Up until now, the Facebook iPhone app had everything but push notifications. The launch of version 3.1, however, remedies that ill. The other 3.1 biggie is the ability to sync your Facebook friends with your phone’s address book contacts — photos and all.

When 3.0 came out this summer, there were some vocal complaints that the Facebook iPhone app didn’t do push notifications; it seems like basic functionality for any post-iPhone OS 3.0 application. With version 3.1, when you start the app up after updating, you’ll get a prompt asking if it’s okay to do notifications. Once you’ve said yes, it follows the standard iPhone notifications rules. You can customize what you’ll receive in settings.

Right after you allow or deny notifications at the beginning, you’ll be asked if you want to sync with your address book. It will sync personal data, and change your contacts’ listed homepages to their Facebook profile URLs if they didn’t list anything themselves. You can choose whether or not to sync profile pictures, but that’s the only customization option you have. Still, it’s a very welcome feature.

You’ll probably want to customize your push notification settings right away, because we quickly discovered that all notifications options are on by default: messages, wall posts, friend requests, friend confirmations, photo tags, events and comments. It can get a little spammy, and if you already have e-mail notifications set up (and push e-mail on your phone) you’ll end up getting double notifications for some things. It’s a small hassle, but easily sorted out.

Samuel Axon