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Nirav Mehta on life, technology and future

Contact Grabber GPLed

with 46 comments

ATTENTION: Another free and open source script – OpenInviter – allows importing from many more services than Contact Grabber and is actively maintained. We recommend you to check it out.

We have been working on a set of scripts to grab contacts from popular email and community sites. We released it under GPL yesterday.

PHPClasses.org actually found it very interesting and flagged it as notable! Here’s what they wrote about Contact Graber:

Extensive package that can be used to grab user contact lists from the most important e-mail and social networking sites: Yahoo, Gmail, MSN Hotmail, Rediff, Orkut and MySpace.

Kudos to Vishal, Janak, Pravin and Tapan for bringing this to life! If you are building something where you want to allow people to fetch their contacts from Yahoo, Gmail, Hotmail, Rediff, Orkut or MySpace, and then use them on your site, go ahead and try this out! Feedback and contributions are welcome!

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Written by Nirav

May 9th, 2007 at 1:58 pm

Posted in PHP

 

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46 Responses to 'Contact Grabber GPLed'

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  1. Very interesting. I was really surprised to know that it is that easy. I hope you will come up with more such valuable add-ons.

    Shantanu Oak

    9 May 07 at 6:23 pm

  2. Dear Shantanu,

    Well, it wasn’t that easy. :)

    Kudos to the development team.

    :Vishal

    Vishal Kothari

    10 May 07 at 10:14 am

  3. So Vishal what was the most difficult part?

    Tarique Sani

    10 May 07 at 4:17 pm

  4. Getting it roled out was the most difficult part :)

    Orkut was most difficult to get through, then MySpace and Rediff was the easiest of all 3.

    Vishal Kothari

    10 May 07 at 6:45 pm

  5. SourceForge Link – https://sourceforge.net/projects/contactgrabber

    Freshmeat Link – http://freshmeat.net/projects/contactgrabber/

    Vishal Kothari

    11 May 07 at 12:53 am

  6. has it been tested on windows

    Oliver

    15 May 07 at 5:06 pm

  7. Very interesting.can you know same project in asp.net or asp ????

    shailesh

    25 May 07 at 1:58 pm

  8. Hi Shailesh,

    The project is open source. You are free to make a .Net version of it! We would be happy to link to you if you make a .Net version!

    :Nirav

    Nirav

    25 May 07 at 7:53 pm

  9. When sending third string sent returns the message:
    “Your browser’s cookie functionality is turned off. Please turn it on”
    What I am making made a mistake?

    Alexandre

    25 May 07 at 8:29 pm

  10. Hi Alexandre,

    Well i didn’t got your problem. Can you tell me about that ‘THIRD STRING’ what exactly it mean. Are you talking about the dropdownlist where the third string is rediff and the error of cookies you are getting in rediff. Also which operating system you are using?

    Well the answers will definately help us to track the problem.

    With regards,
    Pravin Shukla

    Pravin

    29 May 07 at 2:26 pm

  11. Hi Vishal,

    Congrats its a set of very useful classes that u people has written. I have downloaded the scripts n tried. But only my yahoo, gmail & myspace s working. Others like rediff, orkut & hotmail s not working. Am using windows Xp.

    1)MSN :
    This is the error what m getting.

    Could not connect to messenger service=>10060 : A connection attempt failed because the connected party did not properly respond after a period of time, or established connection failed because connected host has failed to respond.

    is the server
    var $server=’messenger.hotmail.com’;
    a valid one? because if I try it on the browser its giving the 404 error….

    2)Rediff :
    This is the error

    HTTP/1.1 302 Found Date: Wed, 30 May 2007 12:40:37 GMT Server: Apache Set-Cookie: Rm=9e3d91857e9d741e18fbb5ba86a43642==gNzgDOyUDM4ETM ; Domain=.rediff.com;Path=/; Set-Cookie: Rl=arunkkg ; Domain=.rediff.com;Path=/; Set-Cookie: Rsc=5L22PK1KCKCqjisCthvqMjwel5IKD6IU ; Domain=.rediff.com;Path=/; Location: http://f5plus.rediff.com/iris/postlogin.php?login=arunkkg&session_id=5L22PK1KCKCqjisCthvqMjwel5IKD6IU&farm=5 Vary: Accept-Encoding Content-Length: 300 Connection: close Content-Type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1 HTTP/1.1 200 OK Date: Wed, 30 May 2007 12:40:36 GMT Server: Apache Set-Cookie: Rl=deleted; expires=Tue, 30 May 2006 12:40:35 GMT; path=/; domain=.rediff.com Set-Cookie: Rsc=deleted; expires=Tue, 30 May 2006 12:40:35 GMT; path=/; domain=.rediff.com Set-Cookie: Rm=deleted; expires=Tue, 30 May 2006 12:40:35 GMT; path=/; domain=.rediff.com Set-Cookie: accounttype=deleted; expires=Tue, 30 May 2006 12:40:35 GMT; path=/; domain=.rediff.com Set-Cookie: Rnl=deleted; expires=Tue, 30 May 2006 12:40:35 GMT; path=.rediff.com; domain=/ Vary: Accept-Encoding Content-Length: 1608 Connection: close Content-Type: text/html

    3) Orkut :
    With orkut also am getting similar type of error.

