Facebooker talk - Jan 2009 - Announcing Facebook Connect support

Thanks to a New Years Eve patch from Kevin Lochner, I''m happy to  
announce Facebook Connect support for Facebooker. I''ve been able to  
run a basic FBConnect application including login and displaying  
information from the REST api. You can read a very basic overview at
http://www.elevatedrails.com/articles/2009/01/02/announcing-facebooker-support-for-facebook-connect/

Have a happy new year!

Mike
--
Mike Mangino
http://www.elevatedrails.com

Thanks all for adding Facebook Connect support to facebooker plugin.

I am looking integrating FBC into our site, and have a couple of
questions, pardon if they are noobish, but I am new to Facebook
platform.

My main goal is to streamline registration process for users of FB,
and to allow posting stories back to FB. I understand that I can
integrate FbC javascript, and in conjunction with xd_receiver file,
the javascript loaded from FB will be able to modify HTML page based
on user information, logged in state, etc. The example with Javascript
I saw, has a static HTML site, and all the connect stuff happens on
the client in Javascript.

It is my understanding that Facebooker plugin supports rich REST API
to Facebook, so what I am not clear on is how is information passed
between my site and facebook.

1) Initially, I believe it is javascript that establishes connection
and sets the cookie - inside <%= init_fb_connect "XFBML"%>
2) after that I can now use this in my view:

<% if facebook_session %>
  <%= facebook_session.user.hometown_location.city %>
<% else %>

My question is: does this helper require a REST API call to FB
servers?  Or is that data cached in the cookie/session? Or is that
data obtained by generating javascript that updates HTML when it
loads?

If I was to register someone from Facebook on my website, I would like
to capture their first name, last name and email in order to create a
proper account on our site. If this information is available at the
controller level, then I have no problem with this.

if, however, it''s only available in the client javascript layer, I
will probably have to construct an ajax call to send this information
back to the server, so that I can register the user.

Any clarification on how FB connect + Facebooker actually works, and
whether the data is available at the controller level is much
appreciated.  If I am off track completely, please feel free to chime
in.

Thanks
Konstantin

On Jan 14, 2009, at 5:33 PM, Konstantin Gredeskoul wrote:
>
>
> My question is: does this helper require a REST API call to FB
> servers?  Or is that data cached in the cookie/session? Or is that
> data obtained by generating javascript that updates HTML when it
> loads?
That will require a REST call. The only things handled by javascript  
are the XFBML tags
>
>
> If I was to register someone from Facebook on my website, I would like
> to capture their first name, last name and email in order to create a
> proper account on our site. If this information is available at the
> controller level, then I have no problem with this.
You should read the Facebook TOS. You can''t capture any of this. The  
name is available, but can''t be stored.
>
>
> if, however, it''s only available in the client javascript layer, I
> will probably have to construct an ajax call to send this information
> back to the server, so that I can register the user.
>
> Any clarification on how FB connect + Facebooker actually works, and
> whether the data is available at the controller level is much
> appreciated.  If I am off track completely, please feel free to chime
> in.
Once you log in, you should get a Facebook session object. From there,  
your application works just like a Facebook canvas application. You  
can check out http://www.pragprog.com/titles/mmfacer to learn more.  
The book shows how to get data using the REST API on the server side.  
There are screencasts available that show similar information.

Mike
>
>
> Thanks
> Konstantin
> _______________________________________________
> Facebooker-talk mailing list
> Facebooker-talk at rubyforge.org
> http://rubyforge.org/mailman/listinfo/facebooker-talk
--
Mike Mangino
http://www.elevatedrails.com