Python URL Redirect Problem

I've got a link that I know redirects to another end url, and I'm trying to get the address for that end url using python. But the original link is a little weird, and doesn't work like a normal redirect, and I can't figure out why. When I post the link (the link's below for you try, if you'd like) into a browser, it redirects perfectly. But when I run the following code, it doesn't.

import urllib2
request = urllib2.Request('http://www.facebook.com/ajax/emu/end.php?eid=AQJSWpZ3e4cCTHoNdahpJzPYzmzHOENzbTWBVlW4SgIxX0rL9bo6NXmS3q06cjeh5jO9wbsmr3IyGrpbXPSj0GPLbRJl4VUH-EBnmSy_R4j7iYzpMe1ooZ6IEqSEIlBl0-5SEldIhxI82m75YPa5nOhuBdokiwTw79hoiRB-Zn1auxN-6WLVe3e5WNSt3HLAEjZL-2e4ox_7yAyLcBo1nkamEvShTyZ-GfIf0A9oFXylwRnV8oNaqNmUnqrFYqDbUhzh7d6LSm3jbv1ue2coS3w8N7OxTKVwODHa-Hd3qRbYskB9weio8eKdDFtkvDKuzSSq5hjr711UjlDsgpxLuAmdD95xVwpomxeEsBsMCYJoUEQYa-cM7q3W1aiIYBHlyn2__t74qHWVvzK5zaLKFMKjRFQqphDlUMgMni6AP1VHSn1wli_3lgeVD8TzcJMSlJIF7DC_O44WdjBIMY8OufER3ZB_mm2NqwUe6cvV9oV9SNyYHE4UUURYjW_Z6sUxz3SpHG8c6QxJ-ltSeShvU3mIwAhFE3M0jGTg7AQ7nIoOUfC8PDainFZ1NV8g31aqaqDsF7UxdlOmBT6w-Y8TPmHOXfSlWB-M3MQYUBmcWS3UzlbSsavQG8LXPqYbyKfvkAfncSnZS3_tkoqbTksFirQWlSxJ3mgXrO5PqopH63Esd9ynCbFQM1q_3_wgkYvTeGS9XK6G63_Ag3N9dCHsO_bCJToJT4jeHQCSQ83cb1U5Qpe_7EWbw1ilzgyL-LBVrpH424dwK-4AoaL00W-gWzShSdOynjcoGeB7KE0pHbg-XhuaVribSodriSGybNdADBosnddVvZldY22-_97MqEuA&amp&c=4&amp&f=4&amp&ui=6003071106023-id_4e0b51323f9d01393198225&amp&en=1&amp&a=0&amp&sig=78154')
opener = urllib2.build_opener()
f = opener.open(request)
f.geturl()

I simply get my original url back. I encounter the same 开发者_JAVA技巧problem when I save cookies and use mechanize. Any help would be much appreciated! Thanks!

It looks like this is using Javascript to perform the redirect. You'll either have to figure out exactly how the Javascript is performing the redirects and pull out the appropriate urls, or you'll have to actually run the Javascript. As far as I know, running Javascript from python is not an easy task.

(original answer deleted)

If you look at the contents of f.read() you'll see what's going on here. Instead of returning a 301 or 302 that redirects to the new URL, Facebook actually returns a real HTML document - which contains a piece of Javascript that uses document.location.replace to change the URL in the browser.

There's no easy way of replicating that with Python - the best thing to do is to parse the document with something like BeautifulSoup to find the Javascript, and somehow extract the new URL. It won't be pretty.