Facebook’s API + FBConnect is great but it has some severe limitations. Notably, it doesn’t expose all the functionality available on the Facebook site. Tonight in particular, I wanted to be able to copy a dump of my friends’ names and phone numbers off the site to load into a fresh cell phone. Unfortunately, looking at the API this isn’t possible.
Never fear – Greasemonkey provides enough of a hook into Firefox that it would be possible to write a UserScript to accomplish this loans-cash.net.
Continuing beyond this point is probably against the Facebook TOS and will probably severely void your warranty.
You have been warned.
The following describes how to use this userscript to extract your Facebook “Phonebook”. It produces of a CSV of your friends’ names and phone numbers. Fair warning – this is a rough prototype and does almost no error handling. Also, since the “Phone” field is a free text field I can’t promise people will have formatted their numbers in any sane fashion. But either way it’s a good start to revering lost numbers.
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So here is what you need to do to use the script:
1. Install Greasemonkey – https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/748
2. Follow these instructions to install the script – http://userscripts.org/about/installing
Edit: The script is also on Userscripts at http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/43681
3. Navigate over to http://m.facebook.com/friends.php? (You’ll have to login)
4. Answer yes to the prompt and sit back – the script will move through your phonebook and eventually dump you a CSV of the results.
5. Copy/Paste the CSV wherever you want.
6. Un-install the Greasemonkey script.
So that’s it, one less walled garden to worry about. And hopefully one less “I lost my cellphone!” event/group on facebook!
The script:
0 thoughts on “Use Greasemonkey to extract your Facebook Phonebook”
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telperin says:
it says something like this when i try to install script in firefox:
[Exception… “Component returned failure code: 0x80520003 (NS_ERROR_FILE_EXECUTION_FAILED) [nsIProcess.run]” nsresult: “0x80520003 (NS_ERROR_FILE_EXECUTION_FAILED)” location: “JS frame :: chrome://greasemonkey/content/utils.js :: launchApplicationWithDoc :: line 188” data: no]
peterc says:
same problem here… anyone can help?
anonymous says:
It might be due to a Greasemonkey version discrepancy. Check to make sure you are running the latest release – 0.8.20090123.1
peterc says:
i downloaded that version from mashable this morning… can i do something wrong?
peterc says:
even when i try other greasemonkey scripts, it gives me an option to install automatically… this one doesnt :( i really need to make this work :(
hey_tc says:
I don’t get how this is supposed to work. It installed ok but how do you run it? Just navigating to the phonebook page doesn’t seem to be triggering any action :-(
anonymous says:
Hey guys give this a shot http://userscripts.org/scripts/review/43681
mate says:
doesnt work… i tried everything…
Me says:
Could this script be modified to extract all the messenger addresses (Skype, MSN, …) of the friendlist?
Jack Mo says:
It doesn’t work
jason says:
You should just use sprnch.com it does this already. works on myspace twitter too.
Marcel Chastain says:
2 changes needed to get this working.
On line 9, change
div[@class=”lnav header”]
to
div[@class=”nd header”]
On line 10, change
var desc = nodesSnapshot.snapshotItem(0).childNodes;
to
var desc = nodesSnapshot.snapshotItem(2).childNodes;
That’s it!
–mC
Ashish Datta says:
thanks Marcel!
Paul Aerison says:
I have installed the script and made the changes as noted by Marcel, but when I load http://www.facebook.com/friends/?filter=pfp nothing happens. GM says it’s enabled and there is a check next to the script. I verified that the above URL is in GM under manage scripts. Any ideas what I missed? This is my first GM script so keep that in mind.
Jacopo says:
Paul , you are supposed to go to
http://m.facebook.com/friends.php?
and not to
http://www.facebook.com/friends/?filter=pfp
jamal says:
I used this script to create this bookmarklet tool that encapsulate all the above work and finally downloads the contacts directly as .CSV file. It does not need a firefox plugin or downloading a script. Check it out http://jamalpro.freehostia.com/fbphone.htm
Esteban says:
Doesn’t work. Installed everything, but step 4 (‘Answer yes to the prompt and sit back’) doesn’t happen. Actually, it does nothing :((
Rover says:
Nothing at all is happening in the new version. It just sits there on page 2. I’ve read the instructions…
Marc.Quark says:
Same problem over here, stops on page two
Full Movie Downloads Now says:
Now after which I’ll stumble across a post like this and I’ll recall that there quite are nevertheless useful pages on the web. ^_^. Thanks.
jamie says:
hey,
the script fails when you do phone and email
phone works fine, hoerver the email does!
really hope this gets sorted, as its a great script
Nad says:
Same thing here.. it works for the phones only.. when trying for the emails, it stop at page 2…
Gjeni says:
Even when i try to install the script i have failure. Pleeeease help me
Pancho says:
Not working anymore, I think. There isn’t any tab of “Phonebook” in the mobile version of Facebook with the last greasemonkey script installed from here http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/43681. What can we do :( thanks
originalbloog says:
Your website is great. Content is very beautiful. Thanks
Erick says:
This isn’t working :( Would love to have a script to easily add friends from Facebook to LinkedIn.