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RSS panel
What is an RSS panel?
An RSS panel allows you to send a live RSS feed to your display board. The example below shows an RSS panel displayed at the bottom of the board.
Adding an RSS panel
To add an RSS panel, click on the 
toolbar button to expand the list of panel types and choose the 
button, as shown below:
After selecting the RSS panel button, the mouse pointer changes into a white crosshair pointer, indicating that the designer is ready to draw your panel. Click and hold your left mouse button, starting at the point defining the upper-left corner of your new panel. Whilst still holding down the left mouse button, drag the marquee that will appear to the point that will define the lower-right corner of your panel, as shown below:
Customising an RSS panel
To customize an RSS panel, click on the 
toolbar button to switch to panel selection mode. Hover your mouse pointer over the label panel you want to customise and click on the 
icon, when it appears towards the top-right corner of the panel, as shown below:
The RSS panel properties window will open, containing the following tabs:
Content
The tab allows you to add the URL of your RSS feed, e.g. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/rss. To verify that the feed is valid, click on the button.
If the entry is valid, the title of the RSS feed will appear in the RSS title field. Click on the button to add this feed to your RSS panel, as shown below:
By default, this will appear in your RSS panel as follows:
Follow the same procedure to add multiple RSS feeds to your panel.
Reordering RSS feeds
If your RSS panel contains more than one RSS feed, you can change the order that they will appear on your display board, by clicking on the 
icon alongside each feed, as shown below:
Deleting an RSS feed
To delete an RSS feed from the panel, click on the 
icon as shown below:
Appearance
The tab allows you change the look of your RSS feed, by amending one or more of the following properties: the article title, the article description and the bullet point, as shown below:
Article title
Apply any styling properties,such as font size, font style or text colour, if you want to change the appearance of your article title.
Article description
Apply any styling properties, such as font size, font style or text colour, if you want to change the appearance of your article description.
Bullet point
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| Image source | To use an image rather than a plain colour as your bullet point, enter its source here; the path is relative to the folder on disk from which the web content is served, and is different for each class of web user; the background colour should be set as Transparent, so it does not interfere with your image |
| Width | Define the width of the image, in pixels |
| Background colour | If you don't want to use an image as your bullet point, you can select a background colour |
The example below shows two different bullet point implementations of the same RSS feed. On the left, you can see an image as a bullet point, whereas on the right the bullet point is just a coloured rectangle of specific width.
Background
The tab allows you to configure the background properties of your RSS panel.
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| Image source | If you want your panel to display an image, type its source here. Remember, the path is relative to the folder on disk from which the web content is served, and is different for each class of web user |
| Image style | Choose how the image should be displayed |
| Colour | Choose the background colour of the panel; if you are adding an image, you may want to select Transparent so that this does not interfere with your image |
| Apply lighting effects to this panel | Tick this option to apply a shine effect to the entire panel; if you are using the panel to display an image, this may adversely affect how it appears |
The two examples below show the difference between panels with and without lighting effects.
 | You should check with the RRS feed provider that they are happy for you to use their feed. |
Metrics
The tab allows you to define the shape of the panel, by entering values for its position and size. You can also choose the refresh rate of the page, by entering a value in the Article refresh box. Click on the button to apply any changes.
RSS panel - overview video
For a live demonstration of how to design and customise an RSS panel, watch the video below:
What is an RSS panel?An RSS panel will allow you to send a live RSS feed to your display board. The example below shows an RSS panel displayed at the bottom of the board. 
|
Design an RSS panel
|
How do I add an RSS panel?
To add an RSS panel, click on the 
button and then select the 
button, as shown below:
The list of panels types available immediately disappears and a blank screen will appear with the white cross-like pointer sign indicating where the panel will begin on the screen.
Simply drag your mouse across the screen and you can size the panel as you can see in below:
How do I customise my RSS panel?
To customise your RSS panel, click on the 
button on the top left hand side of the screen.
Then click on the 
icon of the panel that you want to customise, as shown below:
The following screen will appear:
Content
First you will need to add an RSS feed. To do this, simply type in the URL in the RSS Url panel e.g. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/rss.
Next, check if the feed is valid by pressing the button. If it is valid, the RSS title will appear in the RSS title field.
Now all you have to do is press the button to add this feed to your RSS panel, as below:
By default, this will appear in your RSS panel as follows:
Re-ordering RSS feeds
You can add as many RSS feeds as you like, following the same process. If you want to change their order, just click on the
icon alongside the feed that shows the direction to which you want your RSS feed to move.
In the example that follows, we click on the 
icon alongside the BBC News feed to move it a level up.
This will appear in your RSS panel as follows:
Deleting an RSS feed
To delete an RSS feed from the RSS panel, just click on the 
icon alongside the feed that you want to delete.
Appearance
Each RSS feed consists of the article title, the article description and the bullet point as shown in the image below:
Consequently, in order to change the appearance of a feed in your panel, you have to change the appearence of these little sections that it cosnists of. To do so, just select the tab. This will appear as follows:
Changing Font properties
To edit the appearance of either the Article title or Article description simply change the font's family and style. Choose the font size you would like to use by simply selecting from the drop-down list. You can also choose the style of font you would like to use from the drop-down font family list. To select the text colour, click on the drop-down arrow. This will show the colour palette available. To select a standard colour, all you need to do is click on it. To add a custom colour, click on one of the blank custom colour squares and add the RGB colours to add to your custom palette. You need to click on the button to apply the colour, as shown below:
If you would like the text to appear as bold, italic or underlined, simply click on the required box to highlight
.
To determine the placement of your text, simply click on 
.
Changing Bullet point properties
To use an image rather than a plain colour as your bullet point, simply type the location of the image into the Image source box. You can also define the width of the image in pixels.
Alternatively if you just want to change the colour of the bullet point, click on the drop-down arrow. This will show the colour palette available:
The example below shows two different bullet point implementations of the same RSS feed. On the left, you can see an image as a bullet point, whereas on the right the bullet point is just a coloured rectangle of specific width.
Background
By default the background of the RSS panel is black with a lighting effect. However you can add an image source as the background and either choose to have that image centered in the panel or repeated by typing in details. In that case, you may even want to set a transparent background for your image, as shown below. Alternatively, just pick a colour from the colour palette and leave the Image source field blank.
If you would like to apply lighting effects to the RSS panel, just tick the box as shown here:
The two examples below show the difference between panels with and without lighting effects. The panel with the slight shine has a lighting effect applied, while the solid black panel has no lighting effects.
| N.B. Please check with the RRS feed provider that they are happy for you to use their feed. Most RSS providers will state quite clearly whether they are happy for you to use the feed and how it should be used. |
Metrics
The width and height of the panel containing the RSS feed will be picked up automatically. You can change this by using your mouse to drag back to a different size or by changing the number of pixels in to define the panel size.
You can also choose the refresh rate for the panel by entering the required article refresh rate for the panel as shown below. At the end, click the button to save any changes made.
