I know that his plate is pretty full right now, so it would come down to timing. I will get with Chuck and contact you via PM to see what kind of timeframe we are looking at.

Cheers!

Perfect, thank you!

[Chuck S]

Yeah this is what you want

http://www.reeftalk.com/reviews/show...p/product/1853

There are some more extensive issues that need to be worked out before anyone can move forward on this.

Wimpy requires an external proxy script when using foreign xml files and the xml variable is hardcoded.

I used a simple $fopen $fwrite and $fclose to update the proxy script with the variable from our $extra1 field which stores the xml file url.

However in a dynamic program such as ours you can have 30 users all viewing different xml files and this is where my thoughts are at this point.

No quick answer here on this. I needed to actually download the software and install it just to be able to get to the point of being able to see the examples to do this quick test.

Lots more reading to do.

[Chuck S]

Now it is dynamic here is a second uploaded XML file

http://www.reeftalk.com/reviews/show...p/product/1854

and then of course the original here

http://www.reeftalk.com/reviews/show...p/product/1853

[pcoskat]

Originally Posted by Chuck S

http://www.reeftalk.com/reviews/show...p/product/1853

Hold the phones!!! I heard a podcast in ^that^ link!

Nice work!!! Verrrrrrrrrrry nice work.

[Chuck S]

Yes you did not hard at all once I downloaded the wimpy software and was able to use the configuration tools.

Then of course needed to do some changes to files to make things dynamic like our program instead of the standard static html examples.

[pcoskat]

Sounds good, much appreciated, and my apologies for the 'bad blood' earlier in this thread!

I've sent a message to Michael asking about quotes for Wimpy integration for my sites...

BTW, quick question... If the person does not enter a feed, but instead enters a link to a single mp3 file, will Wimpy still open and play it?

example link to single podcast episode:

http://media.libsyn.com/media/scienc...2006032413.mp3

[Chuck S]

Currently the answer is no since we are using podcast_proxy.php which has to be used when you use external xml feeds however it is something that can be possibly maybe a switch could be added in the code to load another player that does one song.

Again though I would need to look at how wimpy handles external files but I beleive wimpy.php itself can play the external file no need for a proxy script as in the XML. I don't think it should take nothing more than a call to get the extention on the end of the link and if it is xml load that player and if mp3 load this player

Any custom quotes you can email to me as Michael does not handle that end of things. In that respect as he said I am the go to guy.

[pcoskat]

Originally Posted by Chuck S

Any custom quotes you can email to me as Michael does not handle that end of things. In that respect as he said I am the go to guy.

Ok..will shoot you an email later today.

Keep me posted about the single mp3 files.

[Chuck S]

How is this

http://www.reeftalk.com/reviews/show...p/product/1855

[pcoskat]

Perfection - thanks!

So, am I correct, that the user can enter either an XML feed or a link to an mp3 file, and Wimpy will open either?