6 ms·

Nokia: "We will not adopt Windows Phone environment as it is seen today"

61 points by vilpponen 15y ago

vilpponen 15y ago
These are interesting comments from Nokia in the light of their partnership with Microsoft. Most likely this would mean Nokia will change the UI of the Windows Phone environment to their taste. Secondly: According to Nokia, Microsoft will be adopting Ovi Maps to all their services in the future.
shareme 15y ago
SO in other words Nokia gets to screw up another mobile interface, SWEET!
- rbanffy 15y ago
  If nobody uses it, will it really be screwed?
cdesmar 15y ago
Umm.. Live tiles are a huge part of windows phone dev environment. Not sure you could change much on the home screen. Maybe rounded corners? But why bother?
iaskwhy 15y ago
This should be clarified as I would like to invest on the WP7 platform due to Nokia being pushing it on their upcoming mobile phones. I was expecting them to have some success if they didn't change anything at all on WP7 but this makes me think otherwise...
S_A_P 15y ago
My take on this- how much can they really modify here and make sure they don't break compatibility with the 3rd party apps? If things were not so dire that they needed to dump a platform they have years invested in, is it really smart(arrogant?) to think that the OS that has actually shipped and seems to be pretty good is not good enough for them?
- vilpponen 15y ago
  My take on this is that they want to differentiate it enough to make it more "Nokia-like". However, what this means concretely - is still unknown. Also, my guess is that they will announce something on this the coming summer, well before Nokia world in September. (edited for repetition of words)
- silvestrov 15y ago
  In reality, it seems like they are going in the opposite direction: Microsoft has actually partnered with Nokia to include Nokia Maps in all their service platforms
- brudgers 15y ago
  Since Windows Phone is based on .NET, a lot of changes can be made by Nokia without breaking compatibility with third party applications, e.g. .NET allows multiple versions of a library to exist simultaneously for different applications because it was architected with backwards and forwards compatibility in mind.
  - cube13 15y ago
    .NET isn't what allows that to happen, though, since, AFAIK, MS has not committed to binary compatibility between .NET versions. While the framework makes it easier to leverage these features(you can still use it with non-managed C++ but it's quite annoying to get working), the Windows kernel is what allows the multiple versions to exist. In the case of .NET, it's the side-by-side deployment of the .NET runtimes that allow multiple versions to be present on the system at the same time.
    - daeken 15y ago
      > the Windows kernel is what allows the multiple versions to exist. I don't think you know what the Windows kernel does. Multiple library versions have nothing to do with the kernel because 1) the kernel doesn't know anything about libraries, 2) the kernel doesn't do userspace binary loading (even for completely unmanaged code), and 3) the kernel does nothing at all with .NET. Side-by-side deployment of binaries is actually completely separate from the functionality in .NET that allows multiple versions, which is the GAC (Global Assembly Cache); SxS binaries (which are used by unmanaged code) are completely separate, although they both reference their respective binaries via manifest files.
sankara 15y ago
My first phone was a Nokia. My subsequent phones were Nokia too. All these phones predate the iPhone era. Nokia's phone were rock solid. One even survived a fall from the first floor with minor scratches. But their interface was one of the clumsiest; inconsistent, not very user friendly and sometimes not very usable. The only two things I remember doing is messaging and phone calls. I haven't got my hands on a WP7 yet. But judging by my ZuneHD I'm sure the interface must be very good. So far I was hoping that the deal would bring a solid phone with a pretty interface to the market. But now it's obvious, it's going to be another superb phone spoiled by the OS and the interface.
michaelcampbell 15y ago
> In the video Öistämö goes over once more why Nokia decided to partner with Microsoft ... A couple $billion reasons come to mind right off the top of my head.
matheusalmeida 15y ago
WP7 UI/UX looks very good. I don't think UI is the strongest strength in Nokia phones so I don't know how they can improve on that... Probably better integration with OVI apps/maps ? Or they can make it worse to be more Nokia-like?
Kilimanjaro 15y ago
Nokia, an agonizing downward spiral into irrelevance.
- conover 15y ago
  I wouldn't consider 30%+ percent of the global mobile phone market irrelevant. There market share is, in fact, up in the 4th quarter of 2010 according to Wikipedia.
teyc 15y ago
At the moment, I believe it is only the Android phones which sport GPS. (Although Nokia feature phones already have Ovimaps). Bringing maps to the table means WP7 will be on par with Android on such a basic feature. Does this mean MS has basically bought themselves a mapping company for a couple billion dollars? On top of it, they've secured a solid brand with a good distribution channel and pre-existing relationship with carriers. It sounds like a good deal for MS to me. As for who is going to be dictating who, I believe Nokia is mistaken. MS will drive the relationship because MS owns the platform, not Nokia. This is something even HP and Samsung realizes. I'm surprised Nokia has palmed off Symbian to Accenture so quickly. Perhaps this is to shake out the management tree a little bit.
- kiiski 15y ago
  I'm pretty sure that all phone makers have had good GPS for years. And MS has bing already. http://www.bing.com/maps/ http://www.bing.com/maps/
- brudgers 15y ago
  My Nokia has GPS. It is several years old.
- cooldeal 15y ago
  >At the moment, I believe it is only the Android phones which sport GPS. Huh, almost every smartphone from the last 4 years sport GPS. What the agreement means is that Bing maps will be able to use Ovi maps in places where it's currently lacking, i.e Europe and Asia.
  - WrkInProgress 15y ago
    I think what 'teyc' meant was that Android is the only platform that offers free turn by turn navigation among the major platforms. Nokia has provided this recently with their version of Ovi Maps as well (not sure if it's free on all S60 devices). So it is possible that the Ovi Maps & Bing Maps integration may include bringing the free turn by turn navigation to Windows Phone 7.
