widgets walkthru?

This page has the instructions for using them: http://www.nanowrimo.org/eng/widgets

I don't know about using them on facebook, though.

What specifically would you like to know more about?

Heather Dudley
Forums Moderator
Liquid Story Binder, on sale for 50% off during November!
A Dragon Writes

Yes I was wondering this too. I heard you can put them on your facebook page. But how???
Daisychain x

It seems facebook has a beef with easily adding images to your profile. That said, after prodding it for long enough, I managed to find a workaround.

http://apps.facebook.com/extendedinfo/

That's the "Extended Info" app. Adding it allows you to create custom fields to add to your profile. After you add it, it will ask you what kind of info you want to add first. Choose the top option, "Regular". You'll then be presented with this screen:

Image 1

You can see I've already filled it in with HTML; you can use it as an example. Note that you name the field in the box on the left (where I've called it NaNoWriMo). The code above uses the horizontal bars widget, and links the widget to my progress report page. (Remember to swap in your own ID number if you copy that code!)

When you're done there, first click the Save Changes button (if it asks you if you'd like to publish it you can pick not now), and then click on the "Add to Profile" button (circled in the above pic) and you'll get this page:

Image 2

Click the circled option there, and after it asks you (twice) to confirm that it looks the way you like, it will be added to your profile.

2008: Painted Souls
2009: The Black War

Nakor, you are brilliant! I just gave it a try, and sure enough, it worked like a charm! I will add this to either one of the stickies, or an FAQ, or something.

Heather Dudley
Forums Moderator
Liquid Story Binder, on sale for 50% off during November!
A Dragon Writes

I tried to upload a couple different ones to photobucket and it said the links weren't good. I had already tried copying them by right clicking and that didn't work. I wanted to link them to a forum. Ideas?

*needs to decompress*

;)

You need to use the URL on the Widgets page for the widget you want to use. It's a dynamically generated image that won't update if you save.

Heather Dudley
Forums Moderator
Liquid Story Binder, on sale for 50% off during November!
A Dragon Writes

That widgets link ( http://www.nanowrimo.org/widgets/ ) gives a 403: Forbidden.

Is this the page you meant? http://www.nanowrimo.org/eng/widgets

2009 NaNoWriMo: Dulce Tentación
2008 NaNoWriMo: Dulce Noche - WON!

Yes, I've forgotten that that page doesn't work without the language embedded. I'll put abug report on that one, it's nor supposed to do that! Thanks for the heads up, I fixed the link. :)

Heather Dudley
Forums Moderator
Liquid Story Binder, on sale for 50% off during November!
A Dragon Writes

Thank you! It works, although, to get it onto your wall - mine automatically turned up in boxes tab - click the edit icon in the top corner and chose move to wall.
Only thing is, as far as I can tell, it doesnt update my word count when i change it on this site.
Anyone?
Daisychain x

NaNo 2006(win): "Children of the Stars"
NaNo 2007(win): "Darkness Falls"
NaNo 2008(win): "Dark Storm Rising"

Still doesn't work. The one with \eng\ in it WAS the one I was using.

- I tried CnPing the entire link (two different ones) below the pic to my forum. I tried tweaking the address a couple different ways. No luck.
- I tried uploading to photobucket first (both CnPing the whole link & rightclicking the image and copying the URL); got an invalid image message
- I think I tried something else, but I can't even remember now...

You can't upload the image to another hosting account; it doesn't work.

Are you sure that the forum you are trying to post it to uses HTML? It may require BB code, in which case you would use [img]widgeturl[/img]

Heather Dudley
Forums Moderator
Liquid Story Binder, on sale for 50% off during November!
A Dragon Writes

It looks like my method won't allow the widget to update. In order to get the HTML onto Facebook the app has to store the image on a mirror. In other words it caches a copy of the image from when you save it in your Facebook page.

Which is to say, you can use my method, but every time you want the widget to update to what it shows on this site, you have to go to the app on Facebook and add a random query string to it (I'll explain below) so that Facebook will think it's a different image, and update it. :\ This is in the app's FAQ:

Basically to force it to update, put a ? (question mark) on the end of the URL, followed by any combination of letters or numbers. (Gibberish is fine.) This is called a query string (because the stuff after the ? is sent as a query to the server -- in our case, since NaNo's servers aren't expecting a query, they'll just ignore it and you'll get the normal widget anyway).

For example, I changed mine from:

http://www.nanowrimo.org/NanowrimoUtils/NanowrimoGraph/443168.png

To:

http://www.nanowrimo.org/NanowrimoUtils/NanowrimoGraph/443168.png?1

That forced it to update. Next time I change it I'll make the 1 into a 2 and so forth so I don't accidentally repeat one I've used.

Unfortunately, because of the restrictions Facebook puts on customization, it seems that there's really no way around this whatsoever. :\ Any image put on Facebook gets locally cached, so one HAS to update it manually every time they want it to reflect the updated widget from this site.

Sucks, but it's the best I can offer.

2008: Painted Souls
2009: The Black War

YEEESSSSS!!!! It worked. Check out my NaNoWriMo word count widget under my friends box on my profile page on FaceBook. It even updated itself. I am sssoooooooo excited. GEE

You must be a friend to see my profile that is the only problem. I will keep a check on it to make sure it updates and is working properly then I will attempt to explain how I did it :p

I can write html but expaining it is a whole other ball game.