Feb 2, 2012

Drupal for Facebook/ Share the content creating in Drupal with Facebook




Objective:
The Admin/Company Facebook_page/ Wall should update when the site admin creates a content, again sharing should be optional where the admin can simply un-tick if he/she doesn’t want to share.

'When I was requested to meet the above objective I remembered Drupal had a module (Post it everywhere') to fulfill, unfortunately it didn't let me to do what I was supposed to do.

After spending some time I came across 'Drupal for Facebook' module which had a special feature to do what I want, but yet it failed to please me, because the configurations were too complicated and did not act as expected. after going through many articles and documentations I found how it works. 

Finally I wanted to share and merge everything together as one document. So, here it is ...!


Version
  • Drupal 6
  • PHP 5 / >
Modules required


Libraries required

Installation
  • Download the “Drupal for Facebook” module, extract, upload
    • eg: sites/all/modules/fb
  • Download the facebook/sdk, extract it, rename the folder to ‘facebook-php-sdk’, and place it in the libraries directory
    • eg: sites/all/libraries/facebook-php-sdk
  • Next go to the modules page ‘admin/build/modules’ and enable the following modules (sub modules comes under the “Drupal for facebook” module)
    • Facebook API, Facebook Apps, Facebook Stream, Facebook Connect


Confuguration
  • Next navigate to the ‘Facebook applications’ page ‘/admin/build/fb’ or
site building->facebook application.
  • and click ‘Add apps’
    • Now fill out the fields with the needed information
      • Label :  a short name for your app (in lowercase)
      • Check ‘Enabled’
      • Facebook App ID:   : Application public key generated by facebook
      • Secret: Application secret key
      • Check the following image 0.1


  • If you don’t have an App, follow the instructions given above the ‘Label’ in the same page ‘/admin/build/fb/fb_app_create/’ to creat one, and add the keys in relevant fields
Create the custom module
  • In this module, we prompt the user to publish to their Facebook stream after they perform an         action on Drupal (save a node). Because the stream publishing options are relatively complex, we use PHP code to control it. This example comes from fb_example.module, which is included in Drupal for Facebook. You'll find other examples of how to customize behavior there. In your own custom module, you'll want to replace every occurrence of "fb_example" with your module's name.
  • Copy & Paste the code from the below given link in your .module file and do not forget to replace every occurrence of "fb_example" with your module's name

 Facebook Connect
  • Next click on the tab ’Facebook connect’ admin/build/fb/fb_connect
    • and select your app from the ‘Primary Connect Application’ dropdown list\
    • then tick the options you want under ‘Theme overrides’ section


NOTE : Facebook connect is an essential component to accomplish our objective
  • When Facebook Connect module is enabled it creates a block in admin/build/block so, you will have to locate in in a region in-order to make it visible
    • eg: content, footer, header


We are now in our final lap
  • Make sure you have logged in as the admin in Drupal.
  • and you’ll be able to see the Facebook connect icon in the region you located like the below image.


  • Click on it and login with your facebook usernamel, password details.
  • Now Click ‘Content management’ and create a content and you’ll be able to see the check-box checked ‘Share on Facebook’.


  • And once you hit ‘save’ after filling the fields a facebook window will pop-up requesting you to write something and share it as the following image.   

  • Trust me you’ve done !!

Have a great time with the module !!!!
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