Develop Reference

Google My Business API to fetch Reviews

I want to know how can I use GMB API to fetch reviews. According to google documentation we have to make a GET request to https://mybusiness.googleapis.com/v3/{name=accounts/*/locations/*}/reviews
But what is meant by {name=accounts/*/locations/*} and from where we can get the value of accounts & locations.
Also this requires OAuth 2.0. If I get a access_token then GET request will be like this:-
https://mybusiness.googleapis.com/v3/{name=accounts/*/locations/*}/reviews?access_token=token
This is very confusing. Can somebody tell me how to use GMB API correctly to fetch google reviews.

Using Google OAuth 2 Playground
For testing acquisition of Google reviews
Create a project
Console.cloud.google.com
Sign in as {projectowner}#google.com
Select a project from the dropdown in the header or click new project
Go to APIs & Services in the left menu
Enable the Google My Business API; this requires validation by Google and may take a couple of days. They will email you.
Go to developers.google.com/oauthplayground
Using the settings gear, set OAuth flow to Client-side and click Use your own OAuth credentials
Get the client id from console.developers.google.com/apis and paste it in
Put this into scope: https://www.googleapis.com/auth/plus.business.manage and authorize it with {projectowner}#gmail.com
Exchange auth code for token
To get the account name:
Set Request URI to https://mybusiness.googleapis.com/v4/accounts and send a Get request
Copy the entire string value at “name”: not including quotes; it may be 20+ numeric digits
To get location names:
Set Request URI to https://mybusiness.googleapis.com/v4/accounts/{paste account name here}/locations where {paste ... here} is the account name you copied
The returned JSON contains all of your locations
Copy the location names including quotes and commas to a temporary holding document; they will be used in a JSON array in the next step
To get multiple locations’ reviews
a. Set Request URI to https://mybusiness.googleapis.com/v4/accounts/{account name here}/locations:batchGetReviews and the Method to Post
b. Set Request Body to
{
"locationNames": [
"accounts/999999999999999999999/locations/88888888888888888888",
"accounts/999999999999999999999/locations/77777777777777777777",
.
.
.
"accounts/999999999999999999999/locations/11111111111111111111"
],
"pageSize": 200,
"orderBy": "updateTime desc",
"ignoreRatingOnlyReviews": false
}
using the account names you saved from the location JSON for each line of the array
If you have more than 200 total reviews you will have to add "pageToken": string into the JSON body where string is a value returned in the preceding POST.

But what is meant by {name=accounts//locations/} and from where we can get the value of accounts & locations.
To get this details first get the account using the following API (https://mybusiness.googleapis.com/v4/accounts?access_token=#####)
Once you have the account list, fetch Account Location list using the following API (https://mybusiness.googleapis.com/v3/" + name + "/locations) in the response of this API you will get the {name=accounts/*/locations/*}.
Also this requires OAuth 2.0. If I get a access_token then GET request will be like this: https://mybusiness.googleapis.com/v3/{name=accounts/*/locations/*}/reviews?access_token=token
Yes, that is correct.
Let me know if this work's for you.

Using Facebook API to access public group event data

I'm developing a public website and what I want to do is pretty straightforward, but I'm pulling my hair out trying to get everything working right.
I administer an open Facebook group and I want to display the public facebook events of this group on my website.
I can't seem to figure out how to setup my authentication so that I can access the event data. Here is my code for using my application to get an auth token:
var fb = new FacebookClientWrapper();
dynamic result = fb.Get("oauth/access_token", new
{
client_id = AppSettings.AppID,
client_secret = AppSettings.AppSecret,
grant_type = "client_credentials"
});
fb.AccessToken = result.access_token;
I know this works fine because I can access some information - for example, if I access a specific event by its ID, I can retrieve that information.
The problem occurs when I try to retrieve a list of events with fields within a date range:
[HttpGet]
public object GetEventDetails(string unixStartDateTime, string unixEndDateTime)
{
var parms = new Dictionary<string, object>();
parms.Add("fields", new[] { "id","name","description","start_time","venue" });
if (!String.IsNullOrEmpty(unixStartDateTime)) { parms.Add("since", unixStartDateTime); }
if (!String.IsNullOrEmpty(unixEndDateTime)) { parms.Add("until", unixEndDateTime); }
var eventsLink = String.Format(#"/{0}/events", AppSettings.GroupID);
return ObjectFactory.GetInstance<IFacebookClient>().Get(eventsLink,parms);
}
(I'm aware that even if this did succeed, the return value wouldn't be serializable - I'm not concerned about that quite yet).
This GET request returns the following message:
(OAuthException - #102) A user access token is required to request this resource.
So the message is quite clear: I need a user access token to get the data I've requested. The question is - what is the best way to do this? Can I give my application a certain permission to read this data? I've looked over all the permissions available to apps, but I don't see one that would do the trick.
I don't want to require people to log onto Facebook to look at public event data, and I love the idea of allowing people with no technical experience to essentially update the website content by posting Facebook events to the group. Right now, I have to duplicate anything they do.
I would think this kind of application would be very common, but no matter what I've read or tried, I can't quite find an example of the same thing that works.

