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This is so irritating: Project Astoria worked great on Windows Mobile at the time. It seemed solely as a strategic choice they didn't launch it. And now they're

This is so irritating: Project Astoria worked great on Windows Mobile at the time. It seemed solely as a strategic choice they didn't launch it. And now they're doing it again... even though they already killed their mobile platform? Why?

pjmlp 6y ago
Management and politics. I also was enjoying C++/CX, until their WinDev team decided to kill it, replace it with C++/WinRT, without comparable tooling, and now we are told to wait until ISO C++ manages to come up with the features that C++/CX already offered to tooling authors. And I am not the only one complaining, but since they have decided to reboot UWP into Project Reunion, having nicer tooling for C++/WinRT users seems to be at the very bottom of their priority list. At least Project Astoria has brought us WSL.
muststopmyths 6y ago
From what I heard, they killed Astoria because there was fear no one would write UWP if it became good enough. The new Microsoft has pretty much given up on real Windows development, so they're not afraid of Astoria in that sense any more.
- pjmlp 6y ago
  If that was the case they wouldn't be spending money on Project Reunion, React Native for Windows, Python on Windows (even hired Guido).
- Lammy 6y ago
  That’s how Blackberry 10 ended up for me. Very few native apps but lots of good FOSS Android ones that were just never perfect on the device. Overall poor experience that I wanted to love.
  - dleslie 6y ago
    I still have my BB Classic kicking around somewhere. It's neat to load up for interests' sake because the app store and BB services are mostly still operational, and all the apps on the store are _free_; albeit, those apps which are wrappers around proprietary services tend to be grossly out of date. As a phone, it's still a better daily driver than my Pinephone. The camera is fast and decent, the audio is top-notch, it never crashes, and so on.
- tasogare 6y ago
  Nobody was going to develop for UWP anyway since (1) the community with knowledge of XAML and the app model was telling to fuck off with Windows Phone being shutted down (I was part of that community), despite its success in Europe, (2) Microsoft never sold any good amount of tablets to make the cross-device story believable and finally (3) UWP didn’t worked on the most deployed OS of the time... Windows 7. It never made any business sense to develop for UWP for a small market share when developing traditional app meant targeting almost every Windows machine out there. I think Microsoft did the exact reverse of what they had done: they should have open a cross-platform (OS X + Windows) store delivering Silverlight out of browsers app. The Mac App store never had a lot of success, there was a golden opportunity for Microsoft to bank on a concurrent platform.
Nextgrid 6y ago
Remember that you're talking about a company that had the problem of a lack of apps/developer attention on their original mobile platform (Windows Phone 7) and decided that the solution was to reset the ecosystem in a backwards-incompatible way... twice. (first with WP8, then with W10). After that kind of stupidity, I'm not sure anything else would be much of a surprise. It saddens me to say this because Windows Phone could've actually been a great platform and alternative to iOS/Android had idiots not been in charge of it.
- mtgx 6y ago
  They couldn't resist not integrating the "full windows" into wp7/8. One platform to rule...nothing.
- weswpg 6y ago
  I liked WP8. What would you have done differently?
  - seniorivn 6y ago
    they are doing it now the way to get market share is to combine two paths - support apps from as many popular platforms as possible - provide developers a framework native to your platform that gives their apps support for other platforms with zero effort
  - actuator 6y ago
    OS was great. Apps ecosystem sucked though, they really needed to have Android apps compatibility mode till they gained enough market share. We would have three players then, instead of two players and maybe some great devices from players like Nokia. It annoys me so much that MS failed in this, just like they have failed in premium laptops. One player dominates the premium smartphones and laptops in some markets by a good margin.
    - matsemann 6y ago
      While official apps were nonexistant or severely lacking, a guy named Rudy or so made a lot of 6-branded apps that worked better than the originals on Android at the time. The snapchat, instagram etc clients he made were really good. While at the same time the snapchat app for Android constantly crashed and had really bad image quality (a screenshot of the camera seeker or so??). Of course, the apps were simpler then. Mostly images and a feed / chat, not all this AR and advanced filters. Not sure one could compete today without official backing. But I really do miss some of the apps I had on my Lumia 920. The rebuilding of apps and new thinking about UI made some stellar apps. The HERE maps were so much better than Google Maps still is (and GMaps only gets worse and slower each iteration), and the HERE public transport app (Transit?) had a UI layout and interaction I've never seen anyone else have, but which was really intuitive and nice to use. WP8 also had a reddit reader that's far above anything else I've tried since. While I never liked the look of the earlier iPhone UI widgets (blue gradient top row with back button etc) at least most of the apps worked consistently at the time. And that was even better with WP8, the way one could almost see the next screen and could swipe etc worked really well. Now however, apps are made with their own design and not made for the OS they run on. So they look the same on iOS and Android, and out of place on both. So I have one way of interacting with Instagram, and then a completely different way of interacting with Google's material apps.
