Praise the lord and pass the Android! Facebook’s once features-bereft mobile application for the #2 mobile operating system has just been updated, and it’s worlds better than the original.
When Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg downloaded the Facebook for Android app for his personal use last week, we speculated that a few changes might be in the works for what we dubbed the “redheaded stepchild” of Facebook’s (
) mobile offerings. We couldn’t have imagined such a quick turnaround, however; clearly, this update has been quite some time in development.
If the update isn’t showing up in your notifications bar, just search for “Facebook” in the Android Gallery and reinstall the official app.
The home screen now shows messages, notifications and friend requests separately. On the bottom of the home screen, you can see a swipe-to-scroll slideshow of your friends’ recent picture uploads.
Notifications, which comprised the greatest pain point for users we polled last week, now appear in a slide-up bar along the bottom of the screen, similar to the Android OS’s slide-down bar for notifications at the top of the screen. While the Notifications bar doesn’t seem to be working quite smoothly with the rest of the app yet (it keeps launching Facebook’s mobile touch site), we hope an upcoming software update will address this issue soon.
And we’re grateful and slightly ecstatic to report that you no longer have to navigate out of the app to Facebook’s mobile site to do any normal Facebook actions, such as approve a friend request, view a video, RSVP to an event or respond to a message. You’ll use your device’s browser when you click through to shared links, but getting to those links is much easier now. You click through to a screen showing your friend’s post with the link in question, then you tap on the link itself to be redirected. It’s a much better interface than the app’s previous iteration.
Also, “likes,” Facebook search and mobile photo uploads are now as easy as a single touchscreen-tap in most cases, and the overall navigation and interface have gained a few new touches that are subtle but elegant and welcome.
We still aren’t able to use Facebook Chat from our Android (
) phone (iPhone users have had this feature for some time).
These upgrades are the first significant attention Facebook has paid to its Android app since its launch last fall. All things considered, we’re very happy with the improvements. Facebook for Android has become a pleasure to use rather than the out-and-out hassle it was before.
We’re sure there are still improvements to be made — Facebook Chat is one feature that comes to mind immediately. And we’d like the home screen to rotate to a landscape orientation when the phone is rotated, too.
Download the app for yourself, and let us know in the comments what you love, what you hate, and what you think could use improvement.
Hat-Tip to Mashable.com
