Amazon Placeholders no longer working.

[staggers]

Hi,

For years I've been using code generated on the Amazon Affiliate site for products and pasting it as placeholder code in Web Designer (I'm using MX).

Recently, after a break of a month or so I've tried to do that and they don't work. All I get instead on my web page is the top left corner of a failed navigation page instead of the 120 x 240 product image from Amazon that I'm expecting.

I've changed nothing, but I see that the Amazon code has changed entirely. IS this something they've done that Xara hasn't caught up with yet? If I get the code for an image-only product, that still works ok, but my preferred text+image doesn't.

Does anybody have any ideas as to what may be wrong?

TIA.

[Acorn]

TIA, all the Xara Amazon Widget does is accesses the Amazon site for your to logon and build your product.
When that is copied to your Clipboard, your Xara application incorporates that into Placeholder code.

If your current collection is broken, Amazon has changed something and you will have to recreate them all afresh.

If you provide the code generate, someone could add it to a Placeholder and check across all browser types.

Acorn

[staggers]

Thanks for your reply. I must confess I've never used the Xara Amazon widget! I go to the affiliate site, get the code and 'paste as placeholder' using the top Edit menu in WD MX.

None of the existing Amazon placeholder code is broken. It all still works fine. It's only new ones that have the problem.

What I should have done is give an example. Below are 2 sets of code as generated by the Affiliate site. the 1st is the way it's always looked and the second is the way it looks now.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This works. It's the way the code was always generated at the Affiliate site. The links still work.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
<iframe src="http://rcm-eu.amazon-adsystem.com/e/cm?t=cantdistbattr-21&o=2&p=8&l=as1&asins=B00CDP6JBE&nou=1&ref=tf_til &fc1=221C1C&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=30303E&b c1=000000&bg1=F9F9F9&f=ifr" style="width:120px;height:240px;" scrolling="no" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0" frameborder="0"></iframe>

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This doesn't work. It's for precisely the same item and is the code generated by the Affiliate site now (for the same 120 x 240 ad).
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

<iframe style="width:120px;height:240px;" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0" scrolling="no" frameborder="0" src="//ws-eu.amazon-adsystem.com/widgets/q?ServiceVersion=20070822&OneJS=1&Operation=GetAdH tml&MarketPlace=GB&source=ac&ref=qf_sp_asin_til&ad _type=product_link&tracking_id=cantdistbattr-21&marketplace=amazon&region=GB&placement=B00CDP6J BE&asins=B00CDP6JBE&linkId=L3MB7CZAWK2VYJLZ&show_b order=true&link_opens_in_new_window=true">
</iframe>


WD MX recognizes the new code as a placeholder, but when I try to insert it I just get a navigation error page.

I would have thought that a change of this magnitude and with this effect would cause rioting in the streets. Since it hasn't, I can't help feeling that the cause is something a bit more mundane, but I can't think what. Any more help gratefully accepted.

Staggers.

[Acorn]

Staggers, the problem is you have allowed a number of spaces to appear in the source URL. These were giving you the 400 Error.

Everything in red needs to have no gaps:
<iframe style="width:120px;height:240px;" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0" scrolling="no" frameborder="0" src="//ws-eu.amazon-adsystem.com/widgets/q?ServiceVersion=20070822&OneJS=1&Operation=GetAdH tml&MarketPlace=GB&source=ac&ref=qf_sp_asin_til&ad _type=product_link&tracking_id=cantdistbattr-21&marketplace=amazon&region=GB&placement=B00CDP6J BE&asins=B00CDP6JBE&linkId=L3MB7CZAWK2VYJLZ&show_b order=true&link_opens_in_new_window=true"></iframe>

Acorn

[jamesd]

You are also missing http: from the iframe url

[Acorn]

No, don't add http:, this URI is a CDN link.
Acorn

[staggers]

Dear JD & and Acorn

Well, the spaces I should have spotted, but didn't, so thanks for that.

As for the missing protocol, it's missing in the original and doesn't work when posted. When I put the protocol back in though, as would normally be expected, it does work!

I want my mummy.

Thanks to you both.

[jamesd]

Acorn, thanks for the correction and info I haven't worked with a url like that before