Node-RED Feed Parser Plus

An enhanced and modernized fork of node-red-contrib-feedparser-x.

This version introduces better flexibility, improved developer experience, and persistent tracking of seen articles using Redis context storage.

Key Features

• Persistent seen list using Redis — no flood of old articles on restart
• Supports dynamic user-agent and timeout via node config or msg
• Allows string or array of feed URLs via configurable input field
• Two outputs: new articles and error stream
• Node status displays internal activity for better visibility
• Clean and modern internal implementation

Install

Run the following command in your Node-RED user directory (typically ~/.node-red):

npm install node-red-contrib-feedparser-plus

Enable Redis context storage by editing your settings.js:

contextStorage: {
  default: {
    module: "memory"
  },
  redis: {
    module: require("node-red-context-redis"),
    config: {
      host: "127.0.0.1",
      port: 6379,
      prefix: "nodered"
    }
  }
}

Note: node-red-context-redis is no longer published on npm. Install it directly via Git:

npm install git+https://github.com/node-red-hitachi/node-red-context-redis

You must have a running Redis server.

Usage

Input

• msg.payload (or other field defined in feedField): The feed URL (string or array of strings)
• msg.userAgent: (Optional) Override the configured user-agent string
• msg.timeout: (Optional) Override the request timeout in milliseconds
• msg.init_send: If true, send all items from the feed; if false, only new items
• msg.keep_size: Number of latest items to keep track of (default: 30)

You can use an inject node to periodically feed URLs into this node.

Output

The node has two outputs:

1. Article Output — emitted for each new article:

   • msg.topic: Article link
   • msg.payload: Article description
   • msg.article: Complete article object (see below)

2. Error Output — emitted on failure:

   • msg.payload: Human-readable error message

The Article Object

Please refer to https://www.npmjs.com/package/feedparser#list-of-article-properties.

Node Status

The node provides runtime feedback via its status indicator:

• fetching: <url> — fetching feed
• parsing feed — parsing entries
• <n> new articles — number of new entries emitted
• no new articles — nothing new found
• no URL, invalid URL, fetch error, status <code>, stream error, parse error, context error — respective failure statuses

Compatibility

• Requires Node.js 20+
• Compatible with Node-RED 3.x+

Contribute

Please follow CONTRIBUTING.md.

License

Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance with the License. You may obtain a copy of the License at LICENSE.