How To : Create Your Own Twitter Client

August 6, 2012

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I think, Twitter is the most powerful microblogging service at this moment. Indeed, there are so many Twitter clone services in the internet, but they can’t beat the Twitter’s success. For example, Google created Google Buzz and Yahoo with Yahoo Meme.

Why Twitter is so powerful? Yes, Twitter provides their APIs (@twitterapi) that can be used by developers for free. You only need to register your application to get an API key, key consumer, and consumer secret. You will need these informations for you Twitter client.

Now, how to make a Twitter client? Your own Twitter client. Actually you don’t need to have a great coding skills to create a Twitter client. You just use the existing software. Let us start step by step.

1. You need a web hosting and domain, use a free web hosting if you don’t want to spend money. Oops, don’t forget to create a Twitter account.
2. Register your application to Twitter Developers, login with your username your Twitter password.
3. Fill the form as you wish, make sure it’s all true. But you still can edit them later.
4. You should have consumer key and consumer secret now.
5. Ok, Twitter Developers steps have been completed, now you must prepare an application for your Twitter client. Use Rabr, this is a perfect Twitter clone and you can get it for free. Download Rabr.
6. Configure, edit config.php (in lib directory) to insert your key secure, consumer key, consumer secret, and OAuth callback URL.


<?php
define('SECURE_KEY', 'Secure Key');  //Fill as you wish
define('API_URL', 'http://twitter.com');
define('API_TWITTER', 'http://api.twitter.com');
define('TWITESE_API_URL', 'http://rabrapi0.appspot.com');
define('SITE_OWNER', 'Twitter Username');
// OAuth Config
define("CONSUMER_KEY", "Your Consumer Key");
define("CONSUMER_SECRET", "Your Consumer Secret");
define("OAUTH_CALLBACK", "http://www.yoururl.com/oauth.php");
?>

7. Upload Rabr to your web hosting, use an FTP client or Cpanel.
8. Test your client Twiter.

Rabr doesn’t require a database, so don’t worry about your server resource usages.

Rabr features :