Customize Orkut Profile Using Drag-n-Drop Way

With gaining popularity of Orkut Apps, profile pages on Orkut are becoming heavy like Facebook profiles. Well this was bound to happen as orkut is blindly copying features from facebook. After status update & photo-tagging, orkut is now added facebook like drag-n-drop method to customize profiles.

As you can see below, first thing I did, was moving testimonial box above recent photos and videos.

Although I have just two testimonials on orkut (despite having more than 500 friends 🙁 ), I think many people will prefer testimonial above recent photos and videos.

Anyway this dynamic orkut profile will help you manage application boxes on profile more efficiently as explained by Adam Winer on Orkuts official Blog…

1. Reorganize your profile page with drag-and-drop: Simply click on any of the applications or showcases (photos, videos, and testimonials) on your profile page and drag them around until they are just as you’d like. The new layout of your profile page will automatically be saved, so your profile visitors will see everything just as you want it.
2. Put as many or as few applications on your profile as you want. Until now, you were able to display up to three applications on your profile, and some of you wanted to show more. Now, when you add an application, you can choose whether or not you want it on your profile. Just select or unselect the "Add to my profile" box above the big "Add Application" button. You can change this any time with the "tool" button in the upper-right corner of the application.

To hide a profile box…

1. Click on tool icon (top-right corner of box) on that box.
2. Application setting page will open. Uncheck “Add to my profile” option on right side and click on save button.

Something could be done better…

One thing can make orkut profiles more dynamic is smart use of plain CSS and Javascript. As of now orkut clicking on View Full Profile loads separate Full Profile pages. Technically Full Profile have  2 more optional tabs (professional & personal) and few extra rows on default social tab.Now all this info can be sent to browser when normal profile page is requested and kept hidden using CSS’s display:none property. When View Full Profile link is clicked, display property can be changed using simple javascript. This will not only improve user experience but will also reduce load on orkut server.

Related:  Use Orkut apps even if they are not available in your country

(via Official Orkut Blog)