PHP Generate RSS XML - Encoding Error

Question

So I have a small PHP script that generates an xml feel for the rss feed of my blog. However, it throws up this error:

This page contains the following errors:

error on line 23 at column 14: Encoding error
Below is a rendering of the page up to the first error.

(seen here: http://aviatex14.co.uk/rss.xml)

Here's the code that generates it:

while ($line = mysql_fetch_array($result)) {
  $return[] = $line;
  var_dump(date("Y-m-d H:i:s", $line['timestamp']));
}

$now = date("D, d M Y H:i:s T");

$output = "<?xml version=\"1.0\" encoding=\"UTF-16\" ?>
             <rss version=\"2.0\">
                <channel>
                  <title></title>
                  <link></link>
                  <description></description>
                  <pubDate></pubDate>
                  <language>en-us</language>
                    
                  <lastBuildDate>$now</lastBuildDate>
          ";
            
foreach ($return as $line) {
  $output .= "<item><title>".htmlentities($line['title'])."</title>
                <link>http://blog.aviatex14.co.uk/permalink.php?uid=".htmlentities($line['uid'])."</link>     
                <description>".htmlentities(strip_tags($line['entry']))."</description>
                <pubDate>".$date = date("Y-m-d H:i:s T", $line['timestamp'])."</pubDate> 
              </item>";
}
$output .= "</channel></rss>";
print "Content-Type: application/rss+xml";
echo $output;

$f = fopen("rss.xml", "w"); 
fwrite($f, $output); 
fclose($f);

Any help would be appreciated! :D

I wonder for what htmlentities is used everywhere therein. Anyway, you should provide a charset to make it work for itself at least: php.net/manual/en/function.htmlentities.php — hakre
– hakre, Commented Jun 20, 2011 at 19:52
encoding=\"UTF-16\" - is this really the output's true encoding? — hakre
– hakre, Commented Jun 20, 2011 at 19:53
There is no error at that line anymore. Apparently the OP changed the feed after asking. Voting to close. — Gordon
– Gordon, Commented Jun 20, 2011 at 20:01
I did, but then it threw up this: "error on line 33 at column 157: Opening and ending tag mismatch: p line 0 and description" — AviateX14
– AviateX14, Commented Jun 20, 2011 at 20:04
Feed items containing HTML have to be either html encoded or put in CDATA tags. — Gordon
– Gordon, Commented Jun 20, 2011 at 20:06

Community · Accepted Answer · 2023-11-17 19:32:19Z

6

It says "TOKYO � A Japanese" at that line (and further down in the feed as well). The � is not utf-8. Try to utf8_encode (or iconv if you want a different encoding) the content or even better: use an XML processor to create the feed.

edited Nov 17, 2023 at 19:32

CommunityBot

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answered Jun 20, 2011 at 19:47

Gordon

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3 Comments

Gordon Over a year ago

@hakre then the OP changed that while I answered. When I downloaded the feed it was definitely utf8. I've added iconv as an additional solution.

AviateX14 Over a year ago

Works, to the extent of giving me this problem... error on line 33 at column 157: Opening and ending tag mismatch: p line 0 and description .... I'd rather not have to go back and fix the tags :(

AviateX14 Over a year ago

This worked though, <description>".iconv("ISO-8859-1", "UTF-8", $line['entry'])."</description>

Michas · Accepted Answer · 2011-06-20 20:16:27Z

1

You have to configure Your database or connection. Try to execute mysql_set_charset('utf8'); after connection to database.

http://php.net/manual/en/function.mysql-set-charset.php

P.S. You should use <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?> or drop that line. Your output looks like 8 bits based.

answered Jun 20, 2011 at 20:16

Michas

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