Google just released a new addition to their API that allows you to really easily generate an image of a graph or chart.

This is probably one of the simplest web services I have ever used because there is no need to deal with establishing a session, or even signing up.

You simply encode your parameters into a specially crafted URL and Google returns a PNG image of your graph that you can embed directly into your <img> tag.

Here is an example:

I often have to work with company logos and don't always have access to the source vector files to make the changes I want. Instead of rebuilding these logos from scratch there are a couple tools available to automate the process.

If you have been following the news regarding the release of Google’s OpenSocial API you might be interested in knowing that although Facebook is not currently a partner, it is still possible to run OpenSocial gadgets from inside Facebook.

Dan Lester has started a project called OpenSocket that integrates the two APIs. At this time it is very early in development, but it's interesting to see how you can link the two APIs together.

Check out Dan's post at AllFacebook.com for more information.

The Facebook platform status feed says that Facebook is now requiring that all users have a minimum version of Flash. According to the developer wiki, "Facebook requires Flash version 9.0.0 for all <fb:swf> tags."

While this change just went into effect last night, apparently most users already had the latest version. According to the message: "Over 90% of users already have the latest version of Flash."

It's now possible to extend your Facebook applications to accommodate mobile users. Facebook has released new additions to their API that allow you to specify FBML that will only be displayed on mobile devices and also allow for sending and receiving SMS messages.

Thankfully there are many restrictions on how an application can send you SMS messages in order to help avoid spam. You can read the details of the new functionality on the Facebook Developer Wiki.