DariVVmeste.ru - all for one

As we launched the service of joint gifts, in the course of finding loopholes in the API of Facebook and inventing elegant solutions for usability and design. Feedback is welcome.

Creativity and money saving

One of my friends once destroyed at least 10 bears, elephants and cats, which her friends and acquaintances gave her, who wanted to express their warm (and soft) feelings on the occasion of her birthday ... Not a single living being was injured - it was all soft toys and souvenirs, absolutely unnecessary for her and not creating any joy.
People often do not have enough time or just money for a really cool gift, and in the end they buy “otdarki” on the principle: “let it be some kind of nonsense for 1000 rubles, but, like, cute”.

We created DarimVmeste.ru so that instead of a teddy bear you can give a dream. A trip, a laptop, a car, anything ... The collective mind of several friends will quickly find exactly such an idea that will fall into the bull's eye, and a friendly crowdfunding will provide a monetary resource.
And at the same time, the participants will spend not 1000 rubles each, but 300 rubles each. Because many times 300 rubles each is the fifth iPhone, and once 1000 rubles is a knock-on to emit.

Once we made a common gift - we realized the dream of our friend. It turned out great, but how much was writing, accounting, monetary logistics and letters in different social networks, mail and messengers ... So the idea was born DarimVmeste.ru - online service collective gifts.
Before we started working on it, we went through the Russian and global Internet and found several projects with a relatively similar idea. However, none of them did not suit us - in some there was not enough functionality, in others convenience. We began to make the service that we want to use ourselves.
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Next - some of our discoveries in the field of design and service.

Facebook: private messages on behalf of the user

Earlier, for obvious reasons, it was necessary to integrate them into the service on the VKontakte and Facebook APIs to invite users to the gift page. The possibility of sending personal messages to friends on behalf of users was declared. Each network had its own specifics, but in general, having received permission for a certain class of actions, the issue could be solved. Now the situation has changed: if you want to achieve sending messages through the API, then it is hardly possible to do this easily. Confirmation - literally isolated examples of services that managed to implement this functionality, as well as errors that occur when trying to use the remaining methods in the documentation.

However, there is a “plan B”. Not everything is closed: on VKontakte you can publish a video by API on behalf of the user. This, of course, is not so hot, but still some kind of thread. Because if you try, you can add a comment to this video again, using the API. And this is something.

Facebook de facto also does not allow writing messages on behalf of the user. That is, permits, but for this your external site should be useful to Facebook, for example, financially. It is clear that the novice start-up can not offer anything that will interest the giant.

For our service, inviting friends via Facebook is as important as air. We got out like this: we will authorize the gift organizer through Facebook, pick up his friends' IDs and send regular emails to id@facebook.com (much has been written and said about the appearance of such a possibility on Habré).
But these messages fall into the “other messages” folder, that is, in fact, in spam.

The output is clear - at the mail server level, we enter in the “from” field not the address of our service, but the address of the sender. Everything starts to work. By the way, mass mailings can use this solution for a long time, sending with the help of such an algorithm anything over a billion user base.
The result is still not perfect: the information reaches the user in a filtered form, sometimes the system cuts off the most important thing - a link to the gift page. However, this is a solution, and it works. And if for Vkontakte we are only looking for ways to reach the user's friends in convenient ways (because the video instead of a personal message is still a curve), everything on Facebook has already been implemented.

Social network that does not social network

We consider it just a find, the following fact: DarimVmeste.ru is like a social network, but in fact it is not. Social network in form and design UI. Same wall, friends, likes. But at the same time, the site is not a “shell”, but an independent service. He is focused on the convenience of solving a specific problem. People come here from different social networks (Twitter is next, then all the rest) or not at all. They create their gifts and leave Darim along with the next reason to give someone something ... However, the familiar mechanics of likes (for rating gift ideas) and posts on the wall (for twisting live discussion-discussion threads) are immediately integrated into the practice - the user is comfortable and the whole interface is clear at a glance.

For this convenience and clarity, we had to cut off a lot of ideas arising in the course of development: we implemented only the most necessary functions in order not to overload the service and not delay the development. For example, therefore, the service does not transfer money (this places an order of magnitude higher security requirements). And with all this, the development took exactly one year.

Feedback

All this time we have been boiling in our own juice. Fasting on Habré is our first attempt to go beyond the company of friends and show service to unfamiliar, but adequate people. Therefore, we will be grateful for any kind of feedback - criticism, suggestions for usability, questions ... Even if you just express your attitude to DarimVmeste.ru, we will thank you.

UPD: In response to the first edition of this post, we received a lot of fair criticism of the fact that the service did not work under Opera. However, in addition to criticism, we received several specific suggestions and tips on how to overcome our problem. Thanks to the Habr community, all modern browsers now work in DarimVmeste.ru . Thank!

And the very last thing is a video about the service: