Facebook Events not importing into The Events Calendar

[Angela]

I am using The Events Calendar v. 2.0.7 and just purchased/installed the Facebook Events add-on. My calendar at http://viningsfbc.org/events/ does not seem to be importing my Facebook events listed at http://www.facebook.com/ViningsFirstBaptistChurch/events. In WordPress, for the Events Calendar Settings Facebook tab, I left the Facebook App ID and Secret blank (as it is optional), entered the user ID for my Facebook page: ViningsFirstBaptistChurch, chose Published events, Auto Import, Hourly. Nothing imports. I even tried manually importing an event: Import FB Events >> 465677146792304 for the event at http://www.facebook.com/events/465677146792304/. For the attempted manual import I receive the error: Either the event with ID 465677146792304 does not exist, is marked as private on Facebook or we couldn’t reach the Facebook API. It’s a public event, so I don’t know where to go from here. I have disabled all plugins such that I am only running The Events Calendar & The Events Calendar: Facebook Events. I am using WordPress v. 3.3.2 with the theme Modernize 2.04 by Goodlayers, and I hesitate to revert to the 2011 theme. Please advise.

[Rob]

Hey there Angela. Thanks for reaching out on this, and my apologies for taking a few days to get you a response here. I also apologize for the inconvenience you’ve faced so far.

Oddly, I was just able to import the three events on Vinnings’ Facebook page to my site without issue: http://d.pr/i/SbAB. I was running The Events Calendar 2.0.7 and the 1.0 version of the FB plugin.

Have you tried this since that initial run, to see if the problem persists with those same 3 events I’ve linked to in my screenshot above? It’s possible there was a momentary hiccup with the Facebook API at the time you tested that could account for this.

[Angela]

Rob, thanks for responding. I’ve been away for a short while, so I’m sorry I didn’t respond sooner. The Facebook Events plugin is still not working for me. Is there a preferred setup of The Events Calendar that could possibly cause the conflict? I’m at my wits end with trying to figure the problem out … with all other plugins disabled, the only thing I can figure is there’s a conflict with my theme. No events import and I continue to get the error about not being able to reach the Facebook API or events are private/nonexistent when I attempt a manual import. Thanks!

[Angela]

I have been debugging the facebook events plugin and come up with the following.

In the-events-calendar-facebook-importer.php:

a sample url (walmart) returned:
https://graph.facebook.com/430181213672761?access_token

in function json_retrieve:
wp_remote_get($url) returns:
WP_Error Object ( [errors] => Array ( [http_request_failed] =>
Array ( [0] => error setting certificate verify locations: CAfile: /usr/share/ssl/certs/ca-bundle.crt CApath: none ) ) [error_data] => Array ( ) )

The original error was in create_local_event():
$facebook_event_id was set, but after a call to get_facebook_object() $facebook_event was not set; isset returned false, causing the displayed error, “Either the event with ID 430181213672761 does not exist, is marked as private on Facebook or we couldn’t reach the Facebook API”

So it looks like there might be some issue with saving the certificate during the wp_remote_get call to fetch the URL. Do you have any idea what could cause this?

[Rob]

Thanks for the follow-up here, Angela, and my apologies that it took me a few days to get you a response. This does look to be a legitimate issue and I’ve asked our dev Paul – who runs maintenance for this plugin – to take a look directly. If we can identify an issue we’ll make sure to get a patch deployed for the first monthly maintenance release (which should be out in just a couple weeks).

Thanks for your patience so far and stay tuned for any bits of wisdom Paul may have to share on this.

[moderntribe]

Hi, Angela;

It does indeed look like something is going wrong with the certificate. Could you try replacing the line that reads `wp_remote_get($url)` with `wp_remote_get($url, array( ‘sslverify’ => false )` and see if that solves your problem? Let us know, and we’ll know better how to proceed from there. Thanks!

[Angela]

I implemented the change, but it didn’t help. I received a new error concerning ‘sslverify’. I’m just not a php person … Do I need to do something else with ‘sslverify’? Here’s the error message that shows on the “Import FB Events Tab” under “Events from Facebook organizations(s) or page(s) you’ve added”: Notice: Use of undefined constant ‘sslverify’ – assumed ‘‘sslverify’’ in /home2/viningsf/public_html/wp-content/plugins/the-events-calendar-facebook-importer/the-events-calendar-facebook-importer.php on line 208. Thanks!!

[David Sharpe]

I’m having the same issue. One thing I noticed is that under the Import FB Events page, there is no FB page listed even though I’ve added both the ID and the Username (https://www.facebook.com/RiversideCigars).

I created a test installation on my own site and everything works as expected. I can even import Angela’s events.

Just installed on both sites this morning so maybe the problem will correct itself in a few hours.

[Rob]

Angela: my apologies for taking until now to get you a response here. I assume you’re still having an issue (let me know if not). This does seem like something that Paul will need to chime in on and I’ve asked him to take another look accordingly.

David: I’m wondering if your issue may be related to something else…when I go to your Facebook page as a logged out user (https://www.facebook.com/RiversideCigars) it redirects me to the Facebook home page. But if I go to any other public Facebook page – take https://www.facebook.com/OffTheGridSF, for example – it brings me to a landing page. Are you sure that Facebook page is entirely public? Let me know and I’ll try to troubleshoot from there. Thanks!

[Angela]

Rob/Paul,
Yes, I’m still having issues. Facebook events just don’t import into the calendar, and when I implemented Paul’s code changes for sslverify, I received the new error regarding an undefined constant. I am soooo looking forward to getting this working, but I just don’t know enough about php to troubleshoot on my own. Thankfully, I don’t have a lot of events to update, but it sure will be nice to only enter them in Facebook and not have to manually update the Events Calendar, as well 🙂 Thanks for looking into the problem!

[David Sharpe]

I see now what the problem is, Rob. Riverside Cigars is restricted to 18 and over because it’s tobacco. As a test I changed my FB page from 13 and older to 18 and older and could not see my page listed under Import FB Events. I can reproduce this each time I change the age restrictions on the page.

Thanks for pointing out the lack of access unless signed in. I had checked all the settings, but it never crossed my mind that age restriction would have anything to do with it.

Any chance there’s a workaround for this?

Thanks

[alex]

Hello,
I have the same problem.
http://www.ishevents.org/calendar is linked to the purchased add on for sync facebook events, I have the Facebook App ID set up and entered both the Facebook ID and username for my page https://www.facebook.com/ISHvents.
It’s just not showing on my page.

[Rob]

Hi all. Thanks for the follow-ups. On these points:

Angela: I apologize we couldn’t do more here…we’re pretty much out of ideas on our end, but if this changes at all or if you notice any other patterns with this please let us know. We’ll keep releasing these monthly maintenance builds in the interim and hopefully it’ll be ironed out by one of those…

David: the age restriction factor is a solid observation on your end, and my guess is any workaround we tried to implement would be restricted by Facebook’s API. That being said let me get our devs to take a look for a future maintenance release…if we can see a doable workaround, we’ll definitely implement it (but no guarantees).

Alex: I can take a look at the issue for you, definitely. But I’m not quite understanding what the problem is on your site. Can you confirm whether it’s the same problem as Angela, or is it David’s? Let me know and we’ll do what we can to assist. Thanks for your patience so far.

[Rob]

David’s diagnosis nailed it, FYI – after having our dev take another look here he confirmed as much. The workaround would be to create your own Facebook App that has its own API codes…

[pb]

I am having the same issue. I created my own FB app but still no luck. any ideas?

[Author]

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