    I would be greatful if u could just help me thru this….

    regards
    Arun

    Arun

    30 May 07 at 6:14 pm

  12. I have developed yahoo contact list grabber in ASP.I will publish soon . Right now i am working on MSN contact list grabber.if any developer help me on msn conctact list grabber?

    shailesh

    31 May 07 at 1:05 pm

  13. I tried it on yahoo but it didn’t worked.
    When I looked into php code, I found that hardcoded values for some dynamic post parameters like “.challenge” have been supplied. SUch values must be parsed from source page.
    I don’t know how are they expecting it to work?

    iamecstatic

    14 Jun 07 at 7:06 pm

  14. iamecstatic,

    You are using Windows or Linux?

    http://jaist.dl.sourceforge.net/sourceforge/contactgrabber/contactgrabber_0.2.zip

    Above version is stable one and works on Windows as well as Linux.

    About how we are expecting it to work, we are not expecting, but we know it works. :) So there is no question of expectations.

    Feel free to check the application at:

    http://www.mlep.com/~uploads/contacts/

    Thanks for your comments. :)

    :Vishal

    Vishal Kothari

    15 Jun 07 at 12:29 pm

  15. Arun,

    Thanks for your comments.

    Please download following version since you are using Windows XP.

    http://jaist.dl.sourceforge.net/sourceforge/contactgrabber/contactgrabber_0.2.zip

    It is stable version and works on Windows. But version 0.1 isn’t fully working on Windows.

    Please check and let me know.

    :Vishal

    Vishal Kothari

    15 Jun 07 at 12:32 pm

  16. whether contact grabber not work for PHP 4.x.x?
    if not then what i have to do so that it work in PHP 4.x.x(i.e 4.4.4 or any other)
    Regards,
    Gunjan.

    Gunjan

    18 Jun 07 at 2:25 am

  17. I have also tried the phpclasses version and the Yahoo grab doenst work. I also noticed an interesting fenomenon when importing from hotmail (which works) it is disconnecting me from messanger. Why is taking the contats from messanger and not from email?

    valugi

    19 Jun 07 at 5:19 pm

  18. It might not work for PHP 4. Since there are classes of Yahoo, MSN Messenger & Gmail which are perhaps built around PHP5.

    You might want to download the latest version 0.3.

    http://www.magnettechnologies.com/products_contactgrabber.htm

    :Vishal

    Vishal Kothari

    20 Jun 07 at 10:14 am

  19. iamecstatic,

    Yahoo didn’t work because there is a path in the file of Yahoo which stores the cookie. That will need modification. Though you can download the latest release as well 0.3 from:

    http://www.magnettechnologies.com/products_contactgrabber.htm

    :Vishal

    Vishal Kothari

    20 Jun 07 at 10:15 am

  20. I found it very useful and would be using it for our portal, FunPiper.com. Thanks to all of those, who developed it and made it freely available.

    Ajitesh

    25 Jul 07 at 6:00 pm

  21. Everything is working fine except orkut. The response is “Not Read” 3 times.

    taran gill

    8 Aug 07 at 11:21 am

  22. Hi,

    Gr8 job with the contact grabber. Nice to see the classes used in the package. Keep up the good work.

    Thanks.

    Ehsan

    Ehsan

    12 Sep 07 at 1:49 am

  23. I have some trouble with hotmail, i can’t connect to the server ..

    can someone help me?

    Yecine06-

    14 Sep 07 at 9:19 pm

  24. Hii,
    i found it very usefull and intersting.
    i am using it on linux(Fedora),
    everything is working very good, except orkut.
    contact list comes out empty, it is not showing any kind of error.

    If someone knows the solution for orkut then please reply.

    thanks in advance
    vikas sharma
    vikas1284@gmail.com

    vikas sharma

    24 Oct 07 at 7:18 am

  25. Actually there is also another project in SF.net that is using PHP and CURL to import address books or contact lists, you may visit it here:
    http://sourceforge.net/projects/cl-grabber/

    Regards, Ma’moon

    Ma'moon

    22 Nov 07 at 4:47 pm

  26. Hello,

    I downloaded the code from sourceforge and phpclasses. I tried them on Wamp (the latest version running PHP 5.x). I also tried them on a linux server. All I could get to work was the hotmail (which is really a msn messenger contacts list retrieval) and rediff parts. Orkut, Myspace, Gmail and Yahoo contact extraction are not working at all. What could be the reason? Do let me know by email.

    Btw: I think you guys did a great job :)

    Regards,
    Prabal.

    Prabal

    1 Dec 07 at 12:36 pm

  27. I also was unable to make this example work except hotmail. And hotmail also works not properly !

    Gennadiy

    4 Dec 07 at 6:10 am

  28. Hi,
    IF you have any problem to fetch MSN contact list please visit this url
    http://www.phpclasses.org/browse/package/3895.html
    here you can get calsses for msn,yahoo,gmail,orkut,myspace.
    just download these classes and integerate it in your site and enjoy.

