What's New on The Facebook Platform, October 2011

WHAT’S NEW ON THE FACEBOOK
PLATFORM, OCTOBER 2011

Iskandar Najmuddin
19th October 2011
Facebook Developer Garage London

SYNCAPSE | New York | Toronto | London | Portland 1
All materials contained within this presentation are copyright Syncapse Corp. 2011. Reproduction or distribution is prohibited.

I {actioned} THIS {object} USING {app}


October 1st – The Modern FB Platform

The HTTPS deadline for Canvas and Tab apps.
• No SSL? No more users. Bye bye!
• So check your Tabs, if you got „em.
• Use the setAppProperties (REST API) to set secure URLs en-masse
• FBML apps work, but check externally-loaded resources, avoid „mixed
content‟ messages.

OAuth 2.0 now enabled by default
• Use PHP SDK >= 3.1.1
• Set oauth:true in FB JS SDK
• Watch out for JS cookie vs. session „code‟ conflicts, though


Graph API Updates

More methods, more objects
• Manage Notifications
• Manage Events
• Read Friend Requests
• Manage banned App users
• Manage App migrations
• Set App restrictions
• Read Game Achievements

Any reasons left to use the REST API?


New Auth Dialog

Allows users to decline permissions individually. This is great for everyone!

Apps should now
• Validate user permissions before attempting an action
• Gracefully handle failures due to missing permissions

What to do
• Use the Graph API to check permissions and FB.login to request missing ones.
• Or use the Real-Time API to cache existing permissions for each user.
• Use new Insights to see which permissions get rejected and tune your app
accordingly.
• Check out Authenticated Referrals: Automatic permissions when users come to
your app from FB.


New Auth Dialog Example


Timeline is The New Profile

See ALL of your Facebook activity over time.
• Add historical events and content.
• Check-in mapping.
• More expression
• Highlight Timeline Stories
• Use clever Cover images
• And Application Content too!
• Available for Developers now, but not fully launched yet.


Ticker is a Firehose

The Ticker is a near-real-time firehoseof connection activity
stories.

• Perfect for light touch, „trivial‟ content.
• Is this where those damn Farmville stories belong?
• Apps can Publish Stories to the Ticker without user
confirmation.


Ticker | Graph Rank = News Feed

Some stories will be promoted to the News Feed, if the Graph Rank AI
deems them worthy.

Ticker Story
News Feed

Graph Rank Worthy?
Full Story
International AI of Mystery


Requests 2.0 Updates

“Friction-less” requests can skip confirmation dialog.
• But only if all the „to‟ UIDs have been approved by the user at least once.

Breaking Change:
Callback response data structure changed to contain array of UIDs in the to
property.

January 1, 2012 - existing
apps will be opted into the
Request 2.0 migrations!


Cloud Service Integration
The first provider: Heroku
Clickyclickyclicky – now you have a hosted app running in that there cloud.

Heroku supports:
• PHP (warning: docs are sparse)
• Node.js
• Python
• Ruby

$ git push origin master
… heroku does some magic
… And now your app is updated

Free for low-traffic apps!


Mobile Web Apps
Bookmarking, Requests, all work nicely.
• But still no Page Tabs anywhere Mobile.

Native Facebook apps (iOS, Android) know to open your app as:
1. Native Mobile or
2. Mobile Web

Credits on Mobile supported, but not in
native iOS apps (thanks a lot, iTunes)

Your Mobile Web app will work inside
the Facebook Native App chrome.


Mobile Web Apps – Basic Auth Dialog
In the iPad Facebook App:


Mobile Web App - Example
In the iPad Facebook App:


OPEN GRAPH BETA


Open Graph Beta
What’s it about?
From https://developers.facebook.com/docs/beta/

“With the Open Graph, your app becomes
a part of the user‟s identity and social
graph.

Through a single API, you‟re able to
deeply integrate into the key points of
distribution on Facebook: Timeline, App
Views, News Feed, and Ticker.
…
With the Open Graph, you‟ll be able to
create a deep, persistent connection
between you and your users, and drive
new users to your app.”


Open Graph Beta
Say What?

For Developers
• Invent new ways for users to interact with your content.
• Lots of new methods to raise app visibility.
• More connections, more data = more WIN!

But note
• It‟s all beta, baby
• When do Custom Actions launch? undefined

Oh No!
Matt throws Dan
out the window


Open Graph Beta
Nodes and Lines

Objects are Nodes
• Facebook own their Social Graph Nodes
• Users, Pages, Groups, Events, etc
• You can create your own Nodes

Actions are Lines
• AKA Edges or Connections
• Facebook own some Actions
• Like, Recommend, Friend, etc
• You can create your own Actions

You can now connect Nodes together
using your own Actions.


