The Feed is Fixed!

For the past two weeks, I have been having issues with my podcast feed for "Dodge Intrepid." With the latest show just days away, I had to scramble to find a fix. Should I move the .xml file off of the Seton Hill blog servers? It's just an "asset" connected to my blog, so as long as this puppy's working, that should be too.

I coded the darn thing by hand, based off of the official iTunes Podcast file. Suddenly everything just stopped updating somewhere around the podcast of our live I.L.L. episode. I went over the code again and again, but like, like proofreading a paper, sometimes the author can't see all the little mistakes. This afternoon, I spent a few minutes researching Podcast feed programs-- little apps that would generate the RSS feed for me, mistake-free.

The best app I found was simply called Podcast Maker, published by Lemonz Dream. I haven't had the chance to play around with the demo, but it looks to be pretty simple. You make the audio file, fill in some forms, assign some graphics, and then upload it. You can make a super advanced podcast, or just the simple run-of-the-mill radio show. While it looks like I'll eventually purchase it and do all my podcasting with it, I needed to fix the issue at hand. That's when I started reading the developer's FAQ page and discovered a handy website: Feed Validator.

FeedValidator.org might be one of the handiest sites I've used, and it would be a good tool for any beginning blogger or podcaster trying to make the perfect RSS feed. The site is modeled after the simple Google interface. You simply paste in your feed URL (in my case its: "blogs.setonhill.edu/MikeRubino/podcast/dodgeintrepidcommercial.xml") and it goes through the XML code and tells you what's wrong with it. The site had a couple little mistakes when examining the iTunes-specific podcast code, but it was still helpful. It highlighted the entire description paragraph for the previously mentioned I.L.L. episode. Apparently there was some character in there that was stopping all further updates. So I simply deleted and rewrote the description... and it worked.

The podcast feed is safe, and just in time for this Saturday's "Duel with Death" performance. Hopefully these links can help other folks working on podcasts.