Media RSS is used for syndicating multimedia files (audio, video, image) in RSS feeds. It is used by content publishers to make media files available to external systems via a feed. The BlueConic Media RSS Connection Plugin sets up a connection between BlueConic and the Media RSS feed of a content publisher.

By itself, the plugin does not do anything. It merely acts as a liaison for other plugins so they can do their job. For example, the Toolbar Media RSS Plugin requires a configured Media RSS Connection in order to work.

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Obtain the connection URL

To set up the connection, you will need to obtain the MRSS feed URL of the content publisher of your choice. These are typically found in the API documentation of the publisher. Below are a couple of examples:

Picasa

To get a Media RSS feed from Picasa for pictures of "blueberries", this would be the URL to use:
https://picasaweb.google.com/data/feed/base/all?alt=rss&kind=photo&access=public&filter=1&hl=en_US&q=blueberries

Flickr

To get a similar Media RSS feed from Flickr, this would be the URL to use:
http://api.flickr.com/services/feeds/photos_public.gne?format=rss_200_enc&tags=blueberries

Modify the connection URL

As you can see, the search term "blueberries" is contained in a parameter in the Media RSS URL. For the Media RSS connection to work, the plugin needs to be able to pinpoint the search term in the URL. So the URL has to be modified by replacing the search term with the marker string "{searchTerms}". Copy this term exactly, as casing is important.

The modified connection URLs for the above examples are:

Picasa

https://picasaweb.google.com/data/feed/base/all?alt=rss&kind=photo&access=public&filter=1&hl=en_US&q={searchTerms}

Flickr

http://api.flickr.com/services/feeds/photos_public.gne?format=rss_200_enc&tags={searchTerms}

The modified Media RSS URL is now ready to be entered as URL under "Connection Details". Give the connection a meaningful name (e.g. "Picasa MRSS" or "Flickr MRSS"), enable it and save the connection to start using it.