From the docs at https://developers.facebook.com/docs/graph-api/reference/v2.0/group/events you need
A user access token for a member of the group with user_groups permission.
To avoid the hassle, you could create such an Access Token via the Graph Explorer and then store it in your application. Remember to exchange that Access Token to a long-lived one (https://developers.facebook.com/docs/facebook-login/access-tokens/#extending), and that you have to renew the Access Token every 60 days afterwards.

Get current user's name and user id

I dont do aspx at all so trying to work out this simple task.
I see the following code in some cs files which guess gets the current user and i assume this is a standard method in asp but might be wrong:
CS:
User user = (User)Context.Items["CurrentUser"];
I have tried things like this from other posts on here but maybe this system is different or the setup is different? again i dont know.
var currentUser = Membership.GetUser(User.Identity.Name);
string username = currentUser.UserName; //** get UserName
Guid userID = currentUser.ProviderUserKey; //** get user ID
Does anyone know how i can get the Name and User ID of the current user based on what is written above?

it depends on how you handle users in your website.
if you use the asp.net built in user management, then User.Identity.Name will get you the currently logged in username.
other stuff like (User)Context.Items["CurrentUser"] or (User)Session["myUser"] will get you the user which was saved in those places somewhere in your website.
you just need to start your way from the login page, and follow the functions to see how users are being handled in your website.

How to get the facebook user token with a facebook application

I have a facebook application with has to post updates on specific facebook page. The application has rights to post updates on the facebook wall of the page's admin. But how can i get the (admin's) users access token, which i need to get the access token of the page. Do i have to save the access tokenthe first time the user allows the app to post (offline access)?
Thanks for your reply!

I use the Facebook C# SDK as well. You'll need the following permissions:
manage_pages
read_stream
publish_stream
HTTP Get to "me/accounts" and get the .data object off of the returned value. This will be a list of the following:
var list = ApiGet("me/accounts").data;
foreach (dynamic acc in list)
{
var name = (string)acc.name;
var accessToken = (string)acc.access_token;
var category = (string)acc.category;
var pageId = (string)acc.id;
}
As you can see, each one of the pages have their own unique access token.

Show photos from my facebook page on my web site

I have some doubts:
I want to show the photos from my company facebook page on my company web site using C# SDK.
How can I do that with an access token which never expires? Or why my app id and app secret is not enough?
var fb = new FacebookWebClient("app_id", "app_secret");
If I only use this it says:
An active access token must be used to query information about the current user.
Basically I see non-sense to ask for a valid access token because it's not about to interact with any of my visitors' page but just simply show my photos from my company facebook page to them.
UPDATE: To get my app token I am doing:
var oauthClient = new FacebookOAuthClient
{
AppId = "app_id",
AppSecret = "app_secret"
};
dynamic result = oauthClient.GetApplicationAccessToken();
accessToken = result.access_token;
But now, how I can show photos from my account?
If I do it like:
var fb = new FacebookWebClient(accessToken);
//Get the album data
dynamic albums = fb.Get("app_id/albums");
I receive an empty JSON but I am sure that my account on facebook has several albums.

Tokens can and do expire. You must have code in place to handle when it does.
Your appid and app secret are not enough because at least one of the page admins MUST grant access to the page to get photo data via the Graph API.
Remember, the API is not only Facebook's sandbox, but they also are the ones who built it, so you're going to have to play by their rules.