qz2 6y ago
Quite frankly because Microsoft’s management has been a fucking shit show for the last decade. Watch this get abandoned in a couple of years. Basically their entire methodology is come up with something alpha quality, throw it on the market with lots of marketing fanfare, then shoot random products at will. Trust is earned. And I think they’re somewhere below zero at the moment.
- mrandish 6y ago
  True... but there are tangible signs that MSFT's latest CEO (Satya Nadella) is substantially more coherent on long-term strategy than the previous CEO Balmer. It's certainly still no guarantee they'll continue being smarter but it is some justification for not entirely writing them off and perhaps cautious optimism.
  - qz2 6y ago
    I don’t believe it. He’s different but customer concerns are responded to by doubling down rather than listening. That’s a big step backwards. We have QA disaster that is Windows 10 on our hands still., rammed with telemetry, advertising and bundled crap.
svrb 6y ago
The core thing to understand about Windows leadership over the past decade is that the mobile product went so well that when the project was clearly dying, all Windows leadership was fired so the mobile folks could take their place. No joke. With that information decisions like this become significantly less murky, though still ridiculous.
uponcoffee 6y ago
It did, but only for a small portion of applications. Others would run very poorly, if at all, depending on the degree in which the application hooked into google services//android api. The original project was more analogous to WINE for *nix systems, a compatibility layer; there where many edge cases that simply didn't work and supporting new versions of Android would require almost completely rewriting it (pre project treble). The VM route is simply more workable and sustainable. While WINE has achieved some great success, it's still a spectrum. Some software simply doesn't work, some mostly works, some works but performance is abysmal, and some work flawlessly - depending on how deeply they integrate with windows and what APIs they utilize.
john_moscow 6y ago
IIRC, the previous attempts to run Android apps on Windows were killed due to patent risks. Maybe this time the legal team finally found a workaround...
sangnoir 6y ago
At the time,I speculated that it was related to legal exposure. Microsoft filed an Amicus brief supporting Oracles view that API's are copyrightable (in Oracle v Google, a case which is about to be heard by SCOTUS). Should Oracle prevail, Microsoft could be on the hook for implementing Androids API's, and their amicus would ironically be evidence of their willfulness.
- useerup 6y ago
  > Microsoft filed an Amicus brief supporting Oracles view that API's are copyrightable No, actually Microsoft filed an amicus brief supporting Google's view: https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/18/18-956/89566/20190225161900311_Brief%20of%20Microsoft%20Corporation%20as%20Amicus%20Curiae.pdf https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/18/18-956/89566/20190...
  - sangnoir 6y ago
    > No, actually Microsoft filed an amicus brief supporting Google's view: You are wrong to say "No" (but overall partially correct). The SCOTUS amicus is the second amicus Microsoft has filed on this long-running case - initially they were supporting Oracle's appeal[0] to the federal appeals circuit[1] in 2013. Rough timeline: Microsoft files amicus in support of Oracle in 2013 (on appeal). Project Astoria was killed in 2016. Supreme court agrees to hear Oracle v Google 2019/20. Microsoft files amicus in support of Google 2020. Microsoft announces new Android runner late 2020. 0. https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/02/microsoft-foresees-chaos-if-google-v-oracle-result-stands/ https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/02/microsoft-forese... 1. https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/MSFT-Oracle-Brief.pdf https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/MSFT-...
- whereistimbo 6y ago
  After Project Astoria, Microsoft and Google sign pact to not sue each other anymore[0]. At the time I was speculating that's because Microsoft was using Android code which is licensed under Apache license. I had no concrete proof over this speculation beyond the fact that using Android code means dealing with Apache license, which forbid the licensee to do patent litigation against the licensor/licensee. [0]: https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-34409077 https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-34409077
mjw1007 6y ago
Maybe as a response to Apple beginning to support iOS apps on Macs?
- bobberkarl 6y ago
  It looks like the obvious answer. My questions: - Would they be legally able to bring the google play store there? - How will they manage multiple android apps running on the Front-End. That is a major issue with anbox
  - thekyle 6y ago
    The article says the apps will need to be submitted to the Microsoft Store.
    - bobberkarl 6y ago
      Then it's dead in the water. it was the same with BB and android apps. There was no success at all.
      - askvictor 6y ago
        Amazon has a still function Android app store. Windows has a massively greater marketshare than Blackberry ever had; if it's easy for developers to add drop their apk onto another app store, why wouldn't they?
        tasogare 6y ago
        Most phone apps made little sense on desktop. And for a lot of them there are more compelling native or web offer. Finally for games, editors usually forbids running them on PC via emulators since it’s easier to cheat than on mobile.

