Adding RSS Blocks in Moodle Build 1.7.1

Adding RSS Blocks in Moodle Build 1.7.1

by Alastair Graham -
Number of replies: 7
Hello people smile

I'm sorry if this has been covered in another post but I have been looking and I couldn't find it.

Today, I have built a Moodle Server which is running:

Windows 2003 (patched to the hilt)
IIS 6.0 (also patched)
PHP 5.2.1
MySQL 5.0.1
Moodle (ver 1.7.1)

Everything is running perfectly apart from one little bit. I call up an RSS block on the left side of the screen and go to configure it. As it's a new install, I go to add an RSS feed, I input the address, validate the feed (all good so far) and hit submit. Moodle then begins to run VERY slowly and almost times out but brings up a blank screen instead. Thinking this was a one off thing, I returned to the root page and go to configure the block again. My RSS feed is now in the list of available feeds but has no title. I tried to add the feed to the block anyway, thinking it was just the feed, but as soon as I do that, Moodle very slowly again and times out again. So, I returned to the root page again and the block has gone altogether and left me with a very slow Moodle page.

I used MySQL Query Browser to navigate the the mdl_block_rss_client table and sure enough, my feed was in teh database. When I remove the feed manually, Moodle picks back up again and runs smoothly.

So, I tried 2-3 other RSS feeds, thinking it was a problem with my original butthey all do the same too. I then tested other tables in Moodle and they are working fine - data is being input and output just fine.

I'm guessing there is a problem with the RSS table but I'm not sure what and wondered if anyone had a workaround or has also had problems.

regards,

Al

(apologies for length of post)
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In reply to Alastair Graham

Re: Adding RSS Blocks in Moodle Build 1.7.1

by Nicki Howes -

I am also experiencing this problem. I have a similar setup to Al.

Windows 2003 SP2
Apache 2.0.59
PHP 5.1.6
MySQL 5.0.24a
Moodle (ver 1.7.2)

Moodle runs very slowly and when i turn editing on my "add new blocks" has disappeared.

I've tried changing the memory size allocated to run the files in the php.ini files to 32M but this didn't appear to do anything. When i look at the log files there doesn't seem to be an error associated with that particular page load.
I can access the feed through a browser which seems to rule out firewall problems.

Regards,
Nicki

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In reply to Nicki Howes

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In reply to Deleted user

Re: Adding RSS Blocks in Moodle Build 1.7.1

by Alastair Graham -
Hi Dietmar,

Thanks for your reply.

I have tried your solution but the RSS problem means that the footer does not get loaded. Everything after the RSS block doesn't get loaded, presumably because the Block is timing the connection out.

I may have to upgrade to 1.8 which is annoying because I have already started work on 1.7.

It's very strange because I have a development server with the 1.7.1 XAMPP installation on it and the RSS feeds work perfectly on there...

I wonder if there is something on the XAMPP install that isn't on the manual install or something in the PHP installation which isn't in my manual install.
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In reply to Alastair Graham

Re: Adding RSS Blocks in Moodle Build 1.7.1

by Nicki Howes -
Hi Deitmar and Alastair,

Thank you for your reply Deitmar, but again I have the same problem as Alastair in that the footer won't show up.

I have a development server that also works perfectly with RSS, it is running Moodle 1.7.1 On my Moodle server I run WAMP server 1.6.5 where as on my test server I run WAMP 1.6.3. The only other change is that the test server runs XP.

I'm wondering if there is something there is something in that?
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In reply to Nicki Howes

Re: Adding RSS Blocks in Moodle Build 1.7.1

by Alastair Graham -
I have found a work around for this problem though I can't guaranteee it will work for everyone. Also, I can't tell you EXACTLY which extension is fixing the problem but it seems to be an extension problem.

1) download a copy of the XAMPP installation for your version of moodle, or the closest you can find.

2) Unpack the .zip folder and open the ‘php’ folder which can be found in there.

3) In there is a folder called ‘ext’ which holds the PHP extensions.

4) Copy the contents of this folder and paste them into the corresponding folder on the installation you want the RSS feeds on. I click ‘do not overwrite’ on all the duplicate files it found. There will be a few.

5) Next, go back into the XAMPP installation and open up the ‘php.ini’ file and so a search for the string ‘Windows Extensions’. Normally around line 563. A few lines under this there will be a number of lines which look a bit like this:

;extension=php_apd.dll

;extension=php_bcompiler.dll

;extension=php_bitset.dll

;extension=php_blenc.dll

6) Copy all the lines that look like this and paste them into the php.ini file in your big moodle install. Note: if you are using LDAP for your authentication, you’ll need to take the ‘;’ from the beginning of the line to uncomment it.

7) Restart your server or reset the moodle install and hey presto, it should be working.

This worked for me not 20 minutes ago so I’m pretty confident it works. I’m not sure exactly which extension it is which is needed for the RSS feeds but by installing the full lot and defining it in the extensions area of PHP.ini, it fixed that problem for me.

Do you think I should put this up on the Moodle forums? I’m sure people must have tried this before…

Oh, as a side note, this seems to have sorted the RSS Problem in my Moodle 1.8 install too…

Regards,

Al

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In reply to Alastair Graham

Re: Adding RSS Blocks in Moodle Build 1.7.1

by Alastair Graham -

WARNING:

I have heard that this way of fixing the RSS feeds can screw over WAMP servers so please approach with caution. I did this on an IIS Environment with a full install of Moodle.
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