Multiple issues per podba.se with Unexpected HTTP code and byte range support

Question

Multiple issues per podba.se with Unexpected HTTP code and byte range support

I'm using SquareSpace to host our website for our podcast oh, health no! but GoDaddy has the domain so it's connected. We have a 2:40 trailer up on SquareSpace.

Spotify had no issues connecting and neither did iheart but Apple had a ton of issues. And I'm not a techie at all! Can anyone illuminate me? There are no humans to talk to at SquareSpace or GoDaddy and I'm lost!

Apple said the podcast isn't showing up and these are the issues per podba.se

Support for HTTP HEAD requests

The server for your episodes must support “HTTP HEAD requests”, which is a fancy way of saying that Apple Podcasts must be able to get information about your files without downloading them whole.

Unexpected HTTP code: 400

Byte-range support - there's a yellow exclamation point here

The server for your episodes must support “byte-range requests”, which enables podcast apps to fetch media in chunks. This is required to support streaming, and is required to be promoted in Apple Podcasts.

I also got a red x for:

Required namespaces

XML “namespaces” are used to extend the things that can be used in RSS podcast feeds. This tests whether the feed specifies the namespaces needed for PSP-1 compliance.

“Podcast” namespace was not found
“Atom” namespace was not found

Required channel elements

Your channel is missing a atom:link rel="self" element.

Required item elements

Your episodes are missing enclosure elements.

MacBook Pro 15″, macOS 10.13

Posted on Apr 17, 2024 1:33 PM

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Answer 1

Apr 17, 2024 2:48 PM in response to health-podder

That is a web site,, not a feed, which is why it's not working. A feed is a text file containing coding in a very specific way which describes the podcast and its episodes. You won't want to write it yourself, so you will need to find a firm which can do it for you.

I recommend you read my 'get you started' page on creating a podcast so that you have a got a grasp of the varius requirements:

http://wilmut.uk/pc

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Answer 2

Apr 17, 2024 3:05 PM in response to Roger Wilmut1

Oh, I know. SquareSpace has a blog area. That's where the podcast lives. The trailer is posted there. I think I misunderstood. I'm sorry! This is the RSS feed:

The RSS feed is https://www.ohhealthno.com/podcast?format=rss

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Answer 3

Apr 17, 2024 3:27 PM in response to health-podder

Site Server produces appalling feeds. This one is all on one line, which makes it almost impossible to read. A validator threw up this error:

line 3, column 1718: Invalid character in a URI: https://www.ohhealthno.com/podcast/Blog Post Title One-tm8yn

You cannot have spaces in a URL. People usually replace them with an underscore or a hyphen.

Another validator said

FATAL: Found zero items with a valid enclosure tag. Cannot validate. Did not finish feed tests.

This is because you have no 'enclosure' tags contasining the URL of the media file for each episode. You do have one episode, contained within the 'item' tags, with title, descriptions, and so on, but no actual media file. If you read my page, linked to above, it will give you a clearer idea of what I'm talking about.

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Answer 4

Apr 17, 2024 3:39 PM in response to Roger Wilmut1

Thank you! I looked at your page and I know it makes sense to people who know what they're doing. I just followed the directions to set up the Blog Page on SquareSpace. So given that, I still can't find the place that has the code you're speaking of that shows the issues to correct. And Square Space doesn't have a person to talk to. But I very much appreciate your time.

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Answer 5

Apr 17, 2024 11:43 PM in response to health-podder

For a start off you have to provide some media. The web page for your podcast -

https://www.ohhealthno.com/podcast

claims to have a trailer, but if you click it, it says 'no URL provided'. With no media, this isn't even a podcast. And I would advise creating a proper episode, Apple may notn approve of a short trailer which doesn't give a proper idea of what the podcast will be like (they check the contents for breaches of the rules).

You won't be able, and shouldn't need, to edit the coding yourself. But you have to provide proper information, and this includes media files, and URLs which don't have spaces in them.

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