9 ms·

Windows Phone 8 Apollo detailed, will have Windows 8 integration

63 points by ViolentJason 15y ago

untog 15y ago
The integration between Phone 8 And Desktop 8 is going to be the most interesting part of both OSes, IMO. No details on exactly how it'll work yet, of course, but I don't think anyone has tried to merge desktop and mobile to quite the same degree that MS is apparently planning.
- nextparadigms 15y ago
  Well, both Apple and Google want to all but replace the whole "PC paradigm" with iOS and Android. The iPad already re-uses most of the code for the iPhone version, except with some design tweaks, and with Android it's the same. I can't see how this WP8/W8 "integration" could possibly be anymore "integrated" that what Apple and Google already have for both phones and tablets/hybrid devices. Also, I can't help but think that Microsft will take the whole "homogenization" of platforms between mouse-driven PC, touch-driven tablet, and phones, a little too far. Some form factors do need optimized UI's and code for that form factor or device type. You can't just use a one-size-fits-all for everything. It would be like Google using the phone UI for Google TV. It would be a mess.
  - brudgers 15y ago
    >"I can't see how this WP8/W8 "integration" could possibly be anymore "integrated" that what Apple and Google already have for both phones and tablets/hybrid devices." Developers! can use NET and Visual Studio from the compact framework on phones via Silverlight, right on up to Windows Server at your DataCenter. Developers! get a continuous stack. Developers! can integrate everything from an ATM to a Website. [edits: formatting, add quote to which I was responding.]
    - bad_user 15y ago
      Does Visual Studio run on Linux or OS X? I'm asking because IntelliJ IDEA and Java do and I'm not leaving my POSIX toolchain for Visual Studio, no matter how awesome it is. If you want a "continuous stack" there's nothing better than Java. And yet many developers still hate it, while many love the extremely limited iOS platform, which goes to show that this trait is not so important as one might think.
      - untog 15y ago
        It doesn't, no. MonoDevelop is an attempt to make something that will, but it's... iffy. I suspect there isn't any easy solution to this one- same as there's no easy way to make OS X/iOS apps without running OS X yourself.
      - brudgers 15y ago
        Java has its merits. Close integration with the OS is not one of them. Standard graphics libraries which meet contemporary expectations is also unfortunately missing. There's nothing wrong with Java as a development environment, but the cost of "getting Java on the phone" is at best comparable to support for Windows (and at worst you're dealing with Oracle).
        moonchrome 15y ago
        >Standard graphics libraries which meet contemporary expectations is also unfortunately missing. JavaFX 2, with rumored support for iOS and Android (likely WP8 if it has native code)
        recoiledsnake 15y ago
        Aren't frameworks explicitly banned by the iOS App Store EULA ?
        brudgers 15y ago
        Of course, somewhat ironically, JavaFX 2 runtime is available for Windows only. And it is unlikely that WP8 will have a JVM.
  - aik 15y ago
    This is exactly what makes it exciting for me. Microsoft is trying a fairly innovative thing here -- it's risky and perhaps too idealistic, but if they can pull it off so it works well, it'll be hard to beat.
  - cooldeal 15y ago
    I think WP8/W8 integration is rather overblown, but the difference in approaches seems to be that Apple and Google are scaling up phone OSes to a tablet OS, whereas MS seems to be scaling down a desktop OS to a tablet, while simultaneously taking the UI paradigm of their phone OS and scaling it up to tablet/desktop. This means you can dock your Win 8 x86 tablet with a keyboard/mouse and be using the power of full Windows. You can write code for the tablet and debug it from the very same tablet using Visual Studio. You can't really do that with iPads and Android tablets which are relegated to being consumption devices only.
    - brudgers 15y ago
      Microsoft sees mobile devices as computers and Microsoft Research is working on a practical IDE for them via TouchDevelop which gives access to most phone features: http://www.touchdevelop.com/help/api http://www.touchdevelop.com/help/api There appears to be a vision of a commodity phone running Windows Phone as the "computer on every desk" for the developing world - it's probably no accident that Microsoft teamed up with Nokia.
