FlareSmith is a plugin to integrate the FeedBurner Stats and FeedFlare services into your WordPress site - all without having to edit any of your theme files!
It acts as a content filter, and adds the required javascript to your site after the output of your original content. It plays well with others (like other content filters), and works quite nicely with the FeedBurner FeedSmith plugin. In fact, I choose the name of my plugin as an homage to FeedSmith.
Flare Smith - Options Page
This plugin should be considered beta software. It is currently in use on a number of blogs I manage, including this one, and so far there have not been any issues caused by its use - nor do I expect there to be any.
If you need support, just post a comment below.
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If you're new here, please subscribe to my RSS feed. You'll get a blend of tech news, analysis, inspirational essays, and much more. Subscribe today.
hi. Thanks for plugin
perfect.
Regards
You’re welcome, Baron. I felt like it was something that was missing from the WordPress / FeedBurner ecosystem.
Eric,
great plugin.
It works in a single user wordpress but not in wordpress mu. Any tips to make this work for a user in mu?
I’ll take a look. Trying to get an install of MU up now for another project, and will see if I can’t get it to work.
Thanks,
-e
Hello,
A question here. Can I allow feedflare to appear beneath the posts at my homepage besides showing up at the Feedburner page? Is this plugin suppose to allow feedflare to show up in the feedburner page only?
Thanks
Before release, this is how it worked. I changed it, because FeedBurner stats aren’t set up to record homepage hits, since there isn’t really an item in the feed that corresponds to the homepage URL. However, it will be easy for me to add an option that allows to turn this on and off. I imagine that you want the FeedFlare to show below each post on that page, which is a scenario I don’t personally use - which is why I didn’t think to add it.
I am working on the plugin today, and will put this in. Look for an update later this evening.
Thanks!
- Eric Marden
Hi Bran,
I’m happy to report that I have added the feature you requested, and you can update to v0.9 of the plugin to enjoy it.
Let me know if it doesn’t work for you.
- Eric Marden
If you have a problem with a new install not saving your option, that bug as been fixed. Please update to v0.12 and try again. Sorry for any inconvenience.
Guillermo - v0.13 supports WordPress MU.
Hmm?? Hey, you should stop by sometime and we can discuss plugins. It’ll be just like old times.
but really.
Oh, so busy, but yes we need to sync up again, my friend.
Will you be updating the script to be compatible with the new URL for burned feeds?
If you have updated your account, Google is now hosting Feedburner, but they haven’t fully migrated everything yet. In the meantime, new feeds that are burned (or if you have to switch like I did to enroll in the new AdWords Feed that replaced the FeedBurner ad system) aren’t hosted at http://feeds.feedburner.com/FEEDNAME
Now it’s:
http://feedproxy.google.com/FEEDNAME
And as it is set-up now I can’t use it.
Thanks!
Hi David,
I was unaware of this recent change and will put something together today to support both styles.
Thanks for reporting the issue!
- Eric Marden
Hi David K.,
I’ve looked at this, and was able to create a feed with this new URL. However, it doesn’t seem that the FeedFlare script is working on their end… I get a 404 for the feedflare link:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~s/dadamine/planet
But when I look at one with the old school URLs, I get the expected output:
http://feeds.feedburner.com/~s/xentek
It doesn’t seem like I can get around this, or a way to file a bug with FeedBurner/Google.
I will work on supporting the new URL, but it won’t do anything until they fix the issue on their end.
- Eric Marden
Your feed didn’t automatically switch to the new domain and they aren’t currently offering a way to help migrate existing feeds into the new system.
My new FeedBurner link is http://feedproxy.google.com/handleit (without the ~a like the old http://feeds.feedburner.com required).
Thanks for checking it for me, but I think you can still do it with this information.
Please let me know.
Hi David,
Thing is you can’t get to the /~s/ directory, which stores the feedflare script that they insert into your page. This link should be a small snippet of javascript code:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~s/handleit
Like this is:
http://feeds.feedburner.com/~s/xentek
I’ll have my changes rolled out tonight, but until the /~s/ directory stops 404-ing there isn’t much I can do to make it work.
Hopefully Google is aware and its on their radar for stuff they have to do to finish absorbing FB into their system.
- Eric Marden
David - I’m happy to report that v0.15 supports Adsense enabled feeds, and includes a number of other improvements.
Let me know if this works for you.
Thanks for pointing this out!
- Eric Marden
Oh, great! I’ve been waiting for this. Will let you know if I encounter problems. Thanks!
Thanks Vanessa! Let me know if you run into anything, as I will do my best to help you.
v0.17 is uploading now - with improved My Brand support.
please forgive my ignorance. I installed, added feedburner ID, checked box and selected the correct format and clicked save options.
Now what?
Can you clue a relative feed newbie into where to look for “intergating feedburner stats” into my site?
Hi Bill,
If you have a FeedBurner account, which it seems you do, and have turned on stats collection in your FeedBurner account settings (Analyze > Configure Stats) then that is all you need to do.
Stats are only collected when the traffic originates from your feed, as it requires passing through special FeedBurner URLs and landing on your site to be counted.
