Hello... I'm Kelechi Ngaka a computer scientist who makes things (code/food/designs), and welcome to my awesome blog powered by Blogger

Thursday, July 26, 2012

How to update twitter status via anything

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In one of our chitchats "is it possible to post a tweet via *****". Gingered by the calling, I started imploring my Facebook antiques that never worked, URL analysis e.t.c. and all failed. I goggled deeper, found different solutions and derived a custom solution in .NET using VB.


Create a twitter app
Visit http://dev.twitter.com, login and create a twitter application. Application details
  • Name - your application name
  • Description - your application description
  • Website - your application's publicly accessible homepage. <<Put your link>>
  • CallbackURl - leave blank /empty
Modify the Application Settings
Go to the Settings tab and change the application settings to
Read and Write. In English – Your app will get/pull stuff and also set/push stuff on twitter

Grab your keys
Copy your Applications Consumer Key, Consumer Secret, Token Secret, Token Key in a document, sticky note… These keys would be used in da codes.

Design a  VB web app
Create a new ASP.NET Website (Visual Basic). Design the Default.aspx page to look like this.

In bits
  • It’s made up of 2 panels (panel1 and panel2)
  • Panel2 (Handles authorization and login)
  • authorizationUrl is a label which displays the generated authenticating url
  • pinTextBox would receive users input pin
  • loginStatus displays responses when a user tries to login
  • Panel1is my "mini TweetDeck"
  • Username displays the screen name of the logged in twitter user/account.
  • twitterResponse notifies the user whenever a tweet has been successfully posted.
  • Status is a texbox for users to compose tweets
  • tweetBtn updates your twitter account via the application name..

Code it
Note: These codes are in conformity with my ugly designs…

Get Twiterizer a Twitter oAuth library https://github.com/Twitterizer/Twitterizer but you only need is this folder (lib)  http://www.mediafire.com/?46h6n8g2q6xtror which contains all plugins to be referenced.
Download, unzip and add reference to your .NET web application,project or website.

How to Add Reference in .NET Visual Studio 2010
  • Right-Click your WebApplication in the Solutions Explorer
  • select “Add Reference”
  • Choose the Browse tab and locate the unzipped (lib) folder, select all items in the folder and click Ok

Include/import libraries in our Default.aspx.vb

 Imports Twitterizer  
 Imports Newtonsoft


Declare variables that would only be accessible by methods in the class it was initialized.
  • Tokens – a simple collection security keys used by twitter apps for twitter interactions.  
  • consumerKey, consumerSecret, AccessToken, AccesTokenSecret – string of keys
   Private tokens As New OAuthTokens()  
   Private consumerKey As String  
   Private consumerSecret As String  
   Private AccessToken As String  
   Private AccessTokenSecret As String


Page_Load is where you assign your keys and trigger a hidden button to generate an authorization url.  

   Protected Sub Page_Load(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles Me.Load  
     consumerKey = "YOUR CONSUMER KEY"  
     consumerSecret = "YOUR CONSUMER SECRET"  
     AccessToken = "YOUR ACCESS TOKEN"  
     AccessTokenSecret = "YOUR ACCESS TOKEN SECRET"  
    
     'Insert security tokens to perform authorized action on Twitter API  
     tokens.AccessToken = AccessToken  
     tokens.AccessTokenSecret = AccessTokenSecret  
     tokens.ConsumerKey = consumerKey  
     tokens.ConsumerSecret = consumerSecret  
   
     'A hidden button that generates auth.urls only if there's no postback  
     If Not Page.IsPostBack Then  
       hiddenButton_Click(sender, e)  
     End If  
   
   End Sub  


   Protected Sub hiddenButton_Click(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As EventArgs) Handles hiddenButton.Click  
     Dim authorizationTokens As OAuthTokenResponse = OAuthUtility.GetRequestToken(consumerKey, consumerSecret, "oob")  
   
     authorizationUrl.Text = String.Format("http://twitter.com/oauth/authorize?oauth_token={0}", authorizationTokens.Token)  
     hiddenTextBox.Text = authorizationTokens.Token  
   End Sub


Login Button code handles when the user clicks the login button. The app gets the pin, tries to validate and if successful it switches panel to allow authorized user to tweet..

