Revealing most of the new features

Dec 28, 2009 11:56 GMT  ·  By

Facebook is in the midst of yet another redesign and this time the signs are looking good and most people seem to be favorable to the changes. It doesn't mean that a lot of people will have a fit, yet again, when the design goes live, as is the case with all Facebook changes but, for the most part, the tweaks will likely be appreciated. Most of the changes are subtle in nature, but a few are significant in what they point out for the site's future, like the greater emphasis on search and the de-emphasis on Facebook apps.

This isn't the first time we've seen the upcoming redesign but the new screenshots, published by Gigaom, clarify a few of the remaining elements like the bottom toolbar which has now been trimmed down and hosts only the Facebook Chat.

Great attention has been paid to the top navigation bar which is now a lot cleaner and better laid out. The Facebook logo is at its usual location followed by buttons for Friends, Inbox and the new Notifications section designed for applications. Next there is the search box which is now significantly bigger and occupying a more central position, signaling that Facebook is focusing a lot more on search in the future.

It makes sense too, with a lot more content inside the site, thanks to the huge number of Facebook pages and the shift towards more public content, people will be doing a lot more searches on the site and the social network wants to make sure those searches are coming from Facebook itself and not some outside source.

On the right-hand side the settings and log-out buttons have been combined into a drop-down Account menu to save some space, a welcome move as those links aren't used as often as the others like Home, Profile and so on. The sidebars also get slimmed down, taking a lot of cues from the Facebook Lite version of the site introduced earlier this year. Some tweaks are bound to be made until the new design goes live for everyone, but it looks like the site is moving in the right direction.

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The upcoming Facebook redesign
The upcoming Facebook redesign
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