RSS to PDF Newspaper

RSS to PDF Newspaper is a web application that takes a web feed (preferably one with full content, not just summaries) and outputs a PDF with the content formatted in columns, similar to a newspaper or magazine. It’s based on the output of the Tabbloid service but built using free software. Please try it out and let me know what you think.

I’ve been meaning to do this for a while. During work on the Five Filters project we came across a few online services which turned web feeds (RSS/Atom) into pretty PDF documents formatted in the style of a magazine or newspaper. The software we were working on was supposed to take corporate newspaper content as input and give users related news from alternative, non-corporate sources as output. These services did a good job formatting that output into something we could print. The main problem with them is that they’re not free (no access to code, we can’t run it ourselves and modify it). So this is my attempt at creating a free alternative. If you like how it works, you can download the code and host it yourself, you can also modify it to work however you like.

The script that ties the whole thing together is licensed under the AGPL. The main reason for this is to prevent companies downloading and making changes, running services based on the code but not letting users do the same – a worrying trend in so many web applications running on the cloud.

Any feedback appreciated.