1. GETTING STARTED
PAT KINSEL and ANDRZEJ TURSKI
Getting started with Docs for Facebook is easy. The best way to start is by heading over to docs.com. If you don‟t already
have an active Facebook session, login using Facebook Connect. If you already have an active session going, you are
already set to begin. In either case, the first time you log in, you will be asked to give the application the right to access
your basic Facebook data, so that it knows who you and your friends are.
From the front page of docs.com, you can browse and view any of the „Suggested Docs‟. By clicking on the „Friend‟s Docs‟
tab, you can quickly see, read and comment on any docs your friends have shared. To create your own doc, just upload or
create a doc by clicking the „Add a Doc‟ tab and choosing upload or create a Word, Excel or PowerPoint doc.
Once you‟ve chosen to create say a new Word doc, you can edit it just like you would when using the desktop version of
Word. Don‟t forget to give your doc a title—which you do at the top-right of the page. A good hint here is to choose a
title you can live with for a while. Because of the way feeds work in Facebook, once your doc is shared it locks that title to
the feed. You can change the title later in your doc, but you won‟t be able to change it in the feed, so choose wisely.
Just like docs on your desktop, you‟ll want to save your docs when you are done editing them. To save your work and
close the edit session, click the „Finish editing‟ button above the document. When you open the document again, you‟ll be
in „view mode‟, which is the same mode that your fiends will have if you only give them “viewer” permission. Speaking of
friends, this point in the document lifecycle would a good time to add some. Your controls for this are in the right side of
the window under the “SHARING” headline. There you can click to “edit” viewers and pick the friends you‟d like to view
the document. You can share it with as few as one person or as widely as all Facebook users—or many options in-
between. When you‟re done adding viewers, check the “send a message to people” box to send a message to the friends
you selected, and then click OK. You can add editors in just the same way. Remember to click the “send a message to
people” check box there as well, and finish by clicking OK.
And that‟s it. You are now fully set-up and have shared your first doc. We hope you enjoy using Docs for Facebook, and
please let us know how we can make Docs an amazing social productivity tool for creating and sharing your ideas.
