Microsoft earlier this week revealed it was compelled to kill Facebook integration from its Windows Phone operating system. Microsoft has blamed Facebook’s new update to Graph API for shutting down Facebook Connect features.
In a detailed post explaining how the disintegration impacts users, Microsoft says: “Facebook has made an update to their Graph API that will impact Microsoft apps and services. Facebook’s Graph API is the tool that we use to connect your Microsoft account to Facebook. It brings contact information from your Facebook friends into Outlook.com and the Windows People app, keeps those contacts up-to-date, and provides options in apps and services like Photo Gallery, Movie Maker, and OneDrive.com to share to Facebook. We collectively refer to these features as Facebook Connect.”
One of the major features impacted is Outlook.com, Windows , Windows Phone and Office 365 Calendar sync. Facebook events will no longer automatically sync to Calendar on Outlook.com, Windows, Windows Phone and Office 365. Mircosoft suggests an alternative by subscribing to a link that Facebook provides from Outlook.com calendar. Windows 8 Photo Gallery and Movie Maker apps have also been impacted, which means you will be now unable to publish pictures or videos directly to Facebook. However, content previously published to Facebook via Photo Gallery will remain unaffected. You can check out full Microsoft report here.
Back in 2010, Facebook had announced launching Open Graph protocol and APIs, shutting down Facebook Connect. Microsoft was one of the 30 launch partners for the new Open Graph. Microsoft partnered with Facebook to build Docs.com, which came with Facebook integrated features such as auto login. So far, Facebook hasn't commented on the impact on Windows users due to its API change. Microsoft, on the other hand, doesn't seem to be making much of effort to fix the issue. However, the company is likely to provide a few workaround to compensate users. Microsoft is currently focussing on its new Windows 10 OS that is supposed to unify all versions Windows.