One way of checking is to navigate to one of your posts on your site, and view source in your browser. Then using the Find command (CTRL+F or CMD+F in most browsers) look for ~s. This is part of the snippet of javascript that is inserted. I just checked your halfwaytoconcord site and you have the FeedFlare snippet installed correctly. Congrats!
Thanks for stopping by,
Eric Marden
Hello.
I have 2 problems.
The first problem is this: Why does your plugin does not read correctly my CC license? I have the license generic 3.0 and instead your plugin displays Italian 2.5.
Second problem: Because if I did not select some parameters on the site of feedburner (Section feedflare), on my site, however, appear all?
The problem I reflected only on my web site and not on feed.
Thanks for your help
Is there a way to get the tracking code displayed for the current page? I look forward to my home page hits in the Site Stats Pro, but your plugin appears to only display the script at the bottom of each post. For now, I have checked the FeedFlare on the Home page box, but that doesn’t seem like the right solution.
In the directions for Site Stats and Wordpress, they have you add the script to your index.php and single.php for the default theme, but this looks like there’s just one place to add it…?
In short, I want my homepage hits to be tracked, and FB supports it, but I don’t know how your plugin communicates that.
All kinda issues here.
First off, I clicked the option to NOT show the feed flare on my pages. I just wanted to use it for stats. It ignored me and did so, anyway.
Second, while showing the items, it did not show the items I selected.
Third, while showing the feedflare links on the comments page, these got picked up in the feed and my feed showed TWO bands of flarefeed.
I pulled it off the site cause it wasn’t playing nice. I have one of my selections (add to many) in its place.
I am using three column cutline for the theme, v 2.6.3 of Word Press, and Feed Smith. I tried both the branded version and the old school version for the feed name, but everything remained the same.
When you have time to look at it, email me and I’ll reinstall the plugin. Don’t want to leave it up because of the issues it causes in the feed.
Merrill,
#1 is controllable in your FeedBurner account settings (Optimize > FeedFlare). Sadly, they use the same mechanism to deliver the stats functionality as the FeedFlare widgets, so it will print those to the screen if you insert the FeedBurner snippet into your theme, with or without my plugin. There is nothing I can do about that, sorry.
#2 seems to be a bug with FeedBurner.
#3 is definitely a bug on my end, and is due to the way I’m inserting the snippet. I will filter it out for the feeds or find another way to insert it. I’ll address this, and a couple of the other issues posted above in my next release.
Thanks for trying it out and letting me know about the issues you ran into. It goes a long way to helping make this plugin that much better.
- Eric Marden
I did some other playing around.
Went to FeedFlare at the Feed Burner site and clicked all options off for showing on the website and left them on for showing on the feed.
Got the java code for use on Word Press. It used the old school version instead of the branded option of the address.
Put that code in the footer.
Now, stats are back to working and the FeedFlare links do not show on the website. Since I use just one post per page, I can get away with this for now.
I am using the original feed burner as they have not forced me to go to the proxy yet. I am wondering if the ~s was the reason that it never showed my personal selections for use. I had a different set of selections when I started as a blogger blog and changed them when I moved over to wordpress. Flare Smith never picked up those changes but stayed with the original choices on the website. The feed showed the new stuff.
Thanks for the reply! I appreciate it!
Will try the new version when it is posted. I have left feed smith in the inactive status so the update should show on my dashboard.
Hey there Eric,
well I would like to say that is plugin is awesome but I don’t quite understand what its suppose to do really. I’ve activated it and gone to the options setting to enter my unique feedburner account name and I already added my feedburner stats in my index.php file.
So is there something that I’m supposed to see, or does it work behind the scenes? and How do I check to make sure it works? and where?
not that tech savvy… thanks!
http://www.thecocktailcafe.com
Rhea,
This plugin is intended to keep you from integrating the code into your theme files directly, but still be able to use FeedFlare and FeedBurner stats. If you had followed the instructions on FeedBurner.com for FeedFlare or Stats, you won’t really need this plugin. If you want to keep using the plugin, you can, but you’ll want to back out any edits you made yourself to index.php, etc.
Let me know if you need anything else, and thanks for stopping by to comment!
- Eric Marden
Thank you so much for the help with this. I know at some point I would like the assistance of a wordpress tech.
My feedburner is finally generating some live hits but I still added this plugin and edited the index.php (oopsie). I would like to build more of an online community for my blogsite and I don’t know how. So I figure that if I can at least track the live hits I’ll know what they are interested in and cater it to that.
Rhea,
You’re welcome!
You should also sign up for Google Analytics, which is also free. There are a bunch of plugins that will help you integrate it into your site, like FlareSmith does, and will give you even more information about your visitors than FeedBurner will.
Good Luck! Just write good content, tell your friends, and the visitors will come.
- Eric
What an awesome website and you’re awesome 2. Not so bad looking either… wink wink.
I’ll be sure to keep up with you and I hope you’ll check in every now and then. Even though its a chic site, what man doesn’t want to know how we think right? right?
Almost happy hour! Oh yeah!
Cocktails on my Eric
http://www.thecocktailcafe.com