I want to build a mobile application that allows end users to sign up and participate in events (like parties, seminars, conferences etc..). Instead of building a CMS from scratch for an administrator to manage events, is it possible to use Facebook Events as the CMS? Then my mobile application will pull information about these events via the Facebook API.
Any one know if it's better for me to build the CMS from scratch or to use FB events? And what are things I have to consider in making this decision?
Let's say events are authored by users of the system, and if we go the FB CMS method, then users MUST have a Facebook account.
This is certainly possible with the events Facebook api. If you wanted all the events associated with an account you own, you could embed an access token into your application. If you want people to accept your event or host the event under their own account you would need to prompt users for permissions to manage events on their behalf.
It's pretty subjective question whether this is a good idea and it depends on what you are trying to achieve. The biggest upside is that its already built for you and designed to scale and wouldn't require servers, etc. The biggest downside I see is that Facebook changes their API and its not always the most reliable (see the always growing bug list they keep). Also, users may need an account depending on how you decide to implement the functionality.
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I'm facing the situation where I need to programmatically create multiple Facebook Messenger Apps to different chatbots. Pretty much something like ManyChat and ChatFuel. Can someone shed some light on how is it possible?
There's a thread on it from 2011 but I've been uncessful on finding documentation on these old Facebook API's.
Create a facebook application programmatically
Thanks!
There is no API for this. As ceejayoz mentioned, ManyChat and ChatFuel just run one app and use their customer's account with the rights manage_pages and subscribed_apps to subscribe the app to the customer's page.
That said, there is just one endpoint where all traffic is delivered to and the software has to route every message to this endpoint accordingly to the right page (using receiver_id in the payload).
Keep in mind that while you want to run several apps in parallel, you have to approve all of them. Without this approval, the app can not be reached from customers.
For more insight, see the FB docs:
https://developers.facebook.com/docs/facebook-login/access-tokens/?locale=en_US
And https://developers.facebook.com/docs/graph-api/reference/page/subscribed_apps
I have more than few clients that would like to add facebook connect to their landing pages (managed by me). They are too many and not enough tech-savvy to manually create ad appid for each of them.
So my only solution is to usa my own appid to add facebook connect to all my clients websites, but as far as I know, Facebook doesn't allow to simply use the same appid on any domain.
How can I solve this? I can't find any documentation to solve my issue. Does anyone have a direction for me?
This has been discussed a couple o’ times before already – but I mostly commented on earlier questions, so let me write the whole thing up as a proper answer, for future reference.
[paraphrased] Multiple-client Facebook login via one single app id
Does anyone have a direction for me?
You probably rather don’t want to do that.
It is not really possible to run one simple app one multiple different domains.
As a workaround for only a few domains, people used to specify different domains for the different platforms – Website, Page Tab or Canvas App, plus Mobile alternative for Canvas – without actually using any of those platforms besides Website, which made the app usable on multiple domains as a website app. But since Facebook introduced their login/permission review process¹, you can’t do that any more – they expect you to present actual functionality on all platforms you have configured in your app.
You can kind-off use one single app for login on multiple domains – if you are willing to use only the server-side login flow, and to redirect users to one “main” domain (that gets specified as the app domain in the app settings) to login, and then from there back to the origin domain.
But this has several drawbacks:
It’s not what you’d call a “white label” solution. If your clients expect it to look as if users where logging in via “their” app, it should stay on their domain. Individual branding, in regard to stuff such as app name, app logo that shows in the login dialog, etc., would also not be possible. Additionally, app attribution – the link that shows up under content shared/posted via the app – would only link users back to the main domain, and not to your customer’s.
You would not be able to use the JS SDK for client-side API requests, or even just to embed it to render any of the FB social plugins that require an app id – the SDK checks what domain it is “running on”, and can not be tricked to accept a domain that is not specified in the app settings.
There could be privacy issues. An over-exaggerated example: Just because I as the app user decided to share my photos or videos I have on Facebook with your customer Our-Holy-Mother-of-Christ-Bakery.com, does not necessarily mean I want to share them with your other customer, amateurs-doing-all-kinds-of-nasty-stuff.xxx as well – but if they shared an app id for login purposes, I automatically would. Have fun writin’ the Privacy Policy (which is mandatory if you use FB login functionality, and FB also automatically checks if your app has got one) for that scenario ;-)
Finally, and most importantly: All your customers would be “sitting in the same boat.” If one of them, or in turn their website users, would publish spam via your app id, so that Facebook blocks it, login would not work any more for all of your customer’s websites. And if you decide only then, that setting up an individual app for each of your customers would be the better way to go, they would not be able to recognize their existing users any more, because of user ids being app-scoped since API v2.0 was introduced – so if users logged into this new app, that app would see a totally different user id. (And to rely on an email address as an identifier is risky, too, because you will not get one from the API for every user; for example if they registered using their mobile device.)
Edit: Plus, app/domain insights, as luschn mentioned in his answer.
