I've discussed this with the rest of the team and there has been a change in the way we send parameters to gadgets which use Content type="url". In short, we started sending the user prefs parameters after a # - the URL fragment identifier. This change caused problems for developers who rely on using URL parameters in server side code - since the url fragment isn't sent to the server.
We didn't intend to break any gadgets and I would normally announce changes like this on the blog and in this forum earlier. We've talked about ways that affected gadgets can deal with the new location of the parameters for type=url gadgets and have some suggested fixes. First, if your gadget can deal with the user prefs completely in Javascript without another trip to the server then do so. Use the documented apis for user prefs - http://wiki.opensocial.org/index.php?title=Gadgets.Prefs_%28v0.8%29 . Gadgets that are already using these API functions to retrieve user prefs are not affected by this iGoogle change. The other, hopefully less common, case is if you use the parameters in server side code in a way that slightly alters the delivered content. An example would be setting up location-dependant data with the user location stored in their preferences. In this case you can have the gadget read the parameters from the url in Javascript and send an ajax request to your server for the data you need to render the relevant sections of your gadget. Of course your gadget should use the documented userprefs apis as above. A side-effect of the second fix may be that your gadget's initial render can happen sooner which can improve user-perceived performance (while taking roughly the same time to load overall). We realize this unintended consequence may be difficult to deal with immediately. So we've figured out a way to exempt specific gadgets for up to two weeks if you need the time. Just give the url of your gadget in this thread and we'll add you to the list. I encourage anyone to post specific questions about fixes for your code in new threads on this forum. This may not be the best place for help with server-side code generally but in this case you may find other developers in similar situations. Rob Russell Google Developer Relations On Tue, Apr 20, 2010 at 1:16 PM, Nick <[email protected]> wrote: > I found a temporary solution that will get your stuff around this > Google Bug. Add this to your response if the query strings you are > expecting are not found. > > <script type="text/javascript"> > > if (window.location && window.location.hash) { > var hash = window.location.hash; > window.location.search = "?" + hash.substring(1); > } > > </script> > > This is a dirty hack and a kitten dies everytime it is used. It was > the quickest way around the problem that I could find. > > On Apr 20, 1:23 pm, Mahin <[email protected]> wrote: > > Hi, > > > > My gadget is also affected. > http://www.google.com/ig/directory?hl=en&url=screeperzone.com/atplus/... > > > > At least end of March 2 users of my gadget reported this issue, I was > > not able to reproduce at that time as my gadget worked without any > > issue in my IGoogle page. Today I can see many users are being > > affected by this issue. > > > > I think this is to do with Google caching. When IGoogle releases a new > > version of their code, not all users get this new version, slowly all > > the Google servers are updated with this new code and all users get > > this new version. > > > > Please let us know if there is any updates or a due date when this > > issue can be resolved. > > > > Thanks, > > Mahin > > > > On Apr 20, 7:48 am, WP <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > > > > > > > > > > While debugging this problem yesterday it only appeared to affect IE > > > 6, 7, & 8. Today though it is also doing the same thing on FF & > > > Chrome. Opera and Safari seem to be unaffected. > > > > > WP > > > > > On Apr 20, 7:12 am, Roy <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > > > Just a quick follow up to my last post. > > > > > > I have a couple of URL-type gadgets, and approximately 40 to 45 per > > > > cent of requests > > > > to these gadgets deliver no user preferences. So, this is a > > > > significant problem. > > > > > > Looking at user agents, I don't believe that this problem is > exhibited > > > > more > > > > by some useragents. My logs are showing roughly the same proportions > > > > of popular useragent strings in both the "good"- and "bad"-type > > > > requests > > > > to the gadgets. > > > > > > Hope this helps! (I also hope this problem can be resolved soon!) > > > > > > Cheers, > > > > Roy > > > > > > -- > > > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google > Groups "iGoogle Developer Forum" group. > > > > To post to this group, send email to > [email protected]. > > > > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > [email protected]<google-gadgets-api%[email protected]> > . > > > > For more options, visit this group athttp:// > groups.google.com/group/Google-Gadgets-API?hl=en. > > > > > -- > > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google > Groups "iGoogle Developer Forum" group. > > > To post to this group, send email to > [email protected]. > > > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > [email protected]<google-gadgets-api%[email protected]> > . > > > For more options, visit this group athttp:// > groups.google.com/group/Google-Gadgets-API?hl=en. > > > > -- > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "iGoogle Developer Forum" group. > > To post to this group, send email to [email protected] > . > > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > [email protected]<google-gadgets-api%[email protected]> > . > > For more options, visit this group athttp:// > groups.google.com/group/Google-Gadgets-API?hl=en. > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "iGoogle Developer Forum" group. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > [email protected]<google-gadgets-api%[email protected]> > . > For more options, visit this group at > http://groups.google.com/group/Google-Gadgets-API?hl=en. > > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "iGoogle Developer Forum" group. 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