New Facebook app for BlackBerry brings Facebook Chat

California, Mar 18: The world's favourite social networking website, Facebook has rolled out a new app for BlackBerry devices. The new Beta 2.0 version provides Facebook Chat feature on BlackBerry devices running on OS 6.0.

The new Facebook for Blackberry app has a revamped User Interface, which is specially designed to match with the brand new BlackBerry OS 6.0 UI and the upcoming OS 7. Facebook has been trying to widen its popularity with the growing demand for BlackBerry devices.

"The Facebook app team here at Research In Motion (RIM) has been working hard to incorporate the feedback we have received from our users to make v2.0 the biggest update to the Facebook application since we released v1.0 more than three years ago. This initial release of v2.0 has a redesigned user interface and also offers Facebook Chat," described in BlackBerry blog.

New Features on Facebook for BlackBerry App:

* Facebook Chat - You can now check to see which of your Facebook friends are online and start a Chat conversation from within the Facebook application or within the unified mailbox on your BlackBerry smartphone.

* Improved News Feed - Improved News Feed interactions enable you to scroll through your News Feed without accidentally clicking 'Like"; you can simply click the 'More" button (+) to interact with your friends" posts. Enhanced publisher functionality allows you post photos to your Wall, add an update, or check in to a Facebook Place from the News Feed.

* New Navigation Control - By introducing a whole new way to navigate the Facebook for BlackBerry smartphones application, we"ve moved from a static navigation bar to a drop-down navigation control that is scalable to support new features in the future.

* Notifications Bar - Borrowing from the BlackBerry 6 OS" “Today View", the notifications bar offers an easy way to access your Facebook Notifications, Messages, Friend Requests and Chats from anywhere in the Facebook application.

* External Notifications - You don"t have to leave the Facebook for BlackBerry smartphones app to see what"s new on your device. The BlackBerry smartphone external notifications header lets you see when you"ve received a new email message or BlackBerry Messenger (BBM™) message without having to leave the Facebook application.

* New Profile UI and Profile Information Viewing - The New Profile UI now provides Wall, Info, and Photo tabs for an even better browsing experience. New to v2.0 is the ability to view key information on Profiles and Pages, such as contact info, basic info like birthdays, hometown and relationship status, and likes and interests.

The BlackBerry users can download the Facebook Beta v2.0 by log in to the BlackBerry Beta Zone. Currently this new app is compatible with BlackBerry OS 6.0 only, but soon we can expect support for OS 4.6 and an upgrade to OS 7.0.

OneIndia News