FB Chat issue - my messages send, but I don't get responses

[agmetal]

All jokes about my friends ignoring me aside, I've noticed an issue in the last few days. A few months ago, I manually made the change to the Jabber implementation of Facebook chat in Adium, which has worked pretty much flawlessly until now. Suddenly, I can send messages and see people sign on and off within Adium, but when I send messages through Adium, I don't get the responses...and in some cases, haven't noticed them until hours later, because they showed up in my messages on the Facebook website, when I wasn't looking at that window at all.

Adium 1.4.2, OSX 10.6.5, and if it matters, Firefox 5.0

[Robby]

Apparently, Facebook Chat has been having some issues.

[jjakucyk]

Is anyone working on this issue? It's actually been happening for months, where some messages simply don't go through. I've had my own messages not go to other parties, and sometimes their messages don't come to me. It also seems that Adium thinks my contact disconnects when in fact they haven't.

Here's a screenshot that illustrates it very well. As you can see Pete's comment "sorta depends on if I go out tonight or not" didn't come through to me on Adium, nor his last comment "I like the idea of rt 8 west tho..." At the same time, both of my attempts to reply about stopping at the farm stand didn't go through to him.



It wouldn't be so bad if there was some sort of indication that there is a problem. Usually the only way I notice is if I see in Adium that they're typing, but then no message ever comes in. It's really quite frustrating. This is with Adium 1.4.2 on Snow Leopard 10.6.8 using the jabber setup for Facebook chat.

[jneil]

Got this same exact issue, OS X 10.7.1, Adium 1.4.2. Exactly as the above post describes. I've had to switch to Facebook popout web chat for the time being, as I never know which messages I'm missing. Some of them have been rather important. Any fixes?

[David Munch]

As noted on the blog, the Facebook plugin is deprecated and is going away. You can try the current beta (http://beta.adium.im), as this shifts Facebook to using XMPP instead, or wait for the full release of 1.4.3, which, hopefully, is just around the corner.

[jjakucyk]

As noted on the blog, the Facebook plugin is deprecated and is going away. You can try the current beta (http://beta.adium.im), as this shifts Facebook to using XMPP instead, or wait for the full release of 1.4.3, which, hopefully, is just around the corner.

It's not exactly clear what you mean. It looks to me, in the current beta, that the "Facebook account" is what we SHOULD be using. Am I right? That's what I had to use to get that new authorization window and such. Is that different from the "Facebook plugin" you mention?

Please clarify if I have this wrong, but about a year ago we'd use the "Facebook account" in Adium to chat, but eventually it stopped working. Then we were told to switch to the jabber protocol, which appears to still be Facebook's "official" implementation of the chat service. Of course, as we've gone over above, it's unreliable. Now with the Adium 1.4.3 beta, we should use the (new and updated) "Facebook account" which looks (at least as far as the little chat service logo and all) exactly the same as the original one that stopped working a year ago. So when you say the "Facebook plugin" is deprecated and is going away, do you mean it's been revamped and turned into this new updated plugin, and the jabber implementation (at least for Facebook) has been deprecated?

[David Munch]

It's not exactly clear what you mean. It looks to me, in the current beta, that the "Facebook account" is what we SHOULD be using. Am I right?

Correct. Adium will also automatically transfer your old Facebook plugin account to XMPP, so you don't have to do anything yourself.

That's what I had to use to get that new authorization window and such. Is that different from the "Facebook plugin" you mention?

Yes. The old plugin uses a website scraping hack, ie. it litterally pulls everything from the Facebook website. The new method uses XMPP, which is an open standard protocol (Although Facebook does have some modifications to that) and highly recommended.

Then we were told to switch to the jabber protocol, which appears to still be Facebook's "official" implementation of the chat service.

Jabber is the old name for XMPP, ie. they are the same thing. If you are already using the XMPP method, change it to a new account using the new Facebook account in 1.4.3rc1. The minor differences that Facebook polluted the XMPP protocol with, might be relevant in your case.

Now with the Adium 1.4.3 beta, we should use the (new and updated) "Facebook account" which looks (at least as far as the little chat service logo and all) exactly the same as the original one that stopped working a year ago. So when you say the "Facebook plugin" is deprecated and is going away, do you mean it's been revamped and turned into this new updated plugin

Exactly.

, and the jabber implementation (at least for Facebook) has been deprecated?

No, the website scraping plugin is deprecated.

Old plugin was the website scraping method - While that started being unreliable we recommended switching to XMPP (Jabber) as a temporary solution. This has never been an official part of Adium in form of a plugin - Now we recommend the new plugin, which is XMPP with minor modifications.

[jjakucyk]

Thanks for the clarification.

[David Munch]

Thanks for the clarification.

You are welcome.

[jjakucyk]

So the 1.4.3 update is certainly better, but it still doesn't fix the issue completely. It looks like all my outgoing messages are getting through, but some people still aren't getting my replies.