6 ms·

I never thought I would see the day when I agree with something that Steve Ballmer said. But he has a point. The problem is no developer has an incentive to wri

I never thought I would see the day when I agree with something that Steve Ballmer said. But he has a point. The problem is no developer has an incentive to write a universal application that runs on all aforementioned platforms. Developers will always write apps for platforms where it makes sense. Windows has a large share of the desktop market so it is a no brainer. But why would a developer care about their app working on a phone platform with limited market share? I think Windows Phone is brilliant. Well-made devices and a great operating system, but the lack of apps makes it very unattractive to the general masses. Support for Android apps without needing to be redeveloped is a no-brainer in my opinion. No developer will see the value in converting an Android app over to Windows. It has to support Android apps out-of-the-box without the developer needing to do anything or no tool, no matter how great or smart it is will make developers change their tune, even if it is easy to do so. At present there is no motivation for developers to develop for Windows Phone and no incentive for customers who adopt the platform. This is very much a chicken and egg problem, one I don't think they will ever solve for as long as they don't support Android apps.

clumsysmurf 11y ago
> Support for Android apps without needing to be redeveloped is a no-brainer in my opinion. Have you looked at the Android Play Store lately? Its Facebook, Netflix, Twitter, the McDonalds app (#16 !?!?!) a few other social things, games ... and the rest is total crap. Why take this ocean of garbage onto a new platform (and at the same time, alienate existing developers who now must compete with Android apps)? If app popularity obeys power laws (0.005% of all apps make 60% of all app store revenue)[1], seems a better strategy is just to make sure you have the few essential apps necessary, and then provide great tools and encourage developers to write the rest. > At present there is no motivation for developers to develop for Windows Phone I've been developing for Android quite some time, and the economics of the platform are not appealing. There have been several articles saying the cost of Android app dev is between 20-30% (minimum) more expensive than iOS[2]. As Windows 10 adoption moves along, it will be more enticing to write a univeral app for that platform and mobile. [1] http://arc.applause.com/2015/11/11/app-discovery-strategy-and-monetization/ http://arc.applause.com/2015/11/11/app-discovery-strategy-an... [2] https://adtmag.com/articles/2015/11/02/android-ios-costs.aspx https://adtmag.com/articles/2015/11/02/android-ios-costs.asp...
- lemevi 11y ago
  > and the rest is total crap. Do you actually have an Android phone? Because this is totally not true at all. Like for example I just installed the imgur app and it's fantastic. I have 1password and it's great. Hearthstone? Yup, amazing. Just like every app I have I'm happy with. I just don't think you have any idea what you're talking about. I know an Android engineer who works for Square and they've got a huge Android team that is doing amazing work.
  - clumsysmurf 11y ago
    > a huge Android team that is doing amazing work. Exactly. It takes a huge Android team to do the simplest things. Twitter app has dozens of engineers. It doesn't do much!
    - static_noise 11y ago
      Compared to their WP team?
- GFischer 11y ago
  But you want any obscure or local app, and, guess what... it's Android and iOS only. Local food delivery? Only Android or iOS. Local bus routes? Android or iOS. And so on. And lemevi has a point, there are some cool games amidst that sea of crap which are simply not available on WP. I've said before that WP has been doing a great work in their low-end phones (though they've gotten stale lately), but they're still losing the battle.
lawnchair_larry 11y ago
I think you misunderstood. The universal app runs on both windows desktop and windows phone. So they would only need to be incentivized to want their app on windows desktops, and then it's automatically on win phone for free. If that works, it makes more sense to me than emulating or porting android apps. Those ideas will never work, as MS probably found out with the canceled Astoria project. It's a great sounding strategy, but that kind of technology isn't practical for many reasons. Just look at all of the issues that wine has trying to go the opposite direction on Linux.
- eropple 11y ago
  > So they would only need to be incentivized to want their app on windows desktops, and then it's automatically on win phone for free. On Windows desktops in Metro, though. That's a little bit different of a value proposition when WPF and other toolkits do still exist outside of it.
- pavlov 11y ago
  Astoria worked pretty well, though. The reason for its cancellation doesn't seem to be technical.
- cma 11y ago
  Wine is going from windows to linux with only blackbox/binary access to Windows. Astoria was heavily making use of the Android source, wasn't it?
- sandstrom 11y ago
  This is true ("universal apps runs on both windows desktop and windows phone"). But the problem is, for most mobile apps it doesn't make any sense to 'run on a desktop'. So MS huge desktop marketshare doesn't cancel out their tiny mobile marketshare.
- tonyedgecombe 11y ago
  I can see why you might want to share some libraries between a phone and desktop app but running the same app on both platforms makes no sense at all to me. Then you have the problem that universal apps have to be sold through the app store which has all the problems of the Mac app store except worse in every respect.
SixSigma 11y ago
If Windows phone ran Android apps, that will kill any incentive for Native. "Better Windows Than Windows" was one of the nails in OS/2's coffin, a lesson MS should be rather familiar with.
m1sta_ 11y ago
His recognition of this 'platform problem', and his failure of Microsoft to deliver a quality mobile browser to Window Phone, are irreconcilable.

