Visual Studio Headlines

• Download macro - 1 Kb

Introduction

There are many programs to display headlines from websites but who needs another app burning up resources! You can read the headlines from Visual Studio with this handy macro. The fact that it looks like code helps too - easier to hide than a web browser at work. I joke.

Install the Macro

Copy the vsrdf.dsm file to C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\Common\MSDev98\Macros.

Run Visual Studio and go to the Tools menu and select Customize. In the dialog shown, select the 'Add ins and Macros' tab. Click Browse to select the vsrdf.dsm file. The macro file can be edited using the 'Macro' entry in the Tools menu. See MSDN for more info on VS macros.

Modify the Macro

Modify the websites as appropriate in the first sub. Assign the macro to a button and that's it. The tag removal code was found on Code Project. Have fun.

'--------------------------------------------------------------------
'FILE DESCRIPTION: Web Reader by Davy Mitchell www.latedecember.com
'--------------------------------------------------------------------

Sub GetHeadlines()
'DESCRIPTION: Grabs headlines and displays them as text.


    Documents.Add "Text"

    RDFText = GetHTML("http://christdot.org/backend.php")
    ActiveDocument.Selection = ActiveDocument.Selection & stripHTML(RDFText)

    RDFText = GetHTML("http://slashdot.org/slashdot.rdf")
    ActiveDocument.Selection = ActiveDocument.Selection & stripHTML(RDFText)

    'Store
    ActiveDocument.Save("C:\news.cpp")

End Sub

Function GetHTML(strPage)
       On Error Resume Next
       Set objXMLHttp = CreateObject("Microsoft.XMLHTTP")
       objXMLHttp.Open "GET", strPage, False, "", ""

       objXMLHttp.Send
       If Err.Number = 0 Then
              If objXMLHttp.Status = 200 Then
                     GetHTML = objXMLHttp.ResponseText
              Else
                     GetHTML = "Incorrect URL"
              End If
       Else
              GetHTML = Err.Description
       End If
       Set objXMLHttp = Nothing
End Function

function stripHTML(strInput)
    
    strInput = Replace(strInput, "<title>",vbCR + vbLF +"<title>")
    strInput = Replace(strInput, "</title>",vbCR + vbLF +"</title>")
    strInput = Replace(strInput, "<description>",vbCR + vbLF +"<description>")
    strInput = Replace(strInput, "</description>",vbCR + vbLF +"</description>")
    strInput = Replace(strInput, "<link>","<link>//")
    dim regEx
    set regEx = new RegExp
    regEx.Pattern = "<([^>]|\n)*>"
    regEx.IgnoreCase = true
    regEx.Global = true

    StripHTML = regEx.Replace(strInput, "")
    
end function