pjmlp 6y ago

Management and politics. I also was enjoying C++/CX, until their WinDev team decided to kill it, replace it with C++/WinRT, without comparable tooling, and now we are told to wait until ISO C++ manages to come up with the features that C++/CX already offered to tooling authors. And I am not the only one complaining, but since they have decided to reboot UWP into Project Reunion, having nicer tooling for C++/WinRT users seems to be at the very bottom of their priority list. At least Project Astoria has brought us WSL.

muststopmyths 6y ago

From what I heard, they killed Astoria because there was fear no one would write UWP if it became good enough. The new Microsoft has pretty much given up on real Windows development, so they're not afraid of Astoria in that sense any more.

pjmlp 6y ago
If that was the case they wouldn't be spending money on Project Reunion, React Native for Windows, Python on Windows (even hired Guido).
Lammy 6y ago
That’s how Blackberry 10 ended up for me. Very few native apps but lots of good FOSS Android ones that were just never perfect on the device. Overall poor experience that I wanted to love.
- dleslie 6y ago
  I still have my BB Classic kicking around somewhere. It's neat to load up for interests' sake because the app store and BB services are mostly still operational, and all the apps on the store are _free_; albeit, those apps which are wrappers around proprietary services tend to be grossly out of date. As a phone, it's still a better daily driver than my Pinephone. The camera is fast and decent, the audio is top-notch, it never crashes, and so on.
tasogare 6y ago
Nobody was going to develop for UWP anyway since (1) the community with knowledge of XAML and the app model was telling to fuck off with Windows Phone being shutted down (I was part of that community), despite its success in Europe, (2) Microsoft never sold any good amount of tablets to make the cross-device story believable and finally (3) UWP didn’t worked on the most deployed OS of the time... Windows 7. It never made any business sense to develop for UWP for a small market share when developing traditional app meant targeting almost every Windows machine out there. I think Microsoft did the exact reverse of what they had done: they should have open a cross-platform (OS X + Windows) store delivering Silverlight out of browsers app. The Mac App store never had a lot of success, there was a golden opportunity for Microsoft to bank on a concurrent platform.

Nextgrid 6y ago

Remember that you're talking about a company that had the problem of a lack of apps/developer attention on their original mobile platform (Windows Phone 7) and decided that the solution was to reset the ecosystem in a backwards-incompatible way... twice. (first with WP8, then with W10). After that kind of stupidity, I'm not sure anything else would be much of a surprise. It saddens me to say this because Windows Phone could've actually been a great platform and alternative to iOS/Android had idiots not been in charge of it.

mtgx 6y ago
They couldn't resist not integrating the "full windows" into wp7/8. One platform to rule...nothing.
weswpg 6y ago
I liked WP8. What would you have done differently?
- seniorivn 6y ago
  they are doing it now the way to get market share is to combine two paths - support apps from as many popular platforms as possible - provide developers a framework native to your platform that gives their apps support for other platforms with zero effort
- actuator 6y ago
  OS was great. Apps ecosystem sucked though, they really needed to have Android apps compatibility mode till they gained enough market share. We would have three players then, instead of two players and maybe some great devices from players like Nokia. It annoys me so much that MS failed in this, just like they have failed in premium laptops. One player dominates the premium smartphones and laptops in some markets by a good margin.
  - matsemann 6y ago
    While official apps were nonexistant or severely lacking, a guy named Rudy or so made a lot of 6-branded apps that worked better than the originals on Android at the time. The snapchat, instagram etc clients he made were really good. While at the same time the snapchat app for Android constantly crashed and had really bad image quality (a screenshot of the camera seeker or so??). Of course, the apps were simpler then. Mostly images and a feed / chat, not all this AR and advanced filters. Not sure one could compete today without official backing. But I really do miss some of the apps I had on my Lumia 920. The rebuilding of apps and new thinking about UI made some stellar apps. The HERE maps were so much better than Google Maps still is (and GMaps only gets worse and slower each iteration), and the HERE public transport app (Transit?) had a UI layout and interaction I've never seen anyone else have, but which was really intuitive and nice to use. WP8 also had a reddit reader that's far above anything else I've tried since. While I never liked the look of the earlier iPhone UI widgets (blue gradient top row with back button etc) at least most of the apps worked consistently at the time. And that was even better with WP8, the way one could almost see the next screen and could swipe etc worked really well. Now however, apps are made with their own design and not made for the OS they run on. So they look the same on iOS and Android, and out of place on both. So I have one way of interacting with Instagram, and then a completely different way of interacting with Google's material apps.

