Design, Facebook, Social Media, Social Networks, Usability
Aug 30, 2010
Alla
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Facebook’s New Platform: An Exciting iFrames Development

Last week, Facebook announced a set of changes that its development platform is set to undergo within the coming months. In a blog post, the company talked about the enhancements coming to the Facbeook API. A significant change will be the replacement of FBML with iFrames, with the former having been the gold standard for designing visually appealing Fan Pages of the last several years. In fact, by the end of 2010, Facebook will no longer allow for new applications to be created using the antiquated FBML.

How will these new changes affect social media CRM on Facebook?

Short answer: it won’t.

Long answer: The changes will make it easier for developers to bring more dynamic functions to Facebook pages, games, and other applications. On August 23rd, all tabbed pages in profiles and fan Pages were readjusted to be only 520 pixels in width. This standardized (albeit more narrow) width allows for implementation of across-the-board support for IFrames  – which enable designers and developers to easily break up a page into multiple segments with some static and some dynamic sections. Iframes also tend to use lower bandwidth, when compared to single-frame variable content that has to continuously reload.

The Bivings Group is a full service Internet communications firm,  whose own developers are incredibly excited about this change. Chris Roane, a TBG developer who's familiar with FBLM noted that:

It always seemed ridiculous to me that Facebook would implement a specific language for developers to use with their system for web development (FBML). Why not tap into the same coding system that everything else uses across the internet? Instead of having to figure out how to work with a new coding system, developers and programmers can use the systems that they have always been using. This will not only make pages easier to develop, but applications should appear more seamless as it will be easier to make more complicated applications run directly in a facebook tab/page.

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    This is great news for anyone developing applications for Facebook. I suspect that the developers will vote with their feet and phase out FBML before the end of 2010 deadline.

  • http://www.ewebbackup.com Web Backup

    This is great news for anyone developing applications for Facebook. I suspect that the developers will vote with their feet and phase out FBML before the end of 2010 deadline.

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Notice

We are pleased to announce the launch of the Brick Factory, a Washington, DC-based digital agency founded by former employees of The Bivings Group. You can read the details of the transition here.

As a result of the change, The Bivings Report will no longer be updated, although we intend to keep it up for archival purposes. You can read the Brick Factory's new blog here.

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