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polarmate
29-10-2003, 15:09/03:09PM
Looks like Google has goofed while writing specs for Alternate Ads:
https://www.google.com/adsense/faq#basics10Clickable Images: To load a clickable image, specify an HTML page containing the link information for your ad. For example:

<a href="http://www.google.com"><img src="http://www.mydomain/images/Picture1.jpg" /></a>
If you follow their instructions, you get a funky (read b-a-d) js statement:google_alternate_ad_url = "<a href="http://www.google.com"><img src="http://www.mydomain/images/Picture1.jpg" /></a>";And the script fails. No ads are served. Not even the regular AdWords. :rolleyes:
bwelford
29-10-2003, 16:38/04:38PM
Good spot, polarmate :cheers:

I had thought of getting to this when I had the time. Have you informed Google of its error?
Bernard
29-10-2003, 16:44/04:44PM
Does it work if you remove the slash at the end of the <img> tag?
polarmate
29-10-2003, 17:07/05:07PM
Bernard, it's not the slash. Look at the string variable google_alternate_ad_url - it's value is badly formulated. They need to escape the double quotes and also fix their function to treat the value as a URL that is not located on their site.

I tried escaping the quotes as well as removing them entirely...won't work. I am shown a Google error page telling me that the URL does not exist on their server. :rolleyes:

It's a little amazing that this was released without testing from a non-Google server/domain.
polarmate
29-10-2003, 17:09/05:09PM
Originally posted by bwelford
Good spot, polarmate :cheers:

I had thought of getting to this when I had the time. Have you informed Google of its error?
Yes I have. No news yet. Maybe in the next 24-48 hours :confused:
polarmate
29-10-2003, 19:28/07:28PM
Yikes! Next time remind me to learn to read better. I just heard from Google and the instructions say: specify an HTML page containing the link information for your ad. The example is for the HTML code that this page needs to contain.

So there needs to be a page say AltAd.htm containing the following HTML code:

<a href="http://www.google.com"><img src="http://www.mydomain/images/Picture1.jpg" /></a>
And then in the field provided, specify the complete URL for this page: http://www.domain.com/folder/AltAd.htm and then generate the code for the google ads.

The js statement is then:google_alternate_ad_url = "http://www.domain.com/folder/AltAd.htm";So I am the stupid one here. :rolleyes: I know it's Hallowe'en time...no eggs please!
philophax
07-11-2003, 00:55/12:55AM
oh polarmate
thanks a lot. same sh.. to me :()