The highly anticipated (well, for Facebook users, anyway) update to the Facebook iPhone app was released yesterday, and it’s a pretty major change. It looks like a whole different application, and the general design approach seems to be to make the whole Facebook experience more iPhone-esque. That means more icon-based interaction, more tabs, and more badges within the app. Facebook Three-Oh has also become more robust, mimicking desktop features like “notes” and “fan pages”. I was really glad to see the update, as I was getting a little sick of the older Facebook UI, but I’m not sure I really like this new one either.

The main screen of the Facebook app is the home screen. It looks just like an iPhone home screen with the movable icons and the page layout, and you can even place your favourite err, faces, right onto the page. However, just like the iPhone home screen, there are some strange inconsistencies – especially when it comes to which icons will show you what information. If somebody sends me a message or a friend request, the inbox or friend request icons will light up  instantly with a badge. However, if someone writes on my wall or comments on a photo, there isn’t anything to tell me about what’s happened. It’s just like how the stupid iPhone weather icon always reports a sunny 23 degrees, even when I’m freezing my rear off in the winter.

There is a Notifications panel at the bottom of the screen looks like it’s supposed to act like a scrolling news ticker, but it remained pretty static despite my sister posting to my wall three times in a row at my beckoning. The little bugger just wouldn’t update (the notification panel, not my sibling). Tapping on the panel takes you to a specialized screen that’s only seems to refresh every five minutes or so.  This would be alright if the app supported push notifications, but since that feature is still under development, a manual refresh button and a more visual notification panel are needed.

It’s a little strange that these notification problems exist at all, since the Facebook 2.0 app was great at alerting me, and it only had a tab bar with four buttons at the bottom of the screen. Facebook 3.0 features nine icons (each with their own screens and tabbed interfaces) and a dedicated notification button, and I’ve been having a lot more trouble keeping up with my busybody friends

Once you get past those niggles, there are quite a few areas of the app that have really cleaned up nicely: Messaging is a lot easier and more fun. Facebook Chat is now organized in alphabetical order (but doesn’t feature any badge!), birthdays show up as their own column in events (“the day after my birthday is not my birthday, mum”),  Notes and Pages have been added to the app, and I appreciate the ability to zoom in on pictures now. Landscape support for typing and viewing is also pretty awesome.

This quick look hasn’t begun to cover all of the changes and updates to the Facebook app, but social apps like Facebook probably take a bit longer (or just need someone with more friends…) to really review, so I chose to get this piece sooner rather than later. I think the app has improved significantly in terms of how you interact with it, but it’s a real shame that the badges and notifications are so strangely screwed up. Notifications seem to me to be a key part of the whole Facebook experience – and having to continually check on my profile icon or wait five minutes for the notifications panel to refresh does take some of the fun out of it.

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The Facebook app is free, and if you don’t already have it, click on the App Store link right here.

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