¹ Yes, the review process has made it more laborious to set up multiple apps for multiple clients. But for apps that do the same stuff/use the same permissions in the same manner, you can refer to an earlier successfully reviewed app id to speed up the process a little. Also, screenshots of how f.e. posts made via the app look on timeline, and what UI components are used, as well as screencasts that you include in your submission could probably be used with little to no alteration.
Apps are not meant be used on several different domains, you will have to create a new App for each domain, i´m afraid. You can use the different platforms in the App settings to use different domains, but there are only a few so it´s pointless. Just create some screenshots and a tutorial for your clients, that´s how it is usually done.
Btw, it would be weird to authorize an App on a website, and the same App would allow you to be authorized on all other client websites. Also, insights are per App, so your clients may want to see their own insights and not the global insights of all domains together.
Many is not defined but i think for being a smart developer you need to create new app_ids for every project you need to use facebook connect. Just my opinion. It also allows you to monitor alot of stuff.
I have a multi-tenant web application and I'm wondering which would be the best way to let all the tenant publish their content on the feed of their facebook page (if they have one of course).
There's no public page/link to share so all the shared content has to go straight to the feed (using JS with FB.api feed + photos...). I am wondering which is the most proper way to accomplish this task: having one FB app for every tenant, or using the same FB app for all the different pages, or some other way...
Any suggestions?
I would set this up using a Facebook app for each tenant. This would be forward thinking if you ever want to do further Facebook integration. This also protects your tenants from eachother's behavior. If one tenant violates Facebook policy (There's a lot more of it nowadays) and gets their app locked or anything similar then it won't affect your other tenants ability to interact with Facebook. Also if your application is a white label app then giving each tenant their own Facebook app is almost necessary. Of course each clients having their own app does incur maintenance costs. Whenever Facebook decides to deprecate functionality or implement new features that require their Migration strategies, you'll have to manage each of the apps individually at developers.facebook.com, and depending on how many tenants you have and which features you've integrated with, that can be become tedious since there's no way of automating confirmation of compliance for all of the apps set up. Also now there's a review process for a lot of integration features. That review process would be required for each of the apps individually depending on the features implemented.
I have a question about increasing visibility of Facebook app notifications.
As far as I can tell, there are only 2 places where Facebook app requests appear for users who don't click the "Apps & Games" section - in the top right section (https://skitch.com/nicksoman/8172w/facebook) or in the jewel (https://skitch.com/nicksoman/81737/2-facebook) - I believe the wording is a bit different on this one if recipients haven't used the app, as it references an invite rather than a request.
As other have noted, neither of these channels provides any context around the request. In the past I've seen context for apps like BranchOut and FarmVille, but I can't replicate this behavior by sending invites from these apps now (can anyone)?
Has anyone found a Facebook-approved way to either provide more context around these app requests or make them more visible?
I'm familiar with the history of Facebook tweaking channels due to abusive apps - just want to make sure I'm current on best practices today.
Are you referring to users who haven't authorized your app or users who did?
Basically, facebook calls this Social Channels and you have a few options, again, depending on if the user is already using your app or not.
If the user is using your app, you have the bookmarks bar which can be used by issuing a App-generated requests.
If the user isn't using your app then a friend of his that is using your app can send him a User-generated request.
You can and should encourage your users to publish your app stories to their friends' feed and/or to send them to friends.
There's that "Automatic Channels" which is discussed in the first link in this answer.
More options are to use the Social Plugins in your website, and to have a mobile version of your app.
I know about test accounts, but during beta I'd like to allow access only to my friends, and then later friends-of-friends, and then only eventually Kevin Bacon and his friends.
That would probably suck, wouldn't it? The app would be listed (is there a way to prevent listing?) and someone I don't know might try it and get a "sorry, this is in development message." I imagine they'd be irritated and not come back.
From what I've read, only a few apps take off, but when they take off, they REALLY take off. Do developers just release these things fully baked?
Anyone start out with OpenSocial or other smaller-than-Facebook networks?
Any ideas for a soft, gradual, restricted roll-out?
Once you've set up your application, there is a setting in the Developer application control panel for your app: Your app -> Advanced -> Sandbox Mode.
Sandbox mode lets you restrict access to only those people listed as developers (under the Basic section).
In terms of expanding the app, Facebook doesn't provide much more flexibility that the Sandbox mode. Unfortunately, adding everyone as Developers of the app doesn't work very well for a beta, as people can access the application control panel once they are a developer. I ended up putting a whitelist of Facebook Ids into the front controller of my application for a previous beta, and it worked fairly well.
The apps are only listed in the App Directory if you submit them and they are accepted. There's no issue about preventing listing, it's something you have to apply for.
As for restricting users, you can accomplish it with a script in the application that checks whether the currently logged-in user is within your restricted user set. For example, if you only want friends of yourself, check whether the current user is friends with your user id. If not, simply display an error/message page or redirect them to the Facebook home page (or wherever). Add this check to the rest of the start-up logic run each page (such as connecting to your DB and authenticating with Facebook).
What I have done in some cases is keep a database table with the user id's of users who are allowed access, essentially a "whitelist". If the user isn't in the table, redirect them.