MySpace Developer Team : notifications

REST App Notifications Are Now Available

Test User — Sat, 16 May 2009 00:26:00 GMT

We're happy to announce that we've just released the final piece of app notifications. You can now send app notifications directly from an OAuth REST end point. The REST end point allows you to pass in up to one thousand (1000) recipients at a time making it ideal for mass messaging communications to users of your app. This method also allows you to send notifications on a true server-to-server basis which is not initiated by a user action.

The general notifications page can be found in the developer Wiki. Documentation for the REST end point can be found here.

Enjoy!

App Notifications for OpenSocial Container now LIVE

Test User — Tue, 12 May 2009 20:38:00 GMT

Just a quick heads up, sending notifications from the OpenSocial container is now live and ready for use. As I mentioned in my previous blog, this is ideal for implementation of action prompting messages, such as turn based indicators. Per the updated Terms of Usage, notifications sent from the OpenSocial container are limited to ten at a time, and all ten must be friends of the current app viewer. Please make sure you familiarize yourself with the full updated details in the documentation.

You can test out notifications in action by checking out a Simple Notifications App and a Advanced Notifications App.

Here are some current known issues:

The App Notifications home page indicator isn't currently on. Expect this functionality to be turned on shortly.
Notifications aren't currently deleted when a user uninstalls an app. Expect this shortly as well.
Direct REST access to notifications (for mass messaging to all users). Just around the corner... ;)

Please let us know if you run into any problems or if you have any feature suggestions. We hope you enjoy this feature!

App Notifications, Terms of Usage and REST Access

Test User — Thu, 07 May 2009 02:36:00 GMT

With the initial release of App Notifications just around the corner I wanted to clarify some features and best practices for implementing app to user communications.

The first piece of App Notifications we’ll be releasing will allow you to send notifications directly from the OpenSocial 0.8 container. This is the ideal method for sending “action prompting” messages to the user from the app, such as “Your Turn” indicators. Sending notifications from the container will ultimately be limited to ten (10) recipients and they must be friends of the User.

The next component (which will be released shortly after the container functionality) will allow developers to send notifications directly from a REST end point. Using the REST end point, developers can send notifications to any of their app users, making it ideal for digest or informational type messages. You’ll be limited to passing a maximum of one thousand (1000) recipients per call to this end point and it will be throttled (for obvious infrastructure reasons).

As part of our commitment to the MySpace App user experience, we’ll be making some specific updates to the Terms of Use. In addition to the standard rules of content for app communications (no advertising, no incentivizing, etc.), App Notifications obviously need to be directly and clearly related to the sending app. Any users you mention in notifications must be aware that their information is being included and you must provide a way for them to opt out. Please be sure to familiarize yourself with the new terms.

The entire team has worked very hard to get this functionality out and we’re excited to see the great new apps the community creates using it!

App Notifications Beta Release

CodeStorm — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 23:10:00 GMT

Developers can now generate custom notifications from their applications.

App Notifications are generic one to one communications from an application to a specific User of that application. In addition to providing a framework for communicating general application state messages, App Notifications also include the ability to allow the User to execute an application specific action from multiple choices.

The following documentation is for a BETA release. At this time:

App Notifications can only be received by Developers of the application.
App Notifications will expire after 7 days.
Users will only see the 5 most recent notifications per app.

Please read the App Notifications documentation for more information.

Posted by: Bryan Green
a.k.a. Codestorm

Invite!

Kyle — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 20:40:00 GMT

If you've been keeping a sharp eye on your MySpace mailbox you might have noticed the appearance a week or so ago of the new "Notifications" folder. As I mentioned in a previous post, the Notifications folder is where all ACC messages will be delivered, along with a slew of other message types including group and school invites, photo tags, and comments, so getting that folder out was a key first step.

I'm pleased to let you guys know that we're now taking the next step: App Invites are on across the board! Here's the documentation page that has all the info you'll need to hook up invites for your app via requestShareApp.

We expect App Invites to be a really important feature for getting the word out about your apps. While we are still supporting messages, comments, and bulletins, App Invites give you a much more direct way to let your users invite their friends to get your app: the ux is cleaner, the user "workflow" simpler and faster, and Invites are easier to find and recognize. Additionally, App Invites get their own indicator item on the User Home Page!

So, the table is set. It's up to you guys to start making good use of Invites. As always, post your questions/feedback/issues on the forums and stay current on twitter.

And don't forget to send me an Invite!