cooldeal 15y ago
Well, I don't mind much as long there's no fragmentation of the developer experience. But given Nokia's previous forays into UI development, I think it's best that they leave it to MS.
- rbanffy 15y ago
  > I think it's best that they leave it to MS. If they do it, they'll be a commodity phone maker and will have to compete in price with other WP7 phone makers. All three of them.
  - cooldeal 15y ago
    > All three of them. Three? There's atleast 4 in the US, HTC, Samsung, LG and Dell.
    - rbanffy 15y ago
      Fair enough. All four of them.
      - WrkInProgress 15y ago
        How many do they need ? They have the two largest smartphone manufacturers outside of Apple and RIM, in HTC and Samsung. Among the large manufacturers, all they are missing is Sony Ericsson and Motorola. And I believe only Motorola has hinted that they are Android only. And Nokia is still larger (not for long) than #2 and #3 in terms of worldwide sales.
        rbanffy 15y ago
        Actually, they could line up a couple dozen WP7 phone manufacturers and still fail. What they need is not manufacturers, but people buying and using the phones. This is not happening.
        15y ago
keso 15y ago
I don't understand the negative and suspicious comments. How is this different from HTC Sense and Samsung TouchWiz in Android phones?
- glhaynes 15y ago
  People have positive feelings toward W7P even if only because it is novel UI-wise. People don't have positive feelings toward Nokia's UI work... let's just say that.
  - keso 15y ago
    Oh yes I agree, the UIs are horrible. I think Nokia wants and needs to make current Nokia users happy with the new phones by implementing "Nokiaisms" (even though the underlying OS will change).
- iaskwhy 15y ago
  As I was one of the suspicious comments, to me it sounds like they are going to ruin something which I believe is very very good. Can't say anything about Sense or TouchWiz though, never tried any of them.
- cooldeal 15y ago
  Sense and Touchwiz fragment the UI and generally lag more compared to stock Android UI. On top of that, it takes them ages to port the UI skins to the latest Android version which delays the upgrades by several months
  - yason 15y ago
    It's not the UI which is fairly high-level code. See the Android source code for the default Launcher application. What takes time is porting a new Android distribution and kernel to that custom hardware of yours, test all of your hardware-facing kernel code again completely, and make sure your kernel ABI can still talk sensibly with your userspace counterparts since things and APIs might have changed since the last Android version.
- deleted 15y ago
yalogin 15y ago
What Nokia needs right now is to get phones out into the market now. The more they delay the more they lose mind share. They are not letting go of the "we know how to write an OS" mentality. Sure they can do it but they went with Microsoft because they don't want to. They should just slap the OS on to their phones and start pushing them out. Also the current Windows UI is pretty damn good (from what I heard) so not sure what they want to do more.
poundy 15y ago
What many people probably don't know is that Nokia started as a company manufacturing paper in 1868, it moved into electricity generation, footwear, etc before creating the first phone in 1960s (100 years after it started). It is hard to find a company that survived this long in business. I wish they do well, but the MS path does not seem right.
- hvs 15y ago
  Now that's what I call, "pivoting"!
edw 15y ago
Seems like there are a lot of Nokia people doing a lot of rationalizing about whether Nokia's the top or bottom in their new relationship with Microsoft. Exhibit A: "In this question [Kai Öistämö of Nokia] revealed that Microsoft has actually partnered with Nokia to include Nokia Maps in all their service platforms." Sure it did. Regarding the UI customization, this is just delusional-slash-magical thinking that is par for the course with makers of commodity products under the thumb of their commodifier-master. They're always thinking that their "value add" is going to make them stand out when in fact it makes them like one more art student with dyed hair in the oh-so-individual clone army: interchangeably weird.
- prewett 15y ago
  "Interchangeably weird": that is a great description of extreme individualism!
crs 15y ago
"Secondly, another big client of the company, the operators, unanimously voted for a partnership with Microsoft as this will bring a third contender to the marketplace." That sentence stood out the most from that article. For Nokia to say they choose this partnership because the operators want another choice seems insane to me. Basically I am interpreting that to mean the operators want more platforms to help give them leverage when negotiating with phone manufactures. Which could potential hurt Nokia in the future too. Am I reading to much into this, or does Nokia's logic there strike anyone else as funny too?
- r00fus 15y ago
  No what this means is that the operators don't want to be stuck with Android vs. iOS; they would prefer a strong third option, which would be Nokia/MS. Back in 2006, operators used to have dozens of manufacturers of smartphones at their disposal each with relatively weak OS platforms (RIM/Blackberry being the top at the time). Then the iPhone came out and disrupted that market by offering the iOS platform. Then Android matured (using some iOS cues) and became the 2nd leading platform. Right now, the third platform (Blackberry) is getting weaker by the day, while WP7 is not gaining traction. So a combined Nokia/MS could provide a strong 3rd option for worldwide operators. None of this makes sense unless Nokia is the preferred manufacturer for Microsoft and not just another commoditized handset maker of Windows phones.
kogir 15y ago
Given that Nokia owns Navteq, my interpretation of "Microsoft has actually partnered with Nokia to include Nokia Maps in all their service platforms" is that Microsoft will use Navteq data everywhere. Microsoft's big sell to developers has been freedom from device targeting. I'd be very surprised if they allow Nokia to change any fundamental elements, including Live Tiles and Notifications.
yason 15y ago
This won't end well. If they can't communicate a clear focus that doesn't change or require expanding on the details further, they probably don't have one.

