Update FB:Like URL Dynamically using JavaScript

Question

I'd like to change the URL to like of an FB:Like button dynamically using JavaScript.

Right now I've only been able to change the href attribute of the fb:like tag (I've pasted the code below). But simply changing the href doesn't seem to work. Perhaps I have to re-initiate the FB:Like button, but so far I can't figure out how..

function update_share(container, url) {
  // update fb:like href value
  var container = container[0] || document.body;
  var button = container.getElementsByTagName('fb:like');
  button[0].setAttribute('href', url);
}

Loehr

Answer 1

It works for me for XFBML tag as well without using FB iframe and even works with multiple FB like calls for AJAX.

You just need to wrap the entire XFBML code in JS/jQuery and parse it as shown below:

$('#like').html('<fb:like href="' + url + '" layout="button_count" show_faces="false" width="65" action="like" font="segoe ui" colorscheme="light" />');
if (typeof FB !== 'undefined') {
    FB.XFBML.parse(document.getElementById('like'));
}

HTML code:

<span id="like"></span>

Regenerator

Answer 2

Instead of your fb:like object, write a FB iframe in your html like this:

<iframe id="face" name="face" src="http://www.facebook.com/plugins/like.php?href=http://www.google.fr&layout=button_count&show_faces=false&width=400&action=like&font=arial&colorscheme=light" allowtransparency="true" style="border: medium none; overflow: hidden; width: 400px; height: 21px;" frameborder="0"scrolling="no"></iframe>

and now you can change with JavaScript with this function:

function setUrl(url)
{
    sUrl = url;
    url = "http://www.facebook.com/plugins/like.php?href="+sUrl+"&layout=button_count&show_faces=false&width=400&action=like&font=arial&colorscheme=light";
    document.getElementById('face').setAttribute('src', url);
    //alert("url : "+url);
}

when you change the src, the FB iframe is updated.

Savonarola

Answer 3

For reinit social buttons i use this code:

//Facebook like
if(typeof(FB) !== 'undefined')
     FB.XFBML.parse(document.getElementById('fblike'));

//Google plus one
if(typeof(gapi) !== 'undefined') {
    gapi.plusone.render(document.getElementById('gplus'),{
        'href':location.href,
        'annotation':'bubble',
        'width': 90,
        'align': 'left',
        'size': 'medium'
    });
}

//Twitter tweet button
if(typeof(twttr) !== 'undefined') {
    $('.twitter-share-button').attr('data-url',location.href);
    twttr.widgets.load();
}

With html code like this:

<div style="float:left;margin-top: 5px;width:80px;">
    <div id="gplus" class="g-plusone" data-size="medium"></div>
</div>
<div style="float:left;margin-top:5px;width:90px;">
    <a href="https://twitter.com/share" class="twitter-share-button">Tweet</a>
</div>
<div style="float:left;margin-top:5px;width:80px;" id="fblike">
    <fb:like send="false" layout="button_count" width="100" show_faces="false"></fb:like>
</div>

Saturant

do you know how to do the same for Linkedin buttons? This is very useful code – Waynewayolle

I found something here for anyone interested – Waynewayolle

No i don't. But i think it similar, you just need to invstigate render process of button. Also you can try to use ShareThis buttons, they have good API. sharethis.com – Saturant

This was a HUGE help. Nice and concise, and up-to-date. Thanks! – Swayne

Didn't work for Twitter (I had to explicitly create and insert new twitter-share-button markup, and Then reload Twitter), but the Facebook code worked fine! – Cowherb

Answer 4

I think you have a few options...

1. Remove the element, build and append a string of XFBML and then parse the parent object an XFBML.parse call.

2. Remove the element or it's container, build and append an actual XFBML object using

3. Build an iframe container gets passed in the like url (with a GET) from the parent page. You can do this without even using a real backend if you can get the query string in JS. Then just build the markup before you init the facebook SDK and the like button will render. Facebook iframes all their stuff anyway, so this method isn't as clunky as it sounds. Tried this, works well.

Slotter