Xooxia Development

Google has released version 0.5 of the OpenSocial API. It’s basically a standards based method to write gadgets that can be available to any site that implements the API. What this means for developers is that you’re able to write a gadget once and it can be included in various sites that use OpenSocial. I’ve been tinkering with some of the patterns relevant to social networking, even beginning a small project with a co-worker, and have just begun researching OpenSocial.

In a quick example of what OpenSocial can be used to develop, let’s say that you are a member of an online social network. We’ll call it myNet. Within myNet, you have listed about 45 others as ‘friends’ in your network, so you’re able to send/receive messages to each of them, see what news stories they have commented on, see what pages they’ve recently bookmarked, etc. You have quite a bit of functionality available in myNet. The developers within myNet have given you quite a few options that you can customize to meet your needs. However, you’re also a member of myCheese (corny example, I know), and within myCheese, you’re able to rate what kinds of cheeses you’ve tried and which are your favorites and which you would never try again. What OpenSocial will allow is the developers in myCheese to develop a gadget that will run in myNet showing what cheeses your friends have rated. So when you log into myNet, you’ll see all of the regular myNet components. You’ll also see a component that lists your friends in myNet that are also members of myCheese. You’ll be able to see what cheeses they’ve rated as their favorites, etc.

This may not seem like a huge advantage to some developers, but it’s the idea that is really the big topic here. Social networking is all about connecting with others. However, currently you can only connect to others within your own social network site. OpenSocial will allow developers to, in a way, bridge between networks and allow more collaboration between members. This really can help the social networking craze to develop even further. As a matter of fact, here’s a great explanation of what the capabilities and potential of OpenSocial actually are.

Let me know your thoughts, or if you have any ideas of how OpenSocial can be beneficial to you. Leave your comments below!

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