jatiN mahindrA doT coM

Twitter to Get More Useful in Time for Monetization?

Twitter engineer Alex Payne tweeted over the weekend, "If you had some of the nifty site features that we Twitter employees have, you might not want to use a desktop client. (You will soon.)" Some took that to mean that Twitter was working on some new features for its own site, that would essentially render some popular third-party clients all but obsolete. The question is whether this is...

Old Version of AdWords API Nears Expiration Date

Update: Google is reminding users of the AdWords API that on April 22, most of the services related to v13 will be turned off. Google is telling users to switch to v200909 as soon as possible to avoid any complications. Original Article: Google has launched the newest version of the AdWords API v2009 beta. That would be version 200909. Google cites the following as the highlights of the...

Amazon Opens Kindle to Third-Party Apps

Amazon announced that it is inviting software developers to build and upload "active content" that will be available in the Kindle Store. In other words, look for something like an app store for the Kindle in the future. The company is releasing a new Kindle Development Kit, which gives developers access to APIs, tools, and documentation to build such active content. The kit starts limited...

Google Analytics API Gets New Features

Google has launched some new features for the Google Analytics API. These include support for advanced segments and 48 new metrics around goal performance, as well as goal configuration data. "With advanced segmentation, you can look beyond your aggregated data and peer into the nuances of traffic and visitor activity on your site," says Nick Mihailovski of the Google Analytics API Team....

Twitter to Spray Developers With the Coveted Firehose

Twitter announced that it will be opening up its data stream (otherwise known as the Firehose) in early 2010. This means the number of Twitter apps will skyrocket, and the potential for functionality in existing Twitter apps will be greatly increased. That means good things for developers, and most likely great things for Twitter. Twitter reportedly made this and several other announcements at the...

New APIs Should Help MySpace Stay Relevant

MySpace has announced a new set of APIs. These include APIs for real-time streaming, status and mood commenting, open search, photo uploading, and an updated version of the post to/share API. "MySpace sees huge value in real-time data and believes sharing it will mature the socialization of content on the Web," said MySpace COO Mike Jones. "MySpace is building the next-generation content...

Digg’s New API Allows Digging of Stories and Comments

Digg released a new version of the Digg API today, which lets developers write and contribute data via OAuth. This API supports the digging and burying of both stories and comments. "In addition to the revamped API, we focused extensively on usability and have included an updated API documentation section on Digg with more detail on each API method including code and response examples,"...

Bing Launches New Maps with Apps

Microsoft has announced the launch of a new Bing Maps beta, which incorporates Streetside and Photosynth imagery. "The new Bing Maps experience also features innovative new mapping applications such as Twitter Maps for real-time updates by area and Local Lens featuring hyperlocal, neighborhood content," a representative for Bing tells WebProNews. There are a number of interesting apps available,...

Interesting Chrome Extensions On the Way

Google has opened up the Chrome Extension Gallery (beta) to developers. This means that anyone can now upload their extensions. Google says it is making the upload flow available early so developers have time to publish their extensions ahead of Google’s full launch. "Once an extension is uploaded, our gallery takes care of packaging and signing," says Google software engineer Lei...

Now LinkedIn Will Be Featured in a Lot More Apps

LinkedIn has opened up its platform to developers. It can be accessed at developer.linkedin.com. "Over fifty million users entrust their professional identities and relationships with LinkedIn, helping build LinkedIn into the largest global professional network today," says LinkedIn’ Adam Nash. "However, professionals around the world use a wide variety of applications and Web...

Twitter Gives Apps Access to People Search

Twitter is making it easier for third-party apps to allow users to find other people to follow. On the Twitter API Announcements Google Group, the company announced that they are adding the functionality of Twitter’s "find people" feature to a new API. "For a while now Twitter.com has had a ‘Find People’ button that allows  users to search for other people to follow....

Facebook Blocks More Ad Networks

Back in July Facebook updated policies for third-party ads on Facebook Platform. The company disabled two entire ad networks and over 100 more apps were suspended or brought into compliance over ad-related violations. Half of those had over a million monthly active users. Facebook has now disabled two more offer and ad networks, which the company says have repeatedly violated its policies. This has...

PayPal to Take Over Mobile and Social Apps

PayPal has opened its global payments platform called PayPal X, providing new APIs, a new developer portal, and some introductory services pricing to help developers take advantage of PayPal X to build businesses. "The whole world is going digital, and the future of how we communicate, how we get information, and even how we transact, is in the hands of developers," said PayPal President...

Facebook App Developers Face New Obstacles

Facebook has released a developer "roadmap," which it says will simplify communication for users and developers, improve app discovery and engagement, and provide developers with more comprehensive tools for building or expanding their business with Facebook. "Through these new APIs and tools, we are giving all developers building with Facebook and those in our largest application category...

Adobe Teams With Salesforce on New Flash Builder

Adobe and Salesforce.com have partnered to launch the Adobe Flash Builder for force.com, which Adobe says increases developer productivity for creating rich Internet applications in the cloud. The product can be used to enhance existing Salesforce CRM implementations and custom-built Force.com apps, or build new apps altogether. "Flash Builder for Force.com is a jointly developed IDE that provides...