A few days ago, I was thinking of excluding the Asides category from my RSS feed since this category is mostly about personal stuff and I also assume that most of the subscribers aren’t interested to read it. I did a little bit of research and found a way of excluding specific categories from RSS feeds.
First thing you need to do is identify the ID of the category that you want to exclude from your feeds. You can do that by going to your Admin panel, then Manage > Categories and there you’ll see all the ID’s for the different categories. In my case, the category I want to exclude from my feed is the Asides category and it has 23 as it’s ID. Since I’m using Feedburner, I’ll have to edit the original feed source.
Original feed URL:
http://jaypeeonline.net/feed/
Edit feed URL to:
http://jaypeeonline.net/feed?cat=-23
Adding another category:
http://jaypeeonline.net/feed?cat=-23&cat=-24
The last bit of data specifies which category or categories you want to exclude from the feed. You can exclude any category of your choice from your blog’s feed and you can use this even if you’re not using Feedburner as this should work for any type of feed. I’m not 100% if this procedure works. If you decide to try it, any type of feedback or comments would be appreciated.
Also, I don’t think everyone has a need for this but hopefully it would be helpful to those who plan to do it or have been looking for a way to do so.
Says:
May 7th, 2007 at 4:20 am
I might just have to do this. Thanks for the tip JP.
May 7th, 2007 at 10:36 am
@trench - You’re welcome! Let me know if it works.
May 7th, 2007 at 3:02 pm
It works, I think. I’ve been kind of using it.
May 7th, 2007 at 6:28 pm
I think I came across a plugin once that controls which categories appear in your feeds. Forgot the details though, but your tips is as simple as opening the fridge.
May 8th, 2007 at 9:14 am
This is very useful. Thanks for sharing
May 8th, 2007 at 5:40 pm
@Shari - I see, it’s good to know that it works.
@jhay - I didn’t know that there was a plugin for this, anyways, it’s always good to have another option.
@Dre - You’re welcome! Glad to know you found it useful.
February 9th, 2008 at 10:43 am
Wooa… this is really easy. What a easy way to exclude pays entries from the feed. Thats cool. Thats really simple and cool.
Thanks you very much for this information… its absolutely unneccessary to build any plugins, this is much easier as jhay mentioned
Tobi’s last blog post..Feedst Du schon oder fav’st Du noch?
February 9th, 2008 at 10:45 am
@Tobi - Yes, this is muchh easier than using a plugin. But both have their advantages and disadvantages. You’re most welcome! Thanks for dropping by and leaving comment.
July 21st, 2008 at 10:53 am
Thanks for this tip but I’ve got a little problem with it
it works only with one category excluded
what could be a reason?
Kolia Shlapaks last blog post..10 ?по?обів витрачати гроші з думкою про природу
July 21st, 2008 at 10:55 am
@Kolia - You’re welcome! How many categories do you want to exclude from your feed? It should work if you followed the format for adding categories. You also need to check if you got the category numbers right. Let me know if you’ve fixed it or if the format still doesn’t work. Thanks for sharing!
August 23rd, 2008 at 8:06 pm
hey, it works for me. thanks.
saimatkongs last blog post..Show will go on for rock star Avril Lavigne on Aug 29
August 23rd, 2008 at 8:10 pm
@Saimatkong - Glad to hear that. Sama sama.
September 17th, 2008 at 6:51 am
Jaypee, thanks for the reply. I have tried to exclude 3 categories… I didn’t work for me. Probably I did smth wrong. I have chosen another option - editing function.php file, as far as i remember
Kolias last blog post..Зміна клімату - 10 фактів, які має знати кожен.