clumsysmurf 11y ago

> Support for Android apps without needing to be redeveloped is a no-brainer in my opinion. Have you looked at the Android Play Store lately? Its Facebook, Netflix, Twitter, the McDonalds app (#16 !?!?!) a few other social things, games ... and the rest is total crap. Why take this ocean of garbage onto a new platform (and at the same time, alienate existing developers who now must compete with Android apps)? If app popularity obeys power laws (0.005% of all apps make 60% of all app store revenue)[1], seems a better strategy is just to make sure you have the few essential apps necessary, and then provide great tools and encourage developers to write the rest. > At present there is no motivation for developers to develop for Windows Phone I've been developing for Android quite some time, and the economics of the platform are not appealing. There have been several articles saying the cost of Android app dev is between 20-30% (minimum) more expensive than iOS[2]. As Windows 10 adoption moves along, it will be more enticing to write a univeral app for that platform and mobile. [1] http://arc.applause.com/2015/11/11/app-discovery-strategy-and-monetization/ http://arc.applause.com/2015/11/11/app-discovery-strategy-an... [2] https://adtmag.com/articles/2015/11/02/android-ios-costs.aspx https://adtmag.com/articles/2015/11/02/android-ios-costs.asp...

lemevi 11y ago
> and the rest is total crap. Do you actually have an Android phone? Because this is totally not true at all. Like for example I just installed the imgur app and it's fantastic. I have 1password and it's great. Hearthstone? Yup, amazing. Just like every app I have I'm happy with. I just don't think you have any idea what you're talking about. I know an Android engineer who works for Square and they've got a huge Android team that is doing amazing work.
- clumsysmurf 11y ago
  > a huge Android team that is doing amazing work. Exactly. It takes a huge Android team to do the simplest things. Twitter app has dozens of engineers. It doesn't do much!
  - static_noise 11y ago
    Compared to their WP team?
GFischer 11y ago
But you want any obscure or local app, and, guess what... it's Android and iOS only. Local food delivery? Only Android or iOS. Local bus routes? Android or iOS. And so on. And lemevi has a point, there are some cool games amidst that sea of crap which are simply not available on WP. I've said before that WP has been doing a great work in their low-end phones (though they've gotten stale lately), but they're still losing the battle.

lawnchair_larry 11y ago

I think you misunderstood. The universal app runs on both windows desktop and windows phone. So they would only need to be incentivized to want their app on windows desktops, and then it's automatically on win phone for free. If that works, it makes more sense to me than emulating or porting android apps. Those ideas will never work, as MS probably found out with the canceled Astoria project. It's a great sounding strategy, but that kind of technology isn't practical for many reasons. Just look at all of the issues that wine has trying to go the opposite direction on Linux.

eropple 11y ago
> So they would only need to be incentivized to want their app on windows desktops, and then it's automatically on win phone for free. On Windows desktops in Metro, though. That's a little bit different of a value proposition when WPF and other toolkits do still exist outside of it.
pavlov 11y ago
Astoria worked pretty well, though. The reason for its cancellation doesn't seem to be technical.
cma 11y ago
Wine is going from windows to linux with only blackbox/binary access to Windows. Astoria was heavily making use of the Android source, wasn't it?
sandstrom 11y ago
This is true ("universal apps runs on both windows desktop and windows phone"). But the problem is, for most mobile apps it doesn't make any sense to 'run on a desktop'. So MS huge desktop marketshare doesn't cancel out their tiny mobile marketshare.
tonyedgecombe 11y ago
I can see why you might want to share some libraries between a phone and desktop app but running the same app on both platforms makes no sense at all to me. Then you have the problem that universal apps have to be sold through the app store which has all the problems of the Mac app store except worse in every respect.

SixSigma 11y ago

If Windows phone ran Android apps, that will kill any incentive for Native. "Better Windows Than Windows" was one of the nails in OS/2's coffin, a lesson MS should be rather familiar with.

m1sta_ 11y ago

His recognition of this 'platform problem', and his failure of Microsoft to deliver a quality mobile browser to Window Phone, are irreconcilable.