Three Improvements Needed for Facebook Application Platform #facebook-app

As the Facebook application has matured, it has truly neared the point of being a Social Operating System API much like the Windows API was to GUI desktop applications years ago.

While Facebook has invested a great deal in it's new Connect architecture for existing websites, there's plenty of great reasons for new sites to build wholly on the Facebook Application Platform API. However, there are three things that are still drawbacks.

Here are three improvements I'd like to see Facebook add to its Application Platform:

1) Support CNAMEs so Facebook applications can use their own domain name URLs

Spelling out http://apps.facebook.com/hotdish is hard. It's hard to promote the URL and hard to explain it to people. Let me transparently operate my Facebook application from http://www.hotdishnews.com like many common application services do e.g. WordPress.

2) Minimize the gigantic header that application visitors see when they reach the application without being signed in or registered with Facebook:

Let my visitors use the application without being bombarded by this horrible banner. A short narrow bar would do the trick.

3) Integrate Stream API Permissions into the standard Facebook Application Authorization Dialog

As I wrote, earlier, Facebook has nearly walled off its application developers from the benefits of its social network when it launched the Stream API with an unusually difficult set of steps and requirements to participate.

Currently, application visitors first have to authorize an application to access their information. But, then, the application has to prompt them again to request permission to read and publish from their stream.

This authorization process needs to be combined into a single dialog with an opt-out option for the stream features.

Currently, getting users to participate in the Stream is overly difficult.

In conclusion, I hope to see Facebook make these changes - it will make its application platform much more compelling to me and likely other developers.

What do you think? Am I the only one annoyed by the Stream API permissions debacle? Do you want to develop solely in the Facebook Platform world?

   

Microsoft's sidewalk memorial to Encarta, Money and other fossils

When Encarta ended it's U.S. development recently, a reporter asked me how it was that Microsoft ever got into the encyclopedia business in the first place. This TechFlash feature is funny... it details a bit of the answer I gave in photos... one for each CD-ROM based multimedia product Microsoft launched to conquer the world, just before that thing called the Internet...

"Walking through Microsoft's campus the other day, I came across a place I hadn't visited for several years, and realized how much it's starting to feel like a graveyard.

For anyone who's never been there, the company has this great old courtyard in Redmond where for many years it placed plaques in the sidewalk for nearly every piece of software it shipped. Taken as a whole, the hundreds of markers tell the story of the company's rise to the top of the software industry in the 1980s and 1990s.

Each plaque, engraved in classic Microsoft font, was originally placed in the ground in celebration. Windows, Office and other hit products are represented well. But the recent discontinuation of some of Microsoft's best-known consumer brands -- combined with plaques for others that never amounted to much -- make other sections feel like a memorial to fallen products. Click through the pages below for pictures of some of the Microsoft relics commemorated in the courtyard."

Microsoft's sidewalk memorial to Encarta, Money and other fossils - TechFlash: Seattle's Technology News Source.

Used Macs For Sale in Seattle

I am in the rolling process of upgrading some of my Apple Macs - and will be selling the following ... email me if you are interested. All are in mint or excellent condition.

1) Like New! PowerMac G5 Tower 2.3 GHz 2x 250 GB HD, 3 GB RAM, Superdrive No display or keyboard. Very fast machine.

2) Excellent condition. 17" MacBook Pro Laptop 2.4 Ghz, 160 GB HD, 2 GB RAM, 1 Year AppleCare Warranty Remaining, Matte Hi-Resolution Display 1920 x 1200, Superdrive, iSight Camera

3) Like New! White iMac 20" Intel Core Duo, 2 Ghz., 2 GB, SuperDrive, iSight Camera

Google Runs Dummy Ads on New York Times

Interesting, Google runs a dummy ad on the New York Times website that says, "dummy ad - this is a dummy ad do not run me in the wild" See right column of story below.

Think your gmail is safer? Let's hope so. 

Not sure this is helping the revenue story at The Times though.

Backing Up and Restoring Your MySQL Database

This is a handy guide to backing up and restoring your MySQL database using mysqldump:

Backing Up and Restoring Your MySQL Database

Google Makes the Web Faster - Coding Tips and Articles

Great resource for programmers, Google Launches Let's Make the Web Faster page with lots of programming tips...

Let's make the web faster - Google Code

AppleInsider Mac Pricing Matrix: Find the best prices on Macs

Apple Insider, a great site for Apple news, also has a helpful matrix guide to the best prices on Macs:

AppleInsider | Mac Pricing Matrix: Find the best prices on Macs.

Mac Buyer's Guide: Know When to Buy Your Mac, iPod or iPhone

This is a pretty helpful page that shows the time since Apple last updated specific products so you know whether to buy or to wait for an upgrade:

Mac Buyer's Guide: Know When to Buy Your Mac, iPod or iPhone

Of course, this wouldn't have helped you with Amazon's Kindle 2 / 2 DX fiasco - released three months after a major upgrade.

Apple OS X 10.5.7 Again Breaks Some MacBook Pros

UPDATE: Even after the Firmware update, my MacBook Pro 17" still hangs with the fan running when sleep initiates. Thanks Apple!

After this update gone awry, one might think Apple added back the affected 15" and 17" MacBook Pros into their test regimen before releasing updates. But, the latest OS X 10.5.7 updates causes working MacBook Pros to run their fans continuously and hang. 

Days later, Apple has released a firmware update to fix the update for these machines... "This SMC Firmware update adjusts the fan behavior in MacBook Pro systems (15-inch and 17-inch) when running under high workload conditions. 

There is still no fix for my older PowerMac tower which intermittently won't sleep, but runs the fan forever (or until I hear it - it sounds like a jet on the runway). 

How to select the first, least, max row per group in SQL

I found this post very helpful in describing how to get the top n items of each type from a table in MySQL...

How to select the first/least/max row per group in SQL at Xaprb.

However, my version of MySQL always give the wrong result for selecting the one maximum row from each group using group by. I can never understand why.

However, the select the top n rows from each group works super well.