      - freehunter 15y ago
        TouchDevelop is powerful as hell. It's not VC++ by any means, but you can access all of the phones features and data, and develop quite complex applications without actually typing any code. Putting that into Windows 8 Desktop would be a great move, and allowing those scripts into the Marketplace (or someplace where they can be sold and marketed) would be even better. Right now there is a repository for the scripts, but it's sorely lacking in features compared to the Marketplace.
  - stcredzero 15y ago
    I can't see how this WP8/W8 "integration" could possibly be anymore "integrated" that what Apple and Google already have for both phones and tablets/hybrid devices. I can see how: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3544522 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3544522
- drivebyacct2 15y ago
  I've said this for a long time and I told them it when I interviewed with them. Tight integration between WP7 (or WP8) and the Windows desktop platform is their killer feature. iCloud is weak in my opinion and Google has no desktop OS presence to tie into and as much as I might want it to, Chrome and "the web" don't allow for (as someone else termed it) a well functioning and syncing "fat cache". If I can make a Metro app for Windows 8 and hit all desktop and Win8-tablet users and get WP8 users for free or very little cost... I see the number of applications for Windows Phone increasing very quickly compared to their slow start thus far.
cooldeal 15y ago
Don't bother submitting news like this. It will be falsely flagged like your other post http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3544173 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3544173 Enough of those flags and your account will be hellbanned for the crime of posting Microsoft-centric news that anti-MS zealots on HN seem sensitive to. I posted this same news from Winsupersite earlier and it was hellbanned.
- brudgers 15y ago
  It appears that everything from WinSuperSite is killed. Here are two I posted: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3541271 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3541271 http://www.winsupersite.com/blog/supersite-blog-39/android/70-percent-android-devices-covered-microsoft-patents-141881 http://www.winsupersite.com/blog/supersite-blog-39/android/7...
  - recoiledsnake 15y ago
    Happened to me too, I guess it's not enough for the fanboys cult to upvote Gruber, they have to flag Winsupersite as well.
    - huggyface 15y ago
      Have you heard the news about Apple profit margins? Let's celebrate the unwavering ASP they have obtained, and cheer on those riotous riches!
    - brudgers 15y ago
      I don't think it's so much about Apple as about Google. The story about the Gmail Man and privacy concerns was down around number 70 (page 3) at two hours old and 59 points. That's a lot of flagging. And Android is far more vulnerable to Microsoft than iOS because the major manufacturers all have licensing agreements in place with Microsoft because of patents. Stories about BN's claims of patent abuse being thrown out by the ITC magistrate on Monday have been flagged down, including this excellent article: http://fosspatents.blogspot.com/2012/01/itc-throws-out-barnes-nobles-antitrust.html http://fosspatents.blogspot.com/2012/01/itc-throws-out-barne...
rbanffy 15y ago
With removable SD cards and network data usage metering Windows Phone will be unstoppable. Windows Phone is on track to take over the market in 2015 as predicted by IHS. Sure. edit: and Windows fans complain they are being downvoted... sigh...
- brudgers 15y ago
  Snark and sarcasm are often downvoted. Though sometimes downvotes are used to express disagreement, downvotes should be considered editorial feedback - either you didn't make your point clearly, or your comment is considered likely to derail the discussion. Use the "edit" and "delete" links, respectively if you are concerned about the karma score of a particular comment. It is bad form on HN to complain about down votes.
  - rbanffy 15y ago
    > It is bad form on HN to complain about down I was trying to make a meta-point. There are root posts complaining every article criticizing Google and Apple is flagged into oblivion while the same happens to comments that are Microsoft-unfriendly. In this case, it could be the sarcasm too. Anyway, it could be more productive to point me why my sarcastic assessment is wrong.
    - deleted 15y ago
      [deleted]
    - brudgers 15y ago
      Well, as you probably know, going meta is also often downvoted. As for your assessment, the two features upon which your sarcasm was centered were obviously among the most trivial mentioned. Therefore, there was little invitation to respond to your argument based upon its merits. Sometimes of course, one just makes a snarky comment and lets the karma fall where it may. Maybe if you had a few hundred karma points, it would be an option. As for the flagging, on most of the internet it has long been socially acceptable to praise Apple and disparage Microsoft in public forums - Apple of course encouraged this sort of thing with their long running "I am a Mac/PC" advertising campaign. This social norm is actually one of the issues which got me interested in Apple and their advertising and the way in which people who like their products feel free to act in public - seriously, every time the Macbooks get a new case or port or processor upgrade, there's been a front page story here on HN. Google of course doesn't have that luxury of a huge consumer following - people use them by default e.g. as their standard search engine or as the free touchscreen smartphone. And they are smart enough to know what that may mean over the long term - particularly when handset manufacturers now have agreements in place with Microsoft in all probability due to their rush to ship Android. Is there a concerted effort to flag Microsoft stories? The killing of stories from WinSuperSite is consistent with it. The killing of the "Gmail Man" story is consistent with it as well - particularly given the quality of the discussion which was taking place.
