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Initially I thought MS might have learned from missing out on mobile to get ahead in AR/MR/VR and be a device and platform leader. It seems what they learned is

Initially I thought MS might have learned from missing out on mobile to get ahead in AR/MR/VR and be a device and platform leader. It seems what they learned is to give up before entering and focus on partnering instead. That is something they've always succeeded at PC+DOS, IBM+WindowsNT, Apple+Office, JavaVM. To me it does seem a low target to aim for. VSCode shows they can execute, but for some reason when the stakes are higher they don't do as well Windows Phone, Edge browser, etc. I suppose I could call that corporate self-awareness.

WorldMaker 4y ago
Here specifically too: Microsoft has such a weird lead in AR/MR/VR and have mostly just been sitting on it. For example, because of early Kinect work, they own the patents that would have made Meta's weird journey between "no legs" to "everyone gets legs if they want them! excitement!" irrelevant or much faster had the partnership happened sooner. They built the first "metaverse cloud" on Azure and they've used it and they've made something as exciting in theory as the HoloLens boring Enterprise products. The other possible takeaway is that after Windows Phone, Microsoft really has been truly risk adverse when it comes to consumer products, even in areas where they had a lead and could have delivered something no one else could. > VSCode shows they can execute, but for some reason when the stakes are higher they don't do as well Windows Phone Windows Phone was arguably very well executed at the software level. Microsoft's troubles with Windows Phone were at the hardware levels and (worse) the economic levels where the phone carriers had already decided they prefer a duopoly and selling three things is one too many things to sell.
- pjmlp 4y ago
  Windows Phone was bad executed at development experience level, with the WinRT, UAP, UWP enforced rewrites.
  - WorldMaker 4y ago
    We've had this argument more than once and I still disagree with that take. I took a .NET application through those transitions and there was never a "from scratch rewrite" step at any point. A lot of cheese moved and there was sometimes quite a bit of XAML shifts to meet new UI expectations, but most of the business logic code stayed the same or barely changed. On the other side, I've seen Apple enforce equal or worse "enforced" rewrites between major iOS versions with not even a fraction of the complaints Microsoft got across those product versions. (I had more inconvenience moving apps back and forth between WPF and Silverlight in some of the years prior, and even those moves were never from-scratch rewrites. Admittedly that may have left me with more skills to handle XAML changes and write to lowest common denominator XAML, so I am aware of my biases.) I realize you aren't ever going to agree with me on this, and I don't expect you to. I do think it is still useful for other people to see that there are counter-opinions here.
    - int_19h 4y ago
      Apple can get away with a lot more given its dominant market position (esp. when it comes to delivering paying customers to app authors). But when you're the new scrappy contender with minimal market share, so you need the devs to make apps for your store rather than the other way around, it better be smooth sailing all around.
    - pjmlp 4y ago
      A rewrite is a rewrite, even if only one line changes. Not going to bother to list everything that changed, it is public available for anyone to judge.
    - karmakaze 4y ago
      The difference of course is that iOS already has enough adoption to get away with this. Windows Phone and Windows UI development forked for no good reason while keeping very similar names and structures while trying to get initial adoption. It was clearly a mistake at that stage. I personally looked into the tech and as soon as I saw how fragmented it was realized MS didn't have a good plan and didn't venture developing for it.

WorldMaker 4y ago

Here specifically too: Microsoft has such a weird lead in AR/MR/VR and have mostly just been sitting on it. For example, because of early Kinect work, they own the patents that would have made Meta's weird journey between "no legs" to "everyone gets legs if they want them! excitement!" irrelevant or much faster had the partnership happened sooner. They built the first "metaverse cloud" on Azure and they've used it and they've made something as exciting in theory as the HoloLens boring Enterprise products. The other possible takeaway is that after Windows Phone, Microsoft really has been truly risk adverse when it comes to consumer products, even in areas where they had a lead and could have delivered something no one else could. > VSCode shows they can execute, but for some reason when the stakes are higher they don't do as well Windows Phone Windows Phone was arguably very well executed at the software level. Microsoft's troubles with Windows Phone were at the hardware levels and (worse) the economic levels where the phone carriers had already decided they prefer a duopoly and selling three things is one too many things to sell.

pjmlp 4y ago
Windows Phone was bad executed at development experience level, with the WinRT, UAP, UWP enforced rewrites.
- WorldMaker 4y ago
  We've had this argument more than once and I still disagree with that take. I took a .NET application through those transitions and there was never a "from scratch rewrite" step at any point. A lot of cheese moved and there was sometimes quite a bit of XAML shifts to meet new UI expectations, but most of the business logic code stayed the same or barely changed. On the other side, I've seen Apple enforce equal or worse "enforced" rewrites between major iOS versions with not even a fraction of the complaints Microsoft got across those product versions. (I had more inconvenience moving apps back and forth between WPF and Silverlight in some of the years prior, and even those moves were never from-scratch rewrites. Admittedly that may have left me with more skills to handle XAML changes and write to lowest common denominator XAML, so I am aware of my biases.) I realize you aren't ever going to agree with me on this, and I don't expect you to. I do think it is still useful for other people to see that there are counter-opinions here.
  - int_19h 4y ago
    Apple can get away with a lot more given its dominant market position (esp. when it comes to delivering paying customers to app authors). But when you're the new scrappy contender with minimal market share, so you need the devs to make apps for your store rather than the other way around, it better be smooth sailing all around.
  - pjmlp 4y ago
    A rewrite is a rewrite, even if only one line changes. Not going to bother to list everything that changed, it is public available for anyone to judge.
  - karmakaze 4y ago
    The difference of course is that iOS already has enough adoption to get away with this. Windows Phone and Windows UI development forked for no good reason while keeping very similar names and structures while trying to get initial adoption. It was clearly a mistake at that stage. I personally looked into the tech and as soon as I saw how fragmented it was realized MS didn't have a good plan and didn't venture developing for it.