I’m getting my inner geek on – again. I spent the majority of my day today trying to figure out how to crosspost from WordPress to MySpace. I’d found a “hack that looked like it had potential”:http://noumenon.roderickrussell.com/wordpress-to-myspace-auto-crossposting that I messed with for quite a while, but so far I’ve had no success in getting it to run, despite having following the directions to the letter and checked everything over fifthlicate (and then some). I’m still waiting for a reply back on my comment to see if the hack’s author has any idea what’s blocking my attempts.
Ultimately, I gave up on that and started trying to find a way to put a light-weight Twitter badge on to my MySpace profile. I don’t like any of the badges that Twitter produces, so I looked around for other options. But of course, MySpace being the notoriously unfriendly environment that it is, there are no good solutions that are both functional and attractive on the page. So, I’ve given up on that option for the time being, as well.
In the meantime, I plan to learn a little more about the ins-and-outs of PHP coding tomorrow. I’ve got the MyDashboard plugin installed on this blog, but it doesn’t display quite as much information in the dashboard from some of my other behind-the-scenes plugins as I’m used to. So, my intent is to learn out to create a few gadgets that will tap into these plugins and put this information closer to my fingertips. If all goes well, I may even plan to create gadgets for a few other things that I’ve always wanted on the dashboard and never been able to find plugins for.
On that note, I’ve got a few of the plugin pages from the WordPress codex up in my browser. I really would like to get more involved with the development end of WordPress, but it is my sketchy knowledge of PHP that limits how much I can do. Since I have at least a two or three more weeks of down-time while I heal up from surgery, I hope to make some use of that time to learn a little more about how to write plugins for WordPress. I’ve come up with ideas in the past for things I’d love my WordPress installation to be able to do, things that, thus far, no one else has created plugins for. So, I hope to learn and add a few things to the WordPress community myself.
I’ve got other things to work on, as well. I still have plans to create a customized WordPress theme. I’d started work on a minimal theme last week, but that’s been on hiatus due to surgery last week. But now that I’m beginning to feel better and gain some more mobility again, I hope to get back to this project, as well, and try to finish it up. The skeleton I’d managed to build last week will probably undergo an overhaul, though, as I’ve changed my mind about some things in my mind about where I want to go with it. Heck, if I get _really_ ambitious, I might even tailor a new bbPress theme to go with it.
Hi Jim
Glad you liked the MyDashboard plugin. I am (slowly) adding documentation on gadget development to the website, I have a beginners tutorial up in draft form, which would be a good place to start.
If you have any problems or questions, feel free to contact me, I’m always happy to help.
I am also building up a library of available gadgets on the site, so if you decide to make any of your creations available to the public, please email them through so they can be added to the library.
Best regards
Barry
Thanks, Barry. I’ve had your page up in a tab and been watching as it fills out with the tutorial. I plan to try to spend some time today figuring out how things work.
Hey Jim,
Thanks for using (or trying to use) the plugin.
The error that you are getting is indeed a MySpace error, related to either 1.) your credentials upon login or 2.) MySpace simply not functioning properly, as is often the case.
I would of course triple and quadruple check your MySpace username and password and make absolutely certain that it’s entered into the crossposter file properly and in the correct place. Also be sure to use a plain text editor to edit the code (*any* code, not just mine), else you may end up with special characters inserted that are invisible to you on-screen but will wreak havoc with the execution of the code.
Try that and give it another whirl. Looks like the WordPress side of things is working perfectly. You’ll have to create a new entry for it to work, remember. Your database is now listing your last story as already crossposted.
Rest assured that MySpace is not blocking the script. Still works great for me and hundreds of others.
Let me know how it works out.
-R
No dice. I checked the MySpace username and password yet again and then did a test post. It still won’t go over to the MySpace blog. And I, of course, always always use NotePad for editing these kinds of files, so I’m confident there’s nothing extraneous finding its way into the code. I can’t for the life of me determine what might be blocking the script from crossposting entries onto MySpace.
Jim,
Well, this is *definitely* a MySpace login issue – which is good, because it means that the plugin code is just fine. But still, why is it happening? If your credentials are all perfect, then really the only other reason that it would be blocked from working (again, MySpace has *not* done anything to stop the script) is an old or restricted version of CURL on your server side. Unfortunately, that’s an issue with your webhost, so I’m powerless to help you out. :(
-Roderick
Thanks for the help, Roderick. Can you tell me what version of the CURL library is required in order for this to work? I’d like to check to see what my host is running.
Just wanted to give you a heads-up. The newest version of the MySpace Crossposter is now available, and the changes are many.
Everything is contained in one file. Activation from the Plugin Options screen is enabled. No need to edit any source files. All configuration is done through the WordPress Options screen. And best of all, once you “activate” and configure the plugin, it runs itself. You press “publish”, it crossposts. Simple as that.
The older versions are still available, but the new version can be found at: http://noumenon.roderickrussell.com/myspace-crossposter-v2-released
Cheers!
Thanks, Rod. I’ve tested it out and it works great. Thanks for the update.
My pleasure, my friend! Glad it worked for you!