I’ve just released version 0.9.7 of WPBook (a WordPress plugin to bring blog posts into Facebook and enable comments from Facebook users) here and at the WordPress site.
A few changes since 0.9.3, the last version I blogged about (the most recent version can always be found on this page or at the WordPress site):
Share Button. This version adds a Facebook style “Share this post” button next to each blog post in Facebook, which allows the user to send the posts to Facebook friends or post and individual blog entry to their profile.
Here’s what the share button looks like, in context:
Share Button for Post inside Facebook
And here’s the resulting popup, with the “post to profile” tab active:
The resulting Popup with 'Post to Profile' active
Ease of installation and Update. Earlier versions required the user to add a directory to their /wp-content/themes/ directory. In this version, and moving forward, the plugin carries the theme directory inside it. Among other things, this means that the “update automatically” function from inside the WordPress plugins page will now work with no additional effort on the user’s part.
Add to pages. The directions have been clarified with respect to profile page boxes. If you want users to be able to add your Facebook Application to Pages as well as user profiles, you will need to enter some FBML (provided by the plugin, on the settings page) in Facebook.
Facebook Settings for Pages, with Default FBML (Note: FBML here is for this blog - yours will be different)
No Conflict with other Facebook Plugins. Using multiple Facebook plugins on your WordPress blog can lead to problems, as each includes its own copy of the Facebook client libraries. This version now checks for the existence of other libraries and relies on those already present if they have been declared.
Plans for 1.0:
For the impending 1.0 release, here’s what I plan to do:
- Make the “share” button a setting, enabling users to turn off the functionality if they choose.
- Provide a link to the “original” version of each blog post (outside Facebook) – also optional
- Add a small “powered by WPBook” type link to the bottom of the canvas page – with option for user to disable.
I also plan to update the page for the plugin here and at WordPress with some screenshots to accompany the documentation, but that might not happen until after the plugin is released.