Mr Rat's Amazon Product Feed script will stop working on 15th August!

No-one seems to have mentioned this so far, so I thought I'd bring it up. If you are using Mr Rat's APF script to create a Amazon-based affiliate shop (which a great many people are, me included), you could be in trouble on August 15th, when Amazon finalises the changes to the Product Advertising API. That's because Amazon has made changes to the way their API is accessed (without going into the boring details) and any script not updated by August 15th WILL STOP WORKING if Amazon follow through with their timetable for this.

Unfortunately, Mr Rat seems to have stopped developing APF a long time ago and seems to have dropped off the map for the time being, so it is left to a team of enthusiasts to try to find a solution, which they are trying to do over at the forum. However, as far as I can see for now, they are a long way from coming up with a handy little update which will get the script up and running again, unless Mr Rat himself mysteriously reappears!

So basically, all of us who use APF could be a bit stuffed come August 15th and it might be worth coming up with a backup plan now!

 

Unfortunately, it's not just a few lines of code that need to be changed, so I think many scripts will silently stop working.

 

Right - I happened (more by luck!) to write my own code so it could really easily be adapted - it was a 5-minute job for my main site that I custom-wrote. But the way APF is written (never mind the fact it's in Perl) means major work. As for the other scripts, it seems to me that AOM is very regularly updated, so I guess there will be a new version. I forget what others are out there, but APF is the one I am worried about. Guess I need a plan B very quickly for that site...

 

I was going to write my own script for Amazon when, I saw there sample php script. I found some other inexpensive applications and I don't do enough Amazon business to care until I saw this post. I will look into this issue more now. Thanks for the heads up, I knew the change was coming but I had not heard some scripts would stop working.

 

Dang..
I just want try Mr. Rat's script till I read this.

Consider to writemy own script..
Thanks for your info..

 

It looks like there may be an update to fix it on this page
http://www.absolutefreebies.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=7988243

 

Hi, just to update on this issue, some guys have done a great job and updated Mr. Rat's script so it SHOULD now work seamlessly with the new AWS signing procedure. Check out the forum thread here and download the new package from the link there too.

I have installed the new version without too many problems and I can report that

1) it seems to work fine as a standalone script, which is probably how many people are using it
2) it also works with the APF Joomla Bridge too, which means if you were using that then your APF-based Joomla site should continue working fine.

Just to repeat what I have posted on that forum, that if you are updating an existing installation of APF then read the Beginners' instructions carefully, it's all in there, but basically:

1) make sure you have backed up all your old files.
2) Do not overwrite the template directory.
3) Make sure you chmod the cgi files as per instructions.
4) Make sure you rename the apf4.cgi file if you previously had a custom name.
5) Make sure you have specified the path to the locale directory in the apf_config.cgi - for some reason, when I was installing it, the "Directory settings" were all populated except that field.

Hope this helps someone.

Mark

 

I was using Pilkster's script for Wordpress which was depending on ASM2. I'll wait and see if that stops working??

 

Are you sure you just want to wait for it to stop working..!? Actually, today is the 16th, so it should already have happened but I am guessing they will extend it a little or something. Anyway, if you are making anything from Amazon then it would be preferable to fix it BEFORE everything stops working..!

 

I finished updating E4E a little while ago to avoid this particular issue. I'll note also that Amazon didn't actually enforce the changes until the evening of Aug. 16, so if some people looking on Aug. 15 thinking they were safe, might want to take a second look to ensure their site is working and that they are not losing money.

So did the mr. rat script get updated?


thnx,
PuReWebDev

 

Yes, the changes made by Chris Lander, a regular user AFAIK, seem to have got things working - my APF-based site appears to be fully functional. From another thread at the forum it seems there are some small bugs, which I am not sure are due to the changes, or were present anyway, relating to the present of certain punctuation marks in search terms. E.g. if you try to search using APF for a term such as "A. A. Milne", the search will fail because of the full stops. Minor niggle compared to the script not working at all, but hopefully someone will fix it. I think the main problem is, no-one knows how to program in PERL..!