the CRAWL Files

/***** V 3.0 *****/

/*
 *	IMPORTANT!!!!!
 *
 *	READ ME FIRST!!!
 *
 * 	Requirements:	A working directory under which are 2 directories named
 * 					'tmp' to store the html output files and another named
 * 					'dump' where the RSS feed text files are stored.
 *
 *					There is NO error checking here. If these directries are 
 *					not created first, there will be no notice, the script will
 *					NOT abort and tell you what happened.
 *
 *					I run this from the command prompt: "php -f reader.php"
 */

/*
 * FILE:		reader.php
 * Written by:	Brett Blake
 * Date:		6 August 2012
 * 
 * Purpose:		"reader.php" is the framework for a routine which downloads RSS 
 * 				standardized feeds, extracts news stories from them, and writes 
 * 				them to a series of web pages. A news-junkie's dream. The feeds 
 * 				fall into a series of categories based on the type of source being 
 * 				accessed: MSM, blogs, overseas media, official sources, etc for 
 * 				easier navigation. The inputs are a series of arrays found in 
 * 				Feedlist.php. There you will find the 200-odd feeds I currently 
 * 				retrieve. The output is about 2500 news stories every time this 
 * 				is run. Without removing posts older than 24 hours, that outpot 
 * 				doubles. The concept behind this enormous output isn't necessarily 
 * 				to keep track of a particular story as it develops, though I have 
 * 				a page devoted to this, but to provide an easy way to scan through 
 * 				lots of material quickly in order to see what's being reported and 
 * 				talked about.
 * 				
 * 				This is scalable by editing the Feedlist.php file, by adding 
 * 				and/or subtracting RSS feeds from the arrays. Thus, this is scalable to 
 * 				whatever degree you wish. Array indexes are explicitly made in the code 
 *				which I know is unnecessary, but I just suck it up and renumber the index 
 *				as I go along. You may change this as you wish. It is the one area in which 
 *				I abandoned ease of maintenance, and yes, I do check this from time to time. 
 *
 *				$alt[] = array(	"Alternet", "http://feeds.feedblitz.com/alternet", 
 *								"http://www.alternet.org/", true );
 *				$alt[] = . . .
 *
 * 				will work equally as well.
 *
 * 				V3.0 makes use of PHP's OOP functionality, which I find extends the run 
 * 				time 3X, however I accept this drawback in favor of ease of code 
 * 				maintenance. In most aspects the design philosophy has been to be as 
 *				easy as possible to maintain and scale this script and produce output
 *				which is both lightweight and durable.
 * 				
 * 				Files included here:	reader.php
 * 										Feedlist.php
 * 										news_html.php
 * 										reader.css
 * 										index.html
 * 										menu.html
 */

/*
 * FILE:		Feedlist.php    
 * Written By:	Brett Blake
 * Date:		6 August 2012
 * 
 * Purpose:		The application begins with data used to access RSS feeds and this data 
 * 				is stored here in arrays. The array structure used here is structured as 
 * 				follows:
 * 				
 * 				Field 0:	The name of the feed.
 * 				Field 1:	The RSS URL
 * 				Field 2:	The top-level URL of the site, blog, etc.
 * 				Field 3:	Whether the user (me) considers this a must read.
 */

/*
 * FILE:		news_html.php
 * Written by:	Brett Blake
 * Date:		6 August 2012
 * 
 * Purpose:		Functionality here deals with producing output which makes it 
 * 				easy to scan through lots of headlines at a glance, and somewhat 
 * 				easier to navigate through different kinds of news and opinion 
 * 				RSS feeds. The sole input is a massive array of Story_class objects 
 * 				and it is the task of generate_pages() to manage the material within,
 * 				manage destination file creation, and ensure that the correct material 
 * 				lands in the correct file and calls on write_page() to actually write
 *				the html.
 * 				
 * 				*** There is one implicit dependency here: all categories of feed must  
 * 				be contiguous within the array for this level or organization to work.
 */