61 points by vilpponen 15y ago

These are interesting comments from Nokia in the light of their partnership with Microsoft. Most likely this would mean Nokia will change the UI of the Windows Phone environment to their taste. Secondly: According to Nokia, Microsoft will be adopting Ovi Maps to all their services in the future.

shareme 15y ago

SO in other words Nokia gets to screw up another mobile interface, SWEET!

rbanffy 15y ago
If nobody uses it, will it really be screwed?

cdesmar 15y ago

Umm.. Live tiles are a huge part of windows phone dev environment. Not sure you could change much on the home screen. Maybe rounded corners? But why bother?

iaskwhy 15y ago

This should be clarified as I would like to invest on the WP7 platform due to Nokia being pushing it on their upcoming mobile phones. I was expecting them to have some success if they didn't change anything at all on WP7 but this makes me think otherwise...

S_A_P 15y ago

My take on this- how much can they really modify here and make sure they don't break compatibility with the 3rd party apps? If things were not so dire that they needed to dump a platform they have years invested in, is it really smart(arrogant?) to think that the OS that has actually shipped and seems to be pretty good is not good enough for them?

vilpponen 15y ago
My take on this is that they want to differentiate it enough to make it more "Nokia-like". However, what this means concretely - is still unknown. Also, my guess is that they will announce something on this the coming summer, well before Nokia world in September. (edited for repetition of words)
silvestrov 15y ago
In reality, it seems like they are going in the opposite direction: Microsoft has actually partnered with Nokia to include Nokia Maps in all their service platforms
brudgers 15y ago
Since Windows Phone is based on .NET, a lot of changes can be made by Nokia without breaking compatibility with third party applications, e.g. .NET allows multiple versions of a library to exist simultaneously for different applications because it was architected with backwards and forwards compatibility in mind.
- cube13 15y ago
  .NET isn't what allows that to happen, though, since, AFAIK, MS has not committed to binary compatibility between .NET versions. While the framework makes it easier to leverage these features(you can still use it with non-managed C++ but it's quite annoying to get working), the Windows kernel is what allows the multiple versions to exist. In the case of .NET, it's the side-by-side deployment of the .NET runtimes that allow multiple versions to be present on the system at the same time.
  - daeken 15y ago
    > the Windows kernel is what allows the multiple versions to exist. I don't think you know what the Windows kernel does. Multiple library versions have nothing to do with the kernel because 1) the kernel doesn't know anything about libraries, 2) the kernel doesn't do userspace binary loading (even for completely unmanaged code), and 3) the kernel does nothing at all with .NET. Side-by-side deployment of binaries is actually completely separate from the functionality in .NET that allows multiple versions, which is the GAC (Global Assembly Cache); SxS binaries (which are used by unmanaged code) are completely separate, although they both reference their respective binaries via manifest files.

