Hello.

I am Paul Kinlan.

A Developer Advocate for Chrome and the Open Web at Google.

I love the web. The web should allow anyone to access any experience that they need without the need for native install or content walled garden.

RE: OPML - Please enlighten me

Paul Kinlan

I'm struggling to understand the practical uses of OPML, especially given the inconsistent use of attributes like 'type', 'url', and 'xmlurl'. While I'm developing a JavaScript OPML object model for my own projects (like a tagging system where OPML stores related links for blog posts), I haven't found a clear standard for defining outlines. It seems like the 'standard' emerges from popular usage rather than formal specification. I'm particularly interested in how to determine the file type of items within an OPML outline, as my current application only uses links for pages and images (feed support is still pending). The lack of clear semantics in OPML makes it difficult to build dynamic applications that can 'mash up' content from different sources based on the OPML structure.

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