American AAdvantage - How to deep link directly to specific aa.com web pages

Earlier this evening, I figured out how. (Apologies to anyone who ever knew... I didn't.)

Basically, you take a link (from an existing aa.com page), remove its BV_EngineID=... and BV_SessionID=... parameters, and verify that the URL parameters still begin with a question mark (not an ampersand). This yields links that work.

One additional problem is that the Flyertalk UBB system seems to be unable to handle such long URLs (471 characters for one I just made!), even with the explicit bracket-URL-bracket syntax described in the help file. For the moment, I've resorted to making a server-side URL forward to solve this problem, though I'm sure there's some UBB workaround. (Anyone know?)

Results:

aa.com Flagship lounge page is at https://www.im.aa.com/American?form%25category_store_id=101&BV_Operation=Dyn_CategoryReceive&form%25category_cnt_type=2&form%25category_oid=-15153&form%25category_name=American+Air lines+Flagship+Lounges&form%25category_type=2&form%25observe_selected=1&form%25position=unspecified&form%25destination=%2fpands%2fpandscontent.tmpl&form%25category_parent_oid=-1438 7&form%25classname=Dyn_CategoryContentLink&form%25destination_type=template&submit%25form=&form%25action=select

which is the desetination of the server-side redirect at http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/people/edelman/links/aa-fl.asp


Perhaps we can figure out some further refinements for the few more months until aa.com switches over to its new & improved future system!

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by bedelman:
Earlier this evening, I figured out how. (Apologies to anyone who ever knew... I didn't.)

Basically, you take a link (from an existing aa.com page), remove its BV_EngineID=... and BV_SessionID=... parameters, and verify that the URL parameters still begin with a question mark (not an ampersand). This yields links that work.

One additional problem is that the Flyertalk UBB system seems to be unable to handle such long URLs (471 characters for one I just made!), even with the explicit bracket-URL-bracket syntax described in the help file. For the moment, I've resorted to making a server-side URL forward to solve this problem, though I'm sure there's some UBB workaround. (Anyone know?)

Results:

aa.com Flagship lounge page is at https://www.im.aa.com/American?form%25category_store_id=101&BV_Operation=Dyn_CategoryReceive&form%25category_cnt_type=2&form%25category_oid=-15153&form%25category_name=Americ an+Air (https://www.im.aa.com/American?form%25category_store_id=101&BV_Operation=Dyn_CategoryReceive&form%25category_cnt_type=2&form%25category_oid=-15153&form%25category_name=America n+Air) lines+Flagship+Lounges&form%25category_type=2&form%25observe_selected=1&form%25position=unspecified&form%25destination=%2fpands%2fpandscontent.tmpl&form%25category_parent_oid=-1438 7&form%25classname=Dyn_CategoryContentLink&form%25destination_type=template&submit%25form=&form%25action=select

which is the desetination of the server-side redirect at http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/people/edelman/links/aa-fl.asp


Perhaps we can figure out some further refinements for the few more months until aa.com switches over to its new & improved future system!</font>


This is grand, but beyond me until the coffee kicks in. Can you use this to bookmark the "Schedules and Prices" section of the web site, which still exists but is no longer accessible by the main menu system.

The only way I can get there now is to log in, click on See Your Sale Fares, then go to the link in the text near the bottom of the window that says "Schedules and Prices".

The search results seems to be different for "Travel Planning" and "Schedules and Prices". Travel Planning yields lower fares...

I'm looking at DFW-LGA on May 24 return May 26. Schedules and Prices yielded $278. Travel Planning yielded $250.

Wonder why....

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Don't wait for your ship to come in. Build one.

bedelman - looks like you've done it again. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif Good work!

FewMiles..

martin33, I don't know any way to make a deep link that shows you your customized sale fares (to the markets stored in your AA.com profile). To get that info to display properly, the aa.com site needs to know who you are -- which so far requires you logging in (though of course there may yet be some way to put that info right into a URL string).

However, I was able to make a URL to see all Sale Fares at once (the result of pressing the Show All Cities button on a custom Sale Fares page). This is clearly less desirable in the sense that it isn't restricted to the cities you go to most. But I almost always find myself pretting the Show All Cities button anyway -- wanting to see everything (for friends based elsewhere) or just to see what might catch my eye. So maybe this isn't so bad.

URL: https://www.im.aa.com/American?BV_Operation=Dyn_GenericReceive&form%25destination=%2fspecials%2fspecialsallfares. tmpl&BV_ServiceName=American&form%25setsprofdata%25key=salekey%2550 0&form%25setappdata%25oid=bv_content_content_oid%251 3558 to go directly to the Sale Fares - Show All Cities page on aa.com. But again the URL is too long for flyertalk to parse properly. So I made another server-side forward on my home server. The result: http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/people/edelman/links/aa-sales.asp .


Fewmiles, I'm glad to hear this is helpful and of interest. I'm just trying to give back to a community that has tought me so much!

[This message has been edited by bedelman (edited 01-19-2002).]

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by bedelman:
... I don't know any way to make a deep link that shows you your customized sale fares (to the markets stored in your AA.com profile). To get that info to display properly, the aa.com site needs to know who you are -- which so far requires you logging in ...) ...

http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/people/edelman/links/aa-sales.asp .</font>

"Login now to book a Sale Finder fare" is right above the list that comes up.

Not to worry. Your link is the kewlest and the "Login now" is blue, a link to log in after you've looked at the fares.

Now, if you could just figure out a way not to get thrown off the site every five minutes, that would be great!

[This message has been edited by lisamcgu (edited 01-20-2002).]

As I make more of the deep links -- as called for by other discussion threads -- it strikes me that it would be helpful to keep a centralized list of all the deep links I've made. I've put up such a list at http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/people/edelman/travel/ .