As part of our ongoing effort to improve communication with our developer community, we offer you the latest monthly roundup of the announcements, new features, and updates to Facebook Platform that occurred during November, 2009.

This month we released a leaner and faster JavaScript SDK, provided you with a way to get your users to bookmark your applications, and added to our developer roadmap, among other highlights.

New Features

• Try out the new, open source, alpha Facebook Connect JavaScript SDK. This is a faster, more lightweight, easier to use SDK than the current one. Be sure to read the latest documentation.
• Make it easier for your users to come back to your application by prompting them to bookmark it. Render an "Add Bookmark" button with the fb:bookmark FBML/XFBML tag or prompt the user by calling FB.Connect.showBookmarkDialog or Facebook.showBookmarkDialog.
• Start building with the Microsoft SDK for Facebook Platform, an SDK we officially support with Microsoft. Use the SDK to implement Facebook Connect or create a Web-based or desktop application.
• Add the ability to preview links shared through your application by calling links.preview. Also, links.post now takes an optional image parameter, which is the URL to the image being posted.

Updates

• Keep an eye on our developer roadmap and see the direction Facebook Platform is heading.
• We render images in stream attachments so that the maximum dimensions can be 90 pixels square. If you include more than one image in an attachment, or your story's description is longer than 300 characters, the user can see the rest of the content by clicking a "See more" link.
• We removed all reference to the video attachment type in stream stories. You should use the flash attachment type, since the flash type gives you more control over how your stories render.
• You can now find fans of a Facebook Page when you call pages.isFan without a session key. This lets you determine whether a user is a fan of a Facebook Page without the user needing to authorize your application.
• If you're developing IFrame canvas page applications or use the fb:iframe tag, we now pass the base domain to the IFrame. We also pass fb_sig_cookie_sig to IFrame canvas pages; store this signature in your cookies, as it's the signature used to sign the four fb_sig session variables: fb_sig_user, fb_sig_session_key, fb_sig_expires, and fb_sig_ss. Finally, we pass the session secret (in fb_sig_ss) to IFrames rendered with the fb:iframe tag.
• We no longer add a period to the end of a user's status in the status column of the user FQL table, making it consistent with the status FQL table and the behavior of the site.

Announcements

• Facebook joined Google, Microsoft, Yahoo!, and others within the Open Web Foundation community in publishing the Open Web Foundation Agreement and applying it initially to the OAuth 1.0a and OAuth WRAP specifications.
• Join us at Le Web, the annual technology conference in Paris, December 9 and 10, where we'll discuss the real-time Web. Visit the Le Web Facebook Page for more information. If you're planning on being at Le Web, come join us and build at a special Facebook Developer Garage Paris - Le Web edition.
• If you're running ads in your applications to help you monetize, be aware that we take action against deceptive ad networks. We're keeping a list of monetization providers we've banned for violating Facebook policies and advertising guidelines. You can also review this list of trustworthy third parties that can help you monetize.
• Please share your feedback on our documentation.

Articles/Videos

• Learn how to make your software development practices more secure. This article details the security benefits of Facebook Platform's core components, the OWASP top ten vulnerabilities, secure development resources, and administrative practices to enhance site security.

Keep an eye on this blog, the Platform Live Status, and the weekly Push Changes articles for announcements, changes, and other important bulletins. You can subscribe to the blog's RSS feed and the Platform Live Status RSS feed, or subscribe to either or both via email.

As always, we appreciate your continued feedback in our Developer Forum -- let us know how we can reach and communicate with you even better.

Pete, the technical writer on the Platform team, likes keeping you up to date.