   Protected Sub loginBtn_Click(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As EventArgs) Handles loginBtn.Click  
     Dim pin As String  
     pin = pinTextBox.Text  
   
     Dim accessTokens As OAuthTokenResponse  
     Try  
       accessTokens = OAuthUtility.GetAccessToken(consumerKey, consumerSecret, hiddenTextBox.Text, pin)  
       userName.Text = "Hi " & accessTokens.ScreenName  
       Panel2.Visible = "False"  
       Panel1.Visible = "True"  
     Catch ex As Exception  
       loginStatus.Text = "Login failed - " & ex.Message  
     End Try  
   End Sub


Tweet Button code handles when an authorized user clicks the tweet button. the twitter status of authorized user should be updated with the current text in status textbox via my application..(tokens) 
Protected Sub tweetBtn_Click(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As EventArgs) Handles tweetBtn.Click  
     Dim tweetResponse As TwitterResponse(Of TwitterStatus)  
   
     tweetResponse = TwitterStatus.Update(tokens, status.Text)  
     twitterResponse.Text = tweetResponse.Result.ToString()  
     If twitterResponse.Text = "Success" Then  
       status.Text = ""  
     End If  
   End Sub


Wrap up! This is what your code should like.. 
1:  Imports Twitterizer  
2:  Imports Newtonsoft  
3:    
4:  Public Class _Default  
5:    Inherits System.Web.UI.Page  
6:    
7:    Private tokens As New OAuthTokens()  
8:    
9:    Private consumerKey As String  
10:    Private consumerSecret As String  
11:    Private AccessToken As String  
12:    Private AccessTokenSecret As String  
13:    
14:    
15:    Protected Sub Page_Load(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles Me.Load  
16:      consumerKey = "CONSUMER KEY"  
17:      consumerSecret = "CONSUMER SECRET"  
18:      AccessToken = "ACCESS TOKEN"  
19:      AccessTokenSecret = "ACCESS TOKEN SECRET"  
20:    
21:      'Insert security tokens to perform authorized action on Twitter API  
22:      tokens.AccessToken = AccessToken  
23:      tokens.AccessTokenSecret = AccessTokenSecret  
24:      tokens.ConsumerKey = consumerKey  
25:      tokens.ConsumerSecret = consumerSecret  
26:    
27:      'A hidden button that generates auth.urls only if there's no postback  
28:      If Not Page.IsPostBack Then  
29:        hiddenButton_Click(sender, e)  
30:      End If  
31:    
32:    End Sub  
33:  #Region "Authentication"  
34:    Protected Sub hiddenButton_Click(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As EventArgs) Handles hiddenButton.Click  
35:      Dim authorizationTokens As OAuthTokenResponse = OAuthUtility.GetRequestToken(consumerKey, consumerSecret, "oob")  
36:    
37:      authorizationUrl.Text = String.Format("http://twitter.com/oauth/authorize?oauth_token={0}", authorizationTokens.Token)  
38:      hiddenTextBox.Text = authorizationTokens.Token  
39:    End Sub  
40:    
41:    Protected Sub loginBtn_Click(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As EventArgs) Handles loginBtn.Click  
42:      Dim pin As String  
43:      pin = pinTextBox.Text  
44:    
45:      Dim accessTokens As OAuthTokenResponse  
46:      Try  
47:        accessTokens = OAuthUtility.GetAccessToken(consumerKey, consumerSecret, hiddenTextBox.Text, pin)  
48:        userName.Text = "Hi " & accessTokens.ScreenName  
49:        Panel2.Visible = "False"  
50:        Panel1.Visible = "true"  
51:      Catch ex As Exception  
52:        loginStatus.Text = "Login failed - " & ex.Message  
53:      End Try  
54:    End Sub  
55:    
56:  #End Region  
57:    
58:  #Region "Tweet"  
59:    Protected Sub tweetBtn_Click(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As EventArgs) Handles tweetBtn.Click  
60:      Dim tweetResponse As TwitterResponse(Of TwitterStatus)  
61:    
62:      tweetResponse = TwitterStatus.Update(tokens, status.Text)  
63:      twitterResponse.Text = tweetResponse.Result.ToString()  
64:      If twitterResponse.Text = "Success" Then  
65:        status.Text = ""  
66:      End If  
67:    End Sub  
68:  #End Region  
69:    
70:  End Class



Debug and start tweeting
debug any errors encountered and viola your app should be runninggg...



What next?
its a simple application with crazy codes that makes you feel like a twitter-god. It would be awkward to debug every time you want to tweet via your application, save yourself the stress by
  • simply hosting it on IIS (windows).
  • or host it online using "whatever domain" that supports ASP.NET
Explore more and start building robust twitter apps today.
Note: This is not the only way to do stuff like this, similar techniques exists for other languages C#, PHP e.t.c