    Regards,
    Imran Ghafoor (Pakistan)

    Imran Ghafoor

    4 Jan 08 at 12:31 pm

  29. Hi Vikas,

    I install your Contact Grabber.but its not work for gmail,yahoo and rediff.remember my PHP version is 4.3.9.

    Please Help me.

    Nirav Desai

    11 Feb 08 at 5:59 pm

  30. I downloaded this today. Its over here, being tested:
    http://www.imagevertex.com/importer/

    Hotmail and Orkut works OK. But nothing else will. Very strange.
    If all could work, this would be a great free script :-)

    Norman

    22 Feb 08 at 2:27 pm

  31. Hey vishal and team,

    good job guys!!! I have been using your package for quite long. Everything used to work fine but noticed today, orkut has stopped working.

    I am using the contactgrabber version 3 on Linux.

    May be orkut guys have changed the stuff at their end….

    Can you update what needs to be done to fix that.

    sunil

    29 Feb 08 at 12:52 pm

  32. hi all, I am trying to use a grabber for a community website to invite friends and have the site growing but I have my web site in hosting and I do have problems with the curl installation, do you know of any grabber class I can use or service that can help me? r any workaround if my host do not have the curl on?

    mavi

    5 Mar 08 at 9:29 pm

  33. Instead of struggling with scripts and all else, why not just let someone else do it.
    Check http://www.1clickrecommend.com .Just signup get your code and place links on your pages. The rest is done by the other site. And best is it wont ask for your email account details to get contacts. You can build contacts on the site itself.

    jasonmzs

    2 Apr 08 at 12:10 pm

  34. hello,thanks for freely providing the scripts .
    it work fine at localhost
    but not work at remote site.

    thanks,

    don

    5 Apr 08 at 12:11 pm

  35. Hi,

    Thanks for the great work done by providing contact grabber. Hope that this will always be available free of charge.

    On other hand, is there any possibility for providing the classes for .net??

    Thanks

    Kamal

    Kamaldeep

    22 Apr 08 at 1:08 pm

  36. hi i am trying to get work a msn contacts grabber for a while now i am still can’t do it i am still having an error like
    Could not connect to messenger service

    i check my php info
    the out put says

    CURL support enabled
    CURL Information libcurl/7.18.0 OpenSSL/0.9.8b zlib/1.2.3 libidn/0.6.5

    what should i do tnk u in advance..

    val

    2 Jul 08 at 1:40 am

  37. Where I can find out open source code like this in .Net.
    We are developing the site in .Net,We need import the contacts from social networking sites(like Orkut,Linked-in,etc.,)

    venkat

    5 Sep 08 at 12:07 pm

  38. I have tried to implement the contact grabbers.gmail and yahoo works very well . But nothing else will :( .

    Please advise me.

    vinitha

    3 Oct 08 at 11:16 am

  39. Hi,

    While testing on my local system (Windows XP+wamp) everything is working…. but from the live server Yahoo it is not working.

    I found yahoo authentication is working properly, after that address book page is not retrieving properly. means ‘addressbook’ and ‘crumb’ is not generating completely. Both file has only this line ‘‘

    Please help me to solve this issue…

    Thanks

    Rijas

    13 Oct 08 at 6:22 pm

  40. Hey all,
    I have been trying to write a crawler for Orkut, but I was not able to by pass login. I try to use contactgrabber: still no go. The problem is after authenticating they responds with a page with javascript redirect to homepage of profile. When I try to use this redirect link from php code, it responds with nothing.

    I would greatly appreciate any help,
    E

    enkhResearch

    17 Oct 08 at 3:51 am

  41. I installed contact grabber v 4 on linux. Only yahoo is working and nothing else…any help would be appreciated

    Vipin

    21 Oct 08 at 12:35 am

  42. Actually why not test OpenInviter.com which works even without CURL :)

    OI

    28 Oct 08 at 5:04 am

  43. Hi Guys,
    Grate work keep it up!! Contact Grabber saved my life :D (lol)

    anyway U could improve the code to support hotmail.co.uk. Have a look on Open Inviter project. I used both to make my one :D

    Thanks for the support
    Upeksha

    Upeksha

    20 Nov 08 at 5:36 pm

  44. This does *not* work with Hotmail unless you connect your Hotmail account to MSN Messenger, which then gets the addresses of your *MSN Messenger contacts*, NOT the address book of Hotmail.

    Meee

    20 Jan 09 at 2:33 pm

  45. Yahoo and Gmail in Version 0.4… not working!.. Need help !

    pok

    5 May 09 at 7:15 pm

  46. Hi Guys,

    i am Developing a Social Network Website and using the contact Grabber given by You. But it is not working for me. if any one have the solution. Suggest me

    Thanks and Regards
    Thilmca

    Thilmca

    11 May 09 at 3:38 pm

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