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Friend Connect lets website owners utilise features such as logins, review boards and message walls without needing to program anything themselves.

Instead a user selects the widget they want from a library and posts a few lines of code into their site to access the feature.

The login feature is built on OpenID, meaning that users with Yahoo and AOL accounts can login into Friend Connect websites without needing to create a new profile.

Similarly, because the applications are built on the OpenSocial standard, Google is expecting a wealth of third-party applications to become available to Friend Connect sites as the service gains a following.

As with Facebook's recently launched Connect service, Google's offering allows users to publish their activities on the website back to whatever social networks they're also members of.