Twitter - Duncan Mackenzie .NET

Best description of twitter I've seen

2008-07-02T14:07:00

The flow there is pointless. It's like trying to make a baby by having sex with a rock. First, it's hard to get excited. And second, no baby.

If you are wondering where I get my Xbox Live info...

2007-06-02T03:18:00

A few people have emailed me or posted comments wondering how I grab the Xbox Info for the Twitter app and for my services.

It is not from scraping and it is not from any publicly available source. I joined the Xbox Community Developer Program (XCDP), which is an official program designed to support folks who are building community sites (forums, reviews, blogs, etc...) around Xbox related topics.

Many folks who want Xbox info, are not working on a large site like the people in the XCDP, which is exactly why I created my service. This way, people who are building a small tool or script, most likely to be used by a small number of folks, can have access to some well formed and easy to use data.

What if you would qualify for the XCDP? Well, at the moment I don't have any direct link for you, but I'll ask around to see if I can find a link or a contact for anyone may qualify and would like to sign up....

Using the Xbox to Twitter app? Please update your client....

2007-05-27T02:50:00

Ok, ok.... so I should have built-in an auto-update, ClickOnce would have been easy enough.... but anyway.... I've added many features to the Xbox to Twitter application, including support for only updating when the title being played changes, not showing popups and even a preview of what your twitter updates will look like once they are combined with your template.

To update, uninstall the client using your Control Panel then click on the install link and reinstall. You should see the new and improved options dialog where you can choose to update only on title changes and also turn off the lower-right notifications if you wish.

Put up a REST API for Xbox Gamertag Data

2007-05-27T02:37:00

My twitter app uses a web service hosted on my site to get all the necessary Xbox Live info.... way more than the twitter app actually uses. This is a SOAP API, located here:

http://duncanmackenzie.net/services/XboxInfo.asmx

I know that some people prefer a more RESTful API though, so I also have another 'page' that you can call with a straight GET request and just pass the gamertag in as a query string parameter:

http://duncanmackenzie.net/services/GetXboxInfo.aspx?GamerTag=Festive+Turkey

Enjoy!

Connect your Xbox 360 Gamertag to Twitter

2007-05-11T12:58:00

UPDATE: I've updated this application since the original version, addressing most of the 'known issues' listed below

hey folks, the first version of my xbox to twitter app is done (at least done enough to share!) ...

Install the .NET Framework 2.0 (if you don't have it)
Install the app
Run it (from the "Duncan Mackenzie" folder in your Start Menu)
Right click the little 'twitter' icon on your notification area, pick Settings ... enter in your

Twitter Email Address
Twitter Screen Name
Twitter Password
Gamertag
check "Updates Enabled"
Click OK to save these settings...

Now fire up your Xbox 360 and updates will be sent to Twitter every few minutes (if you are online and your status has changed)
Come back here to post any feedback/problems!

Known Issues:

'status has changed' is a bit too sensitive now... if you are playing Crackdown and you go from running to driving then your status on Xbox Live actually changes (from "Running around" to "Driving around") and the app will post an update ... I'm planning to add an option to 'only post when the game changes, not the status'
Time delay, Xbox.com's data and my app are all using various forms of caching... so if you put in a game it may be 10-15 minutes before the app notices and posts an update ... also if you put one in, then stop playing a minute later... you may never see an update
The app checks status every 5 minutes, I can make that configurable in the future (but probably limited to no more often than 5 minutes... I'll let you make it less often though)
Format of the update: Currently it is "playing <game title> (<additional info>)" ... and if you are into config files and user specific isolated storage you can change that... I'll make it part of the settings in a future release.
You have to leave it running on a logged in machine to work... yep... I have a web based version but I thought people might be worried about giving me their userid/password for twitter so for now I thought I'd start with this local version.

Security concerns? Yes, you have to enter in your Twitter credentials. Those are stored in plain text on the hard drive... but it is on your hard drive only ... I never send your Twitter Credentials up to my site, although I do send them as credentials to Twitter when I call the Twitter APIs. Worried I might be sending to my site? Run a HTTP Trace if you'd like (Fiddler), you'll see calls to the Twitter API and calls to a web service on my site to get your gamertag info... nothing else.