Atom Feed and Atom Entry Elements

Atom Feed and Atom Entry Elements

Refer to the Atom Syndication Format: RFC 4287

The following are relevant sections from RFC 4287.

The "atom:entry" Element

The "atom:entry" element represents an individual entry, acting as a container for metadata and data associated with the entry. This element can appear as a child of the atom:feed element, or it can appear as the document (i.e., top-level) element of a stand-alone Atom Entry Document.

atomEntry =
  element atom:entry {
     atomCommonAttributes,
     (atomAuthor*
      & atomCategory*
      & atomContent?
      & atomContributor*
      & atomId
      & atomLink*
      & atomPublished?
      & atomRights?
      & atomSource?
      & atomSummary?
      & atomTitle
      & atomUpdated
      & extensionElement*)
  }

This specification assigns no significance to the order of appearance of the child elements of atom:entry.

The following child elements are defined by this specification (note that it requires the presence of some of these elements):

• atom:entry elements MUST contain one or more atom:author elements, unless the atom:entry contains an atom:source element that contains an atom:author element or, in an Atom Feed Document, the atom:feed element contains an atom:author element itself.
• atom:entry elements MAY contain any number of atom:category elements.
• atom:entry elements MUST NOT contain more than one atom:content element.
• atom:entry elements MAY contain any number of atom:contributor elements.
• atom:entry elements MUST contain exactly one atom:id element.
• atom:entry elements that contain no child atom:content element MUST contain at least one atom:link element with a rel attribute value of "alternate".
• atom:entry elements MUST NOT contain more than one atom:link element with a rel attribute value of "alternate" that has the same combination of type and hreflang attribute values.
• atom:entry elements MAY contain additional atom:link elements beyond those described above.
• atom:entry elements MUST NOT contain more than one atom:published element.
• atom:entry elements MUST NOT contain more than one atom:rights element.
• atom:entry elements MUST NOT contain more than one atom:source element.
• atom:entry elements MUST contain an atom:summary element in either of the following cases: ** the atom:entry contains an atom:content that has a "src" attribute (and is thus empty). ** the atom:entry contains content that is encoded in Base64; i.e., the "type" attribute of atom:content is a MIME media type [MIMEREG], but is not an XML media type [RFC3023], does not begin with "text/", and does not end with "/xml" or "+xml".
• atom:entry elements MUST NOT contain more than one atom:summary element.
• atom:entry elements MUST contain exactly one atom:title element.
• atom:entry elements MUST contain exactly one atom:updated element.

The "atom:id" Element

The "atom:id" element conveys a permanent, universally unique identifier for an entry or feed.

Atom Hopper will generate a unique ID for the entry.

The "atom:updated" Element

The "atom:updated" element is a Date construct indicating the most recent instant in time when an entry or feed was modified in a way the publisher considers significant. Therefore, not all modifications necessarily result in a changed atom:updated value.

Atom Hopper will generate the timestamp for the entry at the time the entry is received.

Example: <updated>2011-09-14T18:50:13.128Z</updated>

Note: this timestamp is in UTC, denoted by the z (zulu) on the end of the string.

The "atom:published" Element

The "atom:published" element is a Date construct indicating an instant in time associated with an event early in the life cycle of the entry. Typically, atom:published will be associated with the initial creation or first availability of the resource.

Atom Hopper will generate the timestamp for the entry at the time the entry is received.

Example: <published>2011-09-14T18:50:13.128Z</published>

Note: this timestamp is in UTC, denoted by the z (zulu) on the end of the string.

Atom Feed Order

Atom Feeds are returned in LIFO (last-in, first-out) order only.