Open Graph, not so long ago
• Create your own Objects
• Use Facebook‟s Object Types or define your own
• Social Graph users can do
• Facebook-defined actions on your Objects.


Open Graph, today
• Create your owndetailed Object Types and Actions in your app Namespace.
• Social Graph users can do
• Facebook-defined actions on your Objects
• Custom actions on your Objects
• Custom actions on Facebook-defined Objects


Get Started – The Open Graph Dashboard
Click on the Open Graph
link in the App Settings
menu.

Create and manage
Actions, Object Types, and
Aggregations.

But there is NO API access
for any of this yet, so get
ready for lots of browser-
driving 


Set up Custom Object Types
1. Name it

2. Add custom
properties

3. Inflect it


Custom Object – Creating an instance
Tweak your OG metadata
1. Add prefix namespaces to the head element
2. Add your app namespace to the og:typemeta content

<head prefix="og: http://ogp.me/ns# my_ns: http://ogp.me/ns/apps/my_ns#">
<meta property="fb:app_id" content="278839975471035"/>
<meta property="og:locale" content="en_US" />
<meta property="og:title" content="Pineapple Pizza Slice" />
<meta property="og:type" content="my_ns:pizza_slice" />
<meta property="og:image" content="http://domain/pineapple-pizza-slice.jpg" />
<meta property="og:url" content="http://domain/pineapple-pizza-slice" />
<meta property="og:description" content="Cheese and fruit, a tropical sensation" />
<meta property="og:site_name" content="FDGL October 2011 App" />
snip


Set up Custom Actions
Use the massive UI in the Facebook Developer App. It‟s seriously huge.

Custom Actions will need to be submitted and approved by Facebook
• FB have proposed a 48-hour turnaround
• Positive actions preferred (so probably no Unlike action, sorry!)


Set up Aggregations
1. Choose the type of data to
Display and the linked
Action.

2. Choose a Style

3. Set up sorting and captions

4. Preview


Set up Aggregation Previews

Users will see Aggregation
Previews in the Auth Dialog.

1. Create Preview Objects
• These are just dummy
Objects for presentation

2. Create Preview Actions
• Link Actions to Preview
Objects


Aggregation Example

Aggregations show on a user‟s
Timeline after they have
completed at least 6 actions.


Custom Actions – Creating an instance
Get publish_actions permission from the user.

Create an Action instance: Graph API & JS SDK
varurl = ‘/me/my_app_ns:action_id?object_type=https://object/opengraph/url’;
FB.api(url, 'post', function(response) { console.log(response); });

A Real-ish Example:
POST /me/my_ns:chow_down_on?pizza_slice=http://domain/pineapple-pizza-slice


Custom Actions – Where do they show?
• Ticker & Ticker Fly-Out
• News Feed
• If promoted from the Ticker
• Timeline – Feed Stories
• If recent and not yet aggregated
• Timeline – Featured Stories
• If user chooses to highlight the story
• Timeline – Recent Activity
• If app used frequently/recently (unclear)
• Timeline – Aggregations
• If > 6 Actions taken by the user

Let‟s have a look!


Custom Actions, Ticker & Fly-out


Custom Actions in News Feed

This story was aggregated, nice.


Custom Actions on Timeline:
Feed Stories

Multiple Actions

A Single Action


Featured Story
Users can choose to Feature a story on their Timelines. I love pizza.


Recent Activity


Aggregations


Open Graph Beta
In Use By

Lots of Media partners:
• Netflix
• Spotify
• The Guardian
• The Independent
• Yahoo!
• And others

See more here:
https://developers.facebook.com/showcase/


IMPORTANT BREAKAGES
AND DATES


Roadmapping

FBML Hell to End. JOY!
• No bugfixes after Jan. 1st 2012
– Except for security fixes
• All FBML endpoints smashed by sledgehammers on June 1st 2012

Other dates
• Nov. 1st, 2011: manage_notifications permission required to, yes, manage notifications
• Dec. 1st, 2011: Dashboard APIs shut down & App Bookmark URL removed
• Jan. 1st, 2012
– FB.Data JS SDK APIs removed
– FB.Canvas.setAutoResize renamed to FB.Canvas.setAutoGrow
– Apps auto-migrated to Requests 2.0
• Feb. 1st, 2012: canvas_name removed from App properties in favor of namespace


IF I TALKED REALLY FAST, WE MAY
HAVE TIME FOR QUESTIONS. DO WE?
And see you next time!

Ask me about social media, technology, or eggs:
• i.najmuddin@syncapse.com
• twitter.com/iskandar
• +44(0)207.096.0146


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Editor's Notes