qz2 6y ago

Quite frankly because Microsoft’s management has been a fucking shit show for the last decade. Watch this get abandoned in a couple of years. Basically their entire methodology is come up with something alpha quality, throw it on the market with lots of marketing fanfare, then shoot random products at will. Trust is earned. And I think they’re somewhere below zero at the moment.

mrandish 6y ago
True... but there are tangible signs that MSFT's latest CEO (Satya Nadella) is substantially more coherent on long-term strategy than the previous CEO Balmer. It's certainly still no guarantee they'll continue being smarter but it is some justification for not entirely writing them off and perhaps cautious optimism.
- qz2 6y ago
  I don’t believe it. He’s different but customer concerns are responded to by doubling down rather than listening. That’s a big step backwards. We have QA disaster that is Windows 10 on our hands still., rammed with telemetry, advertising and bundled crap.

svrb 6y ago

The core thing to understand about Windows leadership over the past decade is that the mobile product went so well that when the project was clearly dying, all Windows leadership was fired so the mobile folks could take their place. No joke. With that information decisions like this become significantly less murky, though still ridiculous.

uponcoffee 6y ago

It did, but only for a small portion of applications. Others would run very poorly, if at all, depending on the degree in which the application hooked into google services//android api. The original project was more analogous to WINE for *nix systems, a compatibility layer; there where many edge cases that simply didn't work and supporting new versions of Android would require almost completely rewriting it (pre project treble). The VM route is simply more workable and sustainable. While WINE has achieved some great success, it's still a spectrum. Some software simply doesn't work, some mostly works, some works but performance is abysmal, and some work flawlessly - depending on how deeply they integrate with windows and what APIs they utilize.

john_moscow 6y ago

IIRC, the previous attempts to run Android apps on Windows were killed due to patent risks. Maybe this time the legal team finally found a workaround...

sangnoir 6y ago

At the time,I speculated that it was related to legal exposure. Microsoft filed an Amicus brief supporting Oracles view that API's are copyrightable (in Oracle v Google, a case which is about to be heard by SCOTUS). Should Oracle prevail, Microsoft could be on the hook for implementing Androids API's, and their amicus would ironically be evidence of their willfulness.

useerup 6y ago
> Microsoft filed an Amicus brief supporting Oracles view that API's are copyrightable No, actually Microsoft filed an amicus brief supporting Google's view: https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/18/18-956/89566/20190225161900311_Brief%20of%20Microsoft%20Corporation%20as%20Amicus%20Curiae.pdf https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/18/18-956/89566/20190...
- sangnoir 6y ago
  > No, actually Microsoft filed an amicus brief supporting Google's view: You are wrong to say "No" (but overall partially correct). The SCOTUS amicus is the second amicus Microsoft has filed on this long-running case - initially they were supporting Oracle's appeal[0] to the federal appeals circuit[1] in 2013. Rough timeline: Microsoft files amicus in support of Oracle in 2013 (on appeal). Project Astoria was killed in 2016. Supreme court agrees to hear Oracle v Google 2019/20. Microsoft files amicus in support of Google 2020. Microsoft announces new Android runner late 2020. 0. https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/02/microsoft-foresees-chaos-if-google-v-oracle-result-stands/ https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/02/microsoft-forese... 1. https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/MSFT-Oracle-Brief.pdf https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/MSFT-...
whereistimbo 6y ago
After Project Astoria, Microsoft and Google sign pact to not sue each other anymore[0]. At the time I was speculating that's because Microsoft was using Android code which is licensed under Apache license. I had no concrete proof over this speculation beyond the fact that using Android code means dealing with Apache license, which forbid the licensee to do patent litigation against the licensor/licensee. [0]: https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-34409077 https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-34409077

mjw1007 6y ago

Maybe as a response to Apple beginning to support iOS apps on Macs?

bobberkarl 6y ago
It looks like the obvious answer. My questions: - Would they be legally able to bring the google play store there? - How will they manage multiple android apps running on the Front-End. That is a major issue with anbox
- thekyle 6y ago
  The article says the apps will need to be submitted to the Microsoft Store.
  - bobberkarl 6y ago
    Then it's dead in the water. it was the same with BB and android apps. There was no success at all.
    - askvictor 6y ago
      Amazon has a still function Android app store. Windows has a massively greater marketshare than Blackberry ever had; if it's easy for developers to add drop their apk onto another app store, why wouldn't they?
      - tasogare 6y ago
        Most phone apps made little sense on desktop. And for a lot of them there are more compelling native or web offer. Finally for games, editors usually forbids running them on PC via emulators since it’s easier to cheat than on mobile.