jobu 15y ago
It's interesting what people find important about news like this. The fact that Win Phone 8 will support native code (C/C++) and cross-app communication is far more important to me than the Windows 8 integration. As a platform I have been very impressed by Win Phone 7, and I hope they continue to execute as well as they have.
- pjmlp 15y ago
  I agree with you. Since the Build conference I have been hoping that they would make WinRT available on WP8.
stcredzero 15y ago
Something occurred to me the other day with regards to integration, which mobile UX designers may or may not be aware of. What people really want is "Fat Cache." Clearly, "thin client" was hyped and fizzled out, because it isn't quite what people want. They don't want a "thin client" to the cloud. A pure thin client is pretty dead when there's no network or the server's down. A "Fat Cache" would retain all of its functionality and the user's most used data. It would also have most of the advantages of thin client, namely invisible centralized administration. It would also ameliorate all of the disadvantages. iCloud, Chromebook, and Kindle Fire/Silk Browser are all moves in this direction. The focus of a computer user should be their data. This includes apps. The apps should also live in the cloud and just appear on all the user's devices. In fact, the user's application "session" should be in the cloud too. I should be able to start a session on a recipe app on my smartphone in the living room, then walk to the kitchen and just seamlessly continue my session on my tablet. No reopening the tablet version of the app, no repeating a search for the same recipe. At most, just one user operation to "open in tablet." All these form factors should just be seen as interfaces to our data, just instances of a "fat cache."
- brudgers 15y ago
  >"iCloud, Chromebook, and Kindle Fire/Silk Browser" What do you do when the storm takes down your cable provider? Or when you are beyond your cell phone carrier's signal? And you have a project to get out the door.
  - theatrus2 15y ago
    What do you do when the storm takes out the road, and you have a project to get out the door? If the "fat cache" still lets you work in a disconnected state (such as iCloud would let you), I don't see this as a problem.
  - cryptoz 15y ago
    You work on it locally, with your Fat Cache copy and your offline app. You sync up when the 'net comes back online. Should I ask you how you get your coding done when the power goes out? Either you don't get it done at all, or you write down ideas on paper. There's not much else you can do, and that's the way it is. Frankly, I've only had about 10 minutes of total, unexpected and unavoidable network downtime in the last few years of my life. With a home internet connection and a smartphone in my pocket, if my power goes out I can work away online for hours and hours. Power outages and network outages happen so infrequently that if we have reasonably good offline apps and Fat Caches, we're good to go. And not only that, but we're approaching a place where can continue working almost uninterrupted if both the main power and the network go down.
potatolicious 15y ago
And yet, despite these features, the thing that will make or break WinPhone is still going to be the marketing and the hardware. The Lumia 900 is a very big step in a very good direction. MS needs to double-down on this and stop kowtowing to Samsung et al, who are pushing out half-assed turds of phones that do a disservice to the brand. The "free OS" segment of the market is taken by Android, and I think it'll take an act of god to unseat it at this point. WinPhone's only hope is to compete at the higher end with the likes of iPhone and Galaxy phones. And marketing. God, the marketing. Where is it? MS is betting the company on WinPhone, but where is the marketing message? Why aren't bus sheltered swimming in these ads? Why aren't they all over TV like Android and iOS is? Why are WinPhones still hiding in the darkest corners of the AT&T stores? This is the biggest failing of WinPhone IMO - it's a fine platform and a fine product, but nobody knows about it.
- jobu 15y ago
  Right now it seems like all of the marketing for Windows Phone is aimed at developers.
  - chj 15y ago
    And yet it doesn't support native code. What a big fail!
    - replax 15y ago
      It's been announced (was some days ago on engadget), that native C++ support will come with the next update. Not