sankara 15y ago

My first phone was a Nokia. My subsequent phones were Nokia too. All these phones predate the iPhone era. Nokia's phone were rock solid. One even survived a fall from the first floor with minor scratches. But their interface was one of the clumsiest; inconsistent, not very user friendly and sometimes not very usable. The only two things I remember doing is messaging and phone calls. I haven't got my hands on a WP7 yet. But judging by my ZuneHD I'm sure the interface must be very good. So far I was hoping that the deal would bring a solid phone with a pretty interface to the market. But now it's obvious, it's going to be another superb phone spoiled by the OS and the interface.

michaelcampbell 15y ago

> In the video Öistämö goes over once more why Nokia decided to partner with Microsoft ... A couple $billion reasons come to mind right off the top of my head.

matheusalmeida 15y ago

WP7 UI/UX looks very good. I don't think UI is the strongest strength in Nokia phones so I don't know how they can improve on that... Probably better integration with OVI apps/maps ? Or they can make it worse to be more Nokia-like?

Kilimanjaro 15y ago

Nokia, an agonizing downward spiral into irrelevance.

conover 15y ago
I wouldn't consider 30%+ percent of the global mobile phone market irrelevant. There market share is, in fact, up in the 4th quarter of 2010 according to Wikipedia.

teyc 15y ago

At the moment, I believe it is only the Android phones which sport GPS. (Although Nokia feature phones already have Ovimaps). Bringing maps to the table means WP7 will be on par with Android on such a basic feature. Does this mean MS has basically bought themselves a mapping company for a couple billion dollars? On top of it, they've secured a solid brand with a good distribution channel and pre-existing relationship with carriers. It sounds like a good deal for MS to me. As for who is going to be dictating who, I believe Nokia is mistaken. MS will drive the relationship because MS owns the platform, not Nokia. This is something even HP and Samsung realizes. I'm surprised Nokia has palmed off Symbian to Accenture so quickly. Perhaps this is to shake out the management tree a little bit.

kiiski 15y ago
I'm pretty sure that all phone makers have had good GPS for years. And MS has bing already. http://www.bing.com/maps/ http://www.bing.com/maps/
brudgers 15y ago
My Nokia has GPS. It is several years old.
cooldeal 15y ago
>At the moment, I believe it is only the Android phones which sport GPS. Huh, almost every smartphone from the last 4 years sport GPS. What the agreement means is that Bing maps will be able to use Ovi maps in places where it's currently lacking, i.e Europe and Asia.
- WrkInProgress 15y ago
  I think what 'teyc' meant was that Android is the only platform that offers free turn by turn navigation among the major platforms. Nokia has provided this recently with their version of Ovi Maps as well (not sure if it's free on all S60 devices). So it is possible that the Ovi Maps & Bing Maps integration may include bringing the free turn by turn navigation to Windows Phone 7.

cooldeal 15y ago

Well, I don't mind much as long there's no fragmentation of the developer experience. But given Nokia's previous forays into UI development, I think it's best that they leave it to MS.

rbanffy 15y ago
> I think it's best that they leave it to MS. If they do it, they'll be a commodity phone maker and will have to compete in price with other WP7 phone makers. All three of them.
- cooldeal 15y ago
  > All three of them. Three? There's atleast 4 in the US, HTC, Samsung, LG and Dell.
  - rbanffy 15y ago
    Fair enough. All four of them.
    - WrkInProgress 15y ago
      How many do they need ? They have the two largest smartphone manufacturers outside of Apple and RIM, in HTC and Samsung. Among the large manufacturers, all they are missing is Sony Ericsson and Motorola. And I believe only Motorola has hinted that they are Android only. And Nokia is still larger (not for long) than #2 and #3 in terms of worldwide sales.
      - rbanffy 15y ago
        Actually, they could line up a couple dozen WP7 phone manufacturers and still fail. What they need is not manufacturers, but people buying and using the phones. This is not happening.
        15y ago

keso 15y ago

I don't understand the negative and suspicious comments. How is this different from HTC Sense and Samsung TouchWiz in Android phones?

