WordPress Plugin: RSS Feed Retriever

About RSS Feed Retriever

This plugin allows you to fetch and display RSS feeds on your website using a shortcode. You can customize the appearance and behavior of the feeds, such as the number of items, whether to display the entire content or just an excerpt, and whether to open links in a new window. The plugin is lightweight and easy to set up, and you can use it in posts, pages, text widgets, and PHP files.

Frequently asked questions

How do I use this plugin?

Simply copy and paste the example shortcode into your post or page. Replace the URL and other properties as needed. You can also use it in Gutenberg blocks, widgets, and PHP as detailed in the FAQ section of the plugin page.

What are some of the key features of this plugin?

You can fetch as many RSS feeds as you want and display them using shortcode. It allows control over displaying the entire content or an excerpt, including the number of words and a 'Read more' link. You can also fetch and control the size of a thumbnail image.

How can I customize the display of my RSS feeds?

The plugin offers various properties to customize your feeds, such as 'url' for single or multiple feeds, 'items' to control the number of entries, and 'orderby' for sorting. You can also control the display of the title, excerpt length, and whether links open in a new window.

Changelog

1.6.0

Add additional methods for retriving thumbnail images

1.5.5

Fix a bug where dofollow option was not working with thumbnails

1.5.3

Add more details to RSS errors
Fallback to original RSS fetch method if feed is invalid

1.5.2

Increase performance with built-in caching system for all feeds
Disable ajax for feeds already cached

1.5.1

Fix an issue causing some sources to block SimplePie requests

1.5.0

Defer loading feeds via JavaScript (solves slow page loading issue)
Add ajax option (true or false) to disable deferred loading
Fix an issue where some feeds would not fetch
Hide images that contain broken or blocked links

1.4.3

Fix an issue with default ordering for single feeds

1.4.2

Add ability to grab thumbnail image from rss image tag

1.4.1

Add custom filter hook to allow changes to the layout (wp_rss_retriever_layout)
Thumbnail images now link to the source

1.4.0

Refactor feed fetching and formatting for performance
Improve error handling. Display attribute errors for administrators and editors
Allow cache setting to be plain text (ie. 2 hours, 2 days, etc.)
Fix a bug causing the shortcode not to load when an open or closing double quote was used
Allow thumbnails to take percentages as arguments for full width (ie. 100%x250)

1.3.10

Fix a bug causing an error if the rss content is an empty string

1.3.9

Fix a bug with function declarations not working with some themes

1.3.7

Improve image finder functionality

1.3.6

Add support for featured images in RSS feeds for self-hosted sources

1.3.5

Suppress php warning from known SimplePie date bug

1.3.4

Fix a bug causing a PHP error for feeds with a 404 error

1.3.3

Fix a bug when published and source are disabled causing layout issue

1.3.2

Fix an issue where feeds were automatically reordered by default WordPress settings

1.3.1

Fix an issue where excerpts in East Asian languages were not trimming words properly

1.3.0

Refactor image CSS to make img element act as background-size:cover
Remove default list-item styles
Include ability to set width and height on thumbnails (ie. 200×150)
Fix an issue where plugin CSS was not enqueuing when using the shortcode inside a text widget
Fix an issue where excerpt=0 was not stripping html tags from the feed.

1.2.6

Fix HTML validation error

1.2.4

Utilizes the local timezone set in WordPress general settings

1.2.2

Dates now translates to the language set in WordPress general settings
Date and time format now uses the format set via WordPress general settings

1.2.1

Fix a bug where the error message “No Items” was displaying outside of the list item
Fix an error that displays sometimes on 404 pages
Add optional plugin credits (disabled by default)
Add orderby=”random” method

1.2

Fix SSL error
Add default nofollow for links
Add option for dofollow

1.1.1

Support for aggregating multiple feeds into one list
Ability to order posts by date or reverse date
Options to display or remove source and date
Option to remove title

1.1

Fixed several bugs
Fetch thumbnail or first image
Control size of thumbnail
Set cache time (in seconds)
Now includes small CSS file, required for thumbnail support

1.0.2

Pulls images & html in when excerpt is not enabled

1.0.1

Fixes bug where excerpt included html and broken images

1.0

Initial release

RSS Feed Retriever