Dynamic OpenGraph Object URL not working

Question

I am trying to post an open graph activity. Actually it's working with a static .html file. But if i point to a url with url params i get an error. The sourcecode on both pages is 100% the same, trust me.

# Dynamic call
/me/somesandbox:drive?car=http://www.domain.com/object/?og:type=somesandbox:car&og:title=Some%20car

# Static call
/me/somesandbox:drive?car=http://www.domain.com/static_car.html

Error:
"Object at URL 'http://www.domain.com/object/?og:type' of type 'website' is invalid because a required property 'og:type' of type 'string' was not provided."

If you look at the error, you ll see, that Facebook didnt get the whole url. The params are missing, right. Please help!

try surrounding the tag *values* with escaped quotation marks. — Lix, Feb 04 '12 at 15:26
Nope, this is a url. Works in the browser and the Facbebook URL Linter — fabian, Feb 04 '12 at 15:37
but clearly you are not using it in the browser or linter. Have you considered that the language you are coding in might have escaping considerations? — Lix, Feb 04 '12 at 15:40
what language are you using? Would help to add it in the tags... — Lix, Feb 04 '12 at 15:49
Seeing the code used to generate the OG tags and having the actual URL (so we can Lint it in the debugger) would be very helpful! — thaddeusmt, Feb 04 '12 at 15:58
@fabian I am with the same issue. In your view how did you decode the url? thanks — Luccas, Sep 10 '12 at 03:31
It's customary on SO to flag a response as accepted, rather than just sticking the answer in your own question. — Tim Keating, Mar 01 '13 at 17:18

score 4 · Answer 1 · edited May 23 '17 at 12:22

The Open Graph object url you are trying to use is this?

http://www.domain.com/object/?og:type=somesandbox:car&og:title=Some%20car

My guess is, since Facebook is already parsing : colon characters for the action names (i.e. graph.facebook.com/me/recipebox:cook?recipe=), they might not be safe to use as your own parameters.

Also, there might be some confusion: so far as I know, Open Graph properties of objects are not passed in URLs like this og:title=Some%20car. They are actually uncoded in the page the URL points to, via the open graph meta tags: <meta property="og:title" content="Some car" />. So if you trying to set the Object properties with the URL, it won't work.

Don't forget to use the Lint Debug Tool to test out your Open Graph Object URLs!

You probably do know this, though, and are just using the URL's GET parameters to set the meta tags. Something like this?

<meta property="og:title" content="<? echo $_GET['og:title'] ?>" />

If this is the case, just try it without the : colons. There is some debate about whether they are safe in URLs anyway, but if Facebook is also parsing them it'll be safest to just leave them out, like this:

// http://www.domain.com/object/?ogtype=somesandbox:car&ogtitle=Some%20car
<meta property="og:type" content="<? echo $_GET['ogtype'] ?>" />
<meta property="og:title" content="<? echo $_GET['ogtitle'] ?>" />

I have not tested this, just giving some suggestions to try. Good luck!

Let me try to to this without the : – fabian Feb 04 '12 at 15:47 — fabian, Feb 04 '12 at 15:47

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Feb 04 '12 at 16:59

0

Facebook has this nice tool to find out what the facebook see: https://developers.facebook.com/tools/debug just put the url, and watch the debug.

Don't forget, these meta tags have to be placed in section.

answered Feb 04 '12 at 16:59

Sándor Tóth

743
4
10

score 0 · Answer 3 · edited Mar 02 '13 at 18:03

Got it. @thaddeusmt: Was already on the right track.

Which it super important - of course it is - you have to encodeURIComponent(yoururl?with=vars)

Solved

If you pass your url like this:

/me/somesandbox:drive?car=http://www.domain.com/object/?og:type=somesandbox:car&og:title=Some%20car

Make sure to encode the object-url. E.g. with Javascript

encodeURIComponent(http://www.domain.com/object/?og:type=somesandbox:car&og:title=Some%20car)

Dynamic OpenGraph Object URL not working

3 Answers3