My Flickr App Blog

Flickr Tagging of Facebook Friends

After a little more than 4 days of polling My Flickr’s users about tagging Facebook friends in photos, we gathered 115 responses.

Normal tagging of Facebook friends is a relatively straight-forward process to implement, but the infrastructure of placing boxes around friends’ faces will require significantly more time to develop. The tags will be available on Facebook as well as Flickr. They will be machine tags which are almost the same as normal tags, but provide a little more context. Theese machine tags will able to be used in other Flickr 3rd-party applications & provide portability (backup solutions)!

The results from the survey revealed a strong two-thirds win between the two options:

1. Tagging of Friends - 66%
2. Tagging of Friends with specific frames/boxes - 34%

This will be the next feature I will be working on for My Flickr. Enjoy!

Adding & Managing with Facebook Pages

Facebook Pages are not a new thing with Facebook; however, recently, they have received a much needed facelift. The process of adding & managing applications though was and still remains a confusing & daunting task. This post will hopefully break down that barrier with the My Flickr App.

During this tutorial, we will be adding the My Flickr App to the fake Facebook Page, “A+ Scholars,” with the ID:39704393888. The Facebook Page would be accessible via http://facebook.com/profile.php?id=39704393888

The A+ Scholars admin visits http://facebook.com/apps/application.php?id=2352557895 and clicks the “Add to Page” button, chooses “A+ Scholars,” and clicks the “Add My Flickr” button.

The admin is redirected to My Flickr’s setup screen where they will authenticate their currently logged into Flickr account (aplusscholarslovesmyflickr) with “A+ Scholars.” The admin is redirected to Flickr and allows My Flickr READ ONLY access. The admin is then directed back to My Flickr’s Configure page to get started. The URL in the URL Bar should look like this: http://apps.facebook.com/myflickr/configure/?fb_page_id=7865241014

The admin searches for the Most Recent photos tagged “Open House” and saves the search to “A+ Scholars” page box. The admin notices a new Faceboo Page fan’s message and reads it. Wait how does the admin get back to managing My Flickr for “A+ Scholars?” The admin’s first intuitive is to click the My Flickr icon bookmarked in the bottom toolbar. WRONG!!! This sends the admin to their personal My Flickr Configure page leaving them puzzled.

The route the admin should have traveled is as follows. First, click the “Page Manager” icon in the “Applications” pop-up (it could be bookmarked) & click the “Pages” link at the top.

One could also visit http://facebook.com/pages/manage/. Second, the admin should click “Edit Page” under the Facebook Page “A+ Scholars” that they want to edit. Third, scroll down to the My Flickr entry under “Applications,” click the pencil in the upper right corner, click “Edit.” The admin is now enjoying the My Flickr Configure page for “A+ Scholars” which looks something like http://apps.facebook.com/myflickr/configure/?fb_page_id=39704393888.

Basically, anytime you are using My Flickr with a Facebook Page account ensure that the URL either reads “…?fb_page_id=39704393888” or “…/fbp-39704393888”.

Bookmark the My Flickr page of the Facebook Page(s) that you manage to save you a hop, skip, and a jump! Enjoy!

* UPDATE (6/14/2009): Adding the Box to a Facebook Page.

My Flickr v4.0

After several weeks of work redesigning and adding several new features, I am proud to announce the release of My Flickr 4.0. Notice: everyone using version 3.0 will automatically upgraded to 4.0.

The first thing users will notice is the simple Configure page where they can control almost every aspect of My Flickr. Want to post your most recent photos to your Profile box? Create a Search, Preview the results, and Post it. Want to add a full My Flickr tab to your Facebook Profile? Since you already have one Search of your most recent photos, choose it from the dropdown list of your Searches and Save & Generate the Tab.

Facebook users are now capable of commenting on your Flickr photos (only if you allow it, of course), however, if they want those comments really heard, they can easily visit the photo on Flickr or use the special Flickr sign-up link at the bottom. Hand in hand with commenting, all Facebook users or just your Facebook friends can now browse your Flickr photostream or Flickr photosets. You can toggle this feature as well.

What about my Privacy!?! All photos should be up to Safe-Search standards. If you decide to display your Flickr Photostream on My Flickr, you can set My Flickr to only display your “Public” photos or maybe “Public” & “Friends” photos.

My Flickr links to your Flickr profile, photos, and photosets at every chance possible.

New Features:

• View larger Flickr photos, photostream, photosets
• Facebook photo commenting & notification
• Facebook Flickr info in the Info Tab
• Increased Privacy settings
• Redesign & Usability improvements

Tell me what you think about the new version!

Facebook’s Feed Auto-Import

Ever since the new Facebook was released, Facebook sports a feature which auto-imports your feeds from various social sites (Digg, Delicious, Flickr, etc.). Three simple steps will add your Flickr account’s recent photos feed to Facebook. Whenever you upload new photos to Flickr, Facebook will post the story on your Wall / Mini-Feed for friends to see (sometimes Facebook is slow). Again, this is a little Facebook feature that I found useful!

Here is a helpful guide showing how to set up your Facebook Flickr auto-importer!

WARNING: Facebook’s importer needs your EXACT username associated with your account. It may or may not be your URL username. E.g. username: bobisalive; your flickr url: http://flickr.com/photos/bob_is_living

Survey, Re-Design, and New Features

I sent out a survey on December 4th to all of you who became fans of the My Flickr app. In the survey, I asked some basic questions to which 77 users responded and provided me with some valuable information! Thank you!

Of those who responded, I learned that 68% use the “Advanced Options” (photosets, groups, sorting) while searching for the photos you want. 59% base your searches on either Tags or Photosets (or some mixture). Interestingly, 88% of you said that your photos are mostly public, but 35% of you only want them shown to your Facebook friends. Everyone agreed with me that the current My Flickr application is a bit cluttered and contributed some ideas about how to spice it up!

I also gathered from the survey which new features you would like to see in My Flickr. Here are the top three:

1. Auto-refreshing of the Profile (Page) Box
2. Facebook user commenting (which won’t be available on Flickr.com)
3. Clicking a photo directs one to a bigger version of the photo listing tags, description, comments

You may have noticed that I have already tackled #1 (Auto-refreshing of the Profile Box). To save on resources so that nothing bogs the My Flickr app down, the boxes are refreshed every 1 to 1.5 hours if needed on an opt-in basis (click the refreshing link in Manage). Also, searches that request photos from groups or to randomly select photos will NOT be refreshed at this time.

An ultra-simple interface is in the works to revamp the site allowing users to easily display their Flickr photos while still retaining some of the more advanced functionality!

Any other suggestions or comments are greatly welcomed!

-Kaleb