flickr.py

# -*- coding: utf-8
# This syncs/gets the latest photos from your flickr photostream and saves them in
# a Django model (FlickrPhoto)

# Gaute Hope <[email protected]> (c) 2010
# Licenced under Creative Commons v3.0
# http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

# this goes in models.py:
from django.db import models
from django.db.models import ObjectDoesNotExist

from datetime import datetime

class FlickrPhoto (models.Model):
  title = models.CharField (max_length = 255, blank = True)
  link = models.CharField (max_length = 255, blank = False)
  description = models.TextField (blank = True)
  pubDate = models.CharField (max_length = 255, blank = True)
  img = models.CharField (max_length = 255, blank = False)
  thumbnail = models.CharField (max_length = 255, blank = False)
  lastsynced = models.DateTimeField (auto_now_add = True, auto_now = True, blank = False, default = datetime(1990, 12, 24))

  def parse (self, rss):
    # Parse rssitem
    if rss:
      ns = '{http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/}'
      self.title = rss.find ('title').text
      self.link = rss.find ('link').text
      self.description = rss.find ('description').text
      self.pubDate = rss.find ('pubDate').text
      self.img = rss.find (ns + 'content').attrib['url']
      self.thumbnail = rss.find (ns + 'thumbnail').attrib['url']
      self.save ()


# this goes where you want to sync it..
import urllib
from xml.etree import ElementTree

def sync_photos ():
  # get latest public flickr photos
  flickrfeed = 'http://api.flickr.com/services/feeds/photos_public.gne?id=66016172@N00&lang=en-us&format=rss_200'

  feed = None

  try:
    feed = urllib.urlopen (flickrfeed)
    tree = ElementTree.parse (feed)

    # clear old photos
    photos = FlickrPhoto.objects.all ()
    for p in photos: p.delete ()

    for item in tree.findall ('channel/item'):
      p = FlickrPhoto ()
      p.parse (item)

  except Exception as ex:
    # failed to get/parse rss feed.. not much to doo
    pass

  finally:
    if feed: feed.close ()

I normally check for last sync time on the first FlickrPhoto, then forks sync to a different process if I want to sync.. this also make python free the memory.