==== Create a Blog Announcements Box ====

{{:tutorials:zencartmods:announce.jpg?|}}

=== Create an Anouncements Category ===

Use Wordpress and create a category called 'announce', and populate it with a few posts. Test to see that the rss feed works. 

If you're using some sort of nice URLS, it'll look like http://www.yourblog.com/feed/announce

If not, it may look more like http://www.yourblog.com/?feed=rss2&category_name=announce



=== PHP / DOM ===

Put this in **includes/templates/YOUR_TEMPLATE/templates/tpl_index_default.php** (we put it at the very bottom).

<code php>
<div id="announceBox">

<?php

$filename = 'http://yourblog.com/feed/announce';   // Change this to your own feed
$xml = new DOMDocument();
$xml->load($filename);

$item = $xml->getElementsByTagName('item')->item(0);
$post_title = $item->getElementsByTagName('title')->item(0)->nodeValue;
$post_link = $item->getElementsByTagName('link')->item(0)->nodeValue;
$post_encoded  = $item->getElementsByTagName('encoded')->item(0)->nodeValue;
$post_text = substr(strip_tags($post_encoded, '<p><a><blockquote>'), 0, 500);  // strip out common tags here
if($post_text != strip_tags($post_encoded, '<p><a><blockquote>'))
  { // add read more tag

    $pre_cut = 499;
    while( substr($post_text, $pre_cut, 1) !== ' ' && $pre_cut > 0)
      {
	$pre_cut--;
      }
    $post_text = substr($post_text, 0, $pre_cut);
    $post_text .= '... <a href="'. $post_link .'">Read More ...</a>';
  }

$post_text = str_replace('<p></p>', '', $post_text);

// find the first image of the post
$matches = array();
preg_match('/<img\s+src="([^"]*)"/', $post_encoded, $matches);
$post_image = $matches[1];


?>
<table>
<tr>
<td>
<div id="announceImgBox">
<a href="<?php echo $post_link; ?>">
<img src="<?php echo $post_image; ?>" />
</a>
</div>
</td>
<?php
  }
?>
<td>
<div id="announceTitle">
  <a href="<?php echo $post_link; ?>"> <?php echo $post_title; ?></a>
</div>
<div id="announceText">
<?php
  echo $post_text;
?>
</div>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
</div>
</code>

This will work for rss feeds generated by Wordpress, but you'll have to add CSS and style it for your own website.