Dear lazy web, Is there an easy way to generate an RSS of an open directory? Ideally a single file you could drop into any directory on your webserver and it would generate an RSS feed of all the files in that directory and would update every time a new file was added. Update: Finke built it. Thanks buddy!
There is now: http://www.chrisfinke.com/files/2007/09/dir_feed.txt
View the source, save as dir_feed.php, and drop it in a directory.
I don’t know if you think this would be useful to anyone else (i.e. worth developing more) but how about enclosure support?
[...] Want an easy way to generate a podcast or RSS feed? At Eliot’s request, I wrote a PHP script that generates an RSS feed based on the contents of its parent directory, so whenever you add files to that directory (or its subdirectories), the feed is updated with links to those files. It also supports enclosures, so if you add an audio or video file to the directory, that file will be available to podcast clients. If you modify a file in the directory, the feed updates the link so that subscribers will see that it has changed. It’s a no-fuss way to syndicate content without having to tie it into a CMS like WordPress or TypePad. [...]
Updated to support enclosures, see http://www.chrisfinke.com/2007/09/02/easy-peasy-podcasting/