Validated Feed processing as Error by iTunes - "Can't parse your feed"

This sort of error usually means that there is some sort of character before the beginning of line 1, such as a word processing code, or even a return or a space. I can't see any evidence of this at all, and I can't find anything wrong with the feed, which works perfectly well when subscribing in iTunes but is not updating in the Store. No problems show up in Feedvalidator, FeedCast Validator, Terminal, or when examining the text in PageSpinner (which will show invisible characters).

So I have no idea what is going on. As it's been going on for some time it's presumably not a temporary glitch. I can only suggest you contact Support, though on the whole they aren't much help when the problem appears to be at your end. You will need to emphasize that it's ben thoroughly checked out. Goto https://itunespartner.apple.com/en/podcasts/overview and click the 'Contact Us' link at the bottom of the page.

OK, further investigation throws up a return at the end of the file, after </rss>. So much for 'line 1', and the first five validators. However although when I amended your feed and uploaded it to my own server to test, it passed on the validator that found the error, but still wouldn't validate at Podcasts Connect. So I can only suggest you remove the return at the end and try yourself.

Both your feeds still have the return at the end.

It looks like you were able to submit your podcast- however, it was submitted twice:

https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/twizted-myrtle/id1078991217?mt=2

Feed: http://artist.twiztedmyrtle.com/static/assets/podcast/twizted_myrtle.xml

https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/twizted-myrtle/id1104849358?mt=2

Feed: http://artist.twiztedmyrtle.com/static/assets/podcast/twizted_myrtle.xml

You probably want to click "Hide" in Podcasts Connect for one of the podcasts. (It doesn't matter which)

-Fan

The problem wasn't with the submissions as such, but the Store hasn't updated either podcast since March 19th and there are several later episodes in the feed (which appear when subscribing). Attempting to validate the feeds in Podcasts Connect brings up the mysterious error, which originally said the error was in line 1 but now simply says 'failed'. There is still a redundant return at the end of the feeds and I can only guess that this is upsetting the Store (only one out of about five validators has picked this up).

I can't think how he managed to get two version of the podcast up with the same title - this isn't supposed to be possible.

twiztedmyrtle wrote:

Roger, would you mind running a cache please?

I cleared the cache in Safari and re-downloaded the feed with the same result, though using curl in Terminal doesn't show the extra blank line. Possibly my ISP's caching is being a bit aggressive. I recommend you try for yourself the one validator which picked this up. Go to

http://xmlgrid.net/validator.html

and click the 'By URL' button. Paste your feed's URL into the field which appears and click 'Submit'. I got this result:

You can ignore the 'line 1', they seem to be referring to the additional return at the end (yesterday when I uploaded a copy of your feed to my server with that return removed this validator passed it, though I still couldn't get Podcasts Connect to validate it).