glhaynes 15y ago
People have positive feelings toward W7P even if only because it is novel UI-wise. People don't have positive feelings toward Nokia's UI work... let's just say that.
- keso 15y ago
  Oh yes I agree, the UIs are horrible. I think Nokia wants and needs to make current Nokia users happy with the new phones by implementing "Nokiaisms" (even though the underlying OS will change).
iaskwhy 15y ago
As I was one of the suspicious comments, to me it sounds like they are going to ruin something which I believe is very very good. Can't say anything about Sense or TouchWiz though, never tried any of them.
cooldeal 15y ago
Sense and Touchwiz fragment the UI and generally lag more compared to stock Android UI. On top of that, it takes them ages to port the UI skins to the latest Android version which delays the upgrades by several months
- yason 15y ago
  It's not the UI which is fairly high-level code. See the Android source code for the default Launcher application. What takes time is porting a new Android distribution and kernel to that custom hardware of yours, test all of your hardware-facing kernel code again completely, and make sure your kernel ABI can still talk sensibly with your userspace counterparts since things and APIs might have changed since the last Android version.
deleted 15y ago

yalogin 15y ago

What Nokia needs right now is to get phones out into the market now. The more they delay the more they lose mind share. They are not letting go of the "we know how to write an OS" mentality. Sure they can do it but they went with Microsoft because they don't want to. They should just slap the OS on to their phones and start pushing them out. Also the current Windows UI is pretty damn good (from what I heard) so not sure what they want to do more.

poundy 15y ago

What many people probably don't know is that Nokia started as a company manufacturing paper in 1868, it moved into electricity generation, footwear, etc before creating the first phone in 1960s (100 years after it started). It is hard to find a company that survived this long in business. I wish they do well, but the MS path does not seem right.

hvs 15y ago
Now that's what I call, "pivoting"!

edw 15y ago

Seems like there are a lot of Nokia people doing a lot of rationalizing about whether Nokia's the top or bottom in their new relationship with Microsoft. Exhibit A: "In this question [Kai Öistämö of Nokia] revealed that Microsoft has actually partnered with Nokia to include Nokia Maps in all their service platforms." Sure it did. Regarding the UI customization, this is just delusional-slash-magical thinking that is par for the course with makers of commodity products under the thumb of their commodifier-master. They're always thinking that their "value add" is going to make them stand out when in fact it makes them like one more art student with dyed hair in the oh-so-individual clone army: interchangeably weird.

prewett 15y ago
"Interchangeably weird": that is a great description of extreme individualism!

crs 15y ago

"Secondly, another big client of the company, the operators, unanimously voted for a partnership with Microsoft as this will bring a third contender to the marketplace." That sentence stood out the most from that article. For Nokia to say they choose this partnership because the operators want another choice seems insane to me. Basically I am interpreting that to mean the operators want more platforms to help give them leverage when negotiating with phone manufactures. Which could potential hurt Nokia in the future too. Am I reading to much into this, or does Nokia's logic there strike anyone else as funny too?

r00fus 15y ago
No what this means is that the operators don't want to be stuck with Android vs. iOS; they would prefer a strong third option, which would be Nokia/MS. Back in 2006, operators used to have dozens of manufacturers of smartphones at their disposal each with relatively weak OS platforms (RIM/Blackberry being the top at the time). Then the iPhone came out and disrupted that market by offering the iOS platform. Then Android matured (using some iOS cues) and became the 2nd leading platform. Right now, the third platform (Blackberry) is getting weaker by the day, while WP7 is not gaining traction. So a combined Nokia/MS could provide a strong 3rd option for worldwide operators. None of this makes sense unless Nokia is the preferred manufacturer for Microsoft and not just another commoditized handset maker of Windows phones.

kogir 15y ago

Given that Nokia owns Navteq, my interpretation of "Microsoft has actually partnered with Nokia to include Nokia Maps in all their service platforms" is that Microsoft will use Navteq data everywhere. Microsoft's big sell to developers has been freedom from device targeting. I'd be very surprised if they allow Nokia to change any fundamental elements, including Live Tiles and Notifications.

yason 15y ago

This won't end well. If they can't communicate a clear focus that doesn't change or require expanding on the details further, they probably don't have one.