Prevent Facebook Tab App from running outside of iframe - facebook

Question

I developed a facebook fan page app with PHP SDK and am successfully running it. I have a Fan Gate implemented, that is, users have to like the page before they can use the app.
What I could not solve until yet is this: I would like to prevent my app from running outside of the Facebook iframe. As of now my app can run in a new browser tab or window, when a user copies and pastes the URL (of the iframe src). At this point I'd like to give an error message like "This app can only run in a Facebook tab".
I am catching the signed_request but as my app has subpages and routines, I have to store the signed_request in a session variable.
Any advices?

Answer 1

Ok, so what I usually do is provide data in the app_data field of signed_request to know which page to load. When POSTing, I redirect to the tab directly after processing the payload.
So, there are two methods a page, that is actually a facebook tab, may be requested: GET and POST.
GET
When using GET, the tab should always be requested using a facebook URL. For example: The tab's subpage "form" should have a URL like: http://www.facebook.com/pages/xXx/[page_id]?sk=app_[app_id]&app_data=form
In your server-side code you recognize the data in app_data after decoding the signed_request (see 1 and 2).
In your links to the form page, you also have to add the target="parent" attribute.
By this, facebook is reloaded and the tab feels slower than when you directly link the subpages. But you have URLs that identify a subpage, which is what we prefer.
Additionally, you can expect every GET request to have a signed_request. If it doesn't, it is not called via facebook and you can either show an error message or, what I suggest, redirect to you tab (sub-page).
POST
POSTs never have a signed_request. But usually, when surfing, browsers use GET requests. So you can assume, if you receive a POST request, it is either from your own form or a hacking attempt.
In both cases, you check the values of that request for validity.
If they are valid, you save them to your DB and redirect to a "success" page. E.g. if you are up for a contest, you should show a page that assures the user he/she has successfully participated.
If the data is not valid, you save your error messages into the session and redirect back to the form where you show them.
I always suggest you redirect after a POST request, no matter if you are in a facebook tab or not. But in a facebook tab, the redirect must be done using a javascript since it is within an IFRAME and you want the whole page to reload:
<script type="text/javascript">
parent.location.href = 'http://www.facebook.com/pages/xXx/[page_id]?sk=app_[app_id]&app_data=form';
</script>
Post scriptum 1: For me, forms always use POST requests.
Post scriptum 2: If you don't like the idea of the whole facebook "frame" to be reloaded every click, you can think of doing some AJAX magic where the requests are "spiced" with extra data for you to recognize them as "yours".