/Kyle

More Information on requestShareApp / App Invites

Donny Mack (DM) — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 16:59:00 GMT

More Information on requestShareApp

This is a follow-up on Kyle’s post “quick update on ACC” with some implementation details.

http://developer.myspace.com/community/blogs/devteam/archive/2008/06/30/quick-update-on-acc.aspx

* As Kyle mentioned this feature is not yet in production, but will be soon. We wanted to get out the implementation details now so when we're ready to turn it on, you will be too.

Invoking requestShareApp

First let’s take a look at the signature:

opensocial.requestShareApp(recipients, reason, opt_callback);

· recipients: this is a person’s friend ID. We currently only support sending in one ID at a time

· reason: this is the message you want sent. I’ll go over the rules for this below

· opt_callback: a callback function

Reason

The reason is an opensocial.Message object that has the text you’d like to have displayed in the invite set as the opensocial.Message.Field.BODY (which you can also pass into the constructor).

There are a few rules for the text:

· The text is limited to 150 characters – the character count does not include your application name or the sender and/or recipient display name. More on this below

· You can not include any HTML markup. Adding your links to your application, recipient and sender will be done by us.

· We have supplied three place holders you can use to add your application name, sender name and recipient name within links:

o [sender] – this will be transformed to a hyperlink with the senders display name as the text. The link will go to their profile.

o [app] – this will be transformed to a hyperlink with your application name as the text. The link will go to the applications profile.

o [recipient] – this will be transformed to a hyperlink with the recipients display name as the text. The link will go to their profile.

· You do not have to use all the placeholders. Example below.

Example Code

The code is pretty simple.

message = opensocial.newMessage("[sender] would like you to intall this really super application [app].");

opensocial.requestShareApp(recipientUserId, message, function(){
    alert('sent application invite');
    }
   );

recipientUserId to be the userId of the recipent.

The stubs for requestShareApp are already in production so you can wire up your applications now. Since the call will fail you’ll want to hide the functionality until we turn things on.

There are two ways to check if SHARE_APP is enabled. One is to make the call to requestShareApp() and if it’s not enabled you’ll get an unsupported back. The second is to use getSupportedPostToTargets() to get a list of supported PostTo targets – this is not part of the OS spec, but because requestShareApp currently uses PostTo it’ll work.

quick update on ACC

Kyle — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 14:59:00 GMT

I mentioned in a previous post that we're working on a new App Communications Channel ("ACC"). As you probably guessed, we're not quite going to get it out in June as we were shooting for, but the good news is that we're very close, so I want to give you guys a quick preview.

A lot of your apps are already making good use of the communications tools we've made available so far: our "Post To" functionality enabling apps to initiate user messages, comments, bulletins and blog posts. The goal for ACC is to provide new types of messages that are unique to applications and that have app-specific functionality. The first of these new message types are App Invites. Here's how this new invite will look to a recipient:

Quite a few things to point out here. First, App Invites will appear in a new Mail Center folder called "Notifications". This new folder will also contain other important messages including Comment requests, and there will be specific indicators for all these messages in the Updates box on Users' Home Pages. Second, the App Invite will include your app picture and allows you to specify the custom text that recipients will see. We think this leads to a much clearer presentation than invites contained in standard messages. Finally, these new invites allow recipients to add your apps right from the invite itself rather than having to go to the app profile or canvas. Here's what recipients will see when they click "Add..."

This dialogue will appear as a "lightbox" overlay right from the Notifcations inbox, so we hope it makes adding your apps much easier for MySpace users.

So how will these new Invites get generated? As with Post To messages, your apps can initiate App Invites from the Canvas page, but using the OpenSocial requestShareApp method. We'll provide more details in next few days on the exact syntax to use so you can start preparing your code. Here's a view of what the sending user will see after initiating an invitation:

I want to emphasize that the same guidelines we've put in place for existing messages apply just as strongly to App Invites: no incentivizing invitations, no tricking users, no auto inviting, etc. The goal for App Invites and ACC generally is to make app communications clearer and easier for end-users. If that goal is achieved, your apps will spread naturally and effectively. On the other, if users perceive these new messages as "spam" we all lose. To prevent that, we are also limiting App Invites to one recipient at a time initially. Utlimately, though, it's really up to you guys to show that we can utilize these tools responsibly and in ways that bolster the ecosystem.

Finally, now that I've whetted your appetites, I'm sure you're wondering when this cool new stuff will be ready. Be assured your trusty MDP Team is working long hours to get this out, and we expect to have it live in the next couple of weeks. Also, as mentioned above, we'll be providing more implementation details and info in advance.

/Kyle