convio pages are breaking for facebook share

Awakash Bodiwala

This advocacy page:

https://secure.aclu.org/site/Advocacy?cmd=display&page=UserAction&id=1937&s_src=UNW100001ACT

use to have a facebook share button but we recently took it down. That's because when an end-user clicks on the share button, it directs the user here:

http://www.facebook.com/share.php?u=https://secure.aclu.org/site/Advocacy?cmd=display&page=UserAction&id=1937&s_src=UNW100001ACT

where all one sees is javascript / ajax code and not the actual context of the Advocacy page.

Has something recently changed on convio pages because this was not an issue prior to a few days ago? Perhaps something has changed on the Facebook end? Anyone have similar issues?

Thanks

Noah Cooper

First, note that when using Facebook Share you should be sure to url-encode the link you want shared. Since it is not url-encoded, your link is pointing to your site's Page Not Found page. The link should look like:

http://www.facebook.com/share.php?u=]

As far as why it is that Facebook is using this bit of JavaScript as the description ... how exactly Facebook determines what to share is largely based on conjecture, but from my testing it appears that it works like so:

1) Facebook looks for the meta description tag. In it's absence

2) Facebook grabs the content surrounded by the least amount of HTML

I'd recommend trying to set the meta description in the Take Action page of your alert, like so:

]

Awakash Bodiwala

Noah Cooper:

First, note that when using Facebook Share you should be sure to url-encode the link you want shared. Since it is not url-encoded, your link is pointing to your site's Page Not Found page. The link should look like:

http://www.facebook.com/share.php?u=]

As far as why it is that Facebook is using this bit of JavaScript as the description ... how exactly Facebook determines what to share is largely based on conjecture, but from my testing it appears that it works like so:

1) Facebook looks for the meta description tag. In it's absence

2) Facebook grabs the content surrounded by the least amount of HTML

I'd recommend trying to set the meta description in the Take Action page of your alert, like so:

]

The URL encoding and adding meta description fixes the issue of the javascript appearing - the js does not appear anymore. After clicking on the FB share, I get the URL of the article and the meta description, however, there is no body of the post/article/page. It seems like something is preventing the body text to appear (possibly the javascript still). Are you seeing this as well?

Noah Cooper

Awakash Bodiwala:

The URL encoding and adding meta description fixes the issue of the javascript appearing - the js does not appear anymore. After clicking on the FB share, I get the URL of the article and the meta description, however, there is no body of the post/article/page. It seems like something is preventing the body text to appear (possibly the javascript still). Are you seeing this as well?

I'm not sure what you mean. The meta description is what will be displayed. When it detects the meta tag, Facebook uses that instead of anything from the content of the page. So you'd need to set the meta description to be whatever you want to be shown on Facebook.

Tracy Compton

Is there any way to edit the meta tags for the web version of emails? We are trying to encourage our facebook users to share this link: >

David Elliott

Awakash,

I had the opposite thing happen to me. Facebook sharing of advocacy alerts is actually working, at least with some additional coding.

I put the below text in the advocacy pages, and they show the proper information in the facebook sharing tool now:

]

]

Of course, you could combine the U5 tags more efficiently, but this worked so I don't want to fiddle with it. Good luck! I'm not sure if I just got the code correct for the first time or if Convio/Facebook fixed something.

Awakash Bodiwala

David Elliott:

Awakash,

I had the opposite thing happen to me. Facebook sharing of advocacy alerts is actually working, at least with some additional coding.

I put the below text in the advocacy pages, and they show the proper information in the facebook sharing tool now:

]

]

Of course, you could combine the U5 tags more efficiently, but this worked so I don't want to fiddle with it. Good luck! I'm not sure if I just got the code correct for the first time or if Convio/Facebook fixed something.

Thanks David,

We found out the same thing (haven't used the U5 tags though) - these three things are essential for the facebook share button to work:

1- meta description

2- title tag

3- encoded URL

Seems to be working now, but will use U5 tags if it's more appropriate to use.

Thanks,

Awakash

Carol Cicerone

We are experiencing duplicate messages showing up on our message viewer page when you click on the link from within facebook (after sharing)

http://subscribe.kqed.org/site/MessageViewer?em_id=16601.0&printer_friendly=1

This is the code we're using in our messages:



<p style="font-size: 70%;">]x:: <a href="http://subscribe.kqed.org/site/MessageViewer/FaceBook?em_id=]">Share

on FaceBook</a> :: <a href="http://subscribe.kqed.org/site/MessageViewer/FaceBook">Share this newsletter on FaceBook</a>

We do have a case filed, but Support hasn't been able to figure it out yet.

I thought i would post this in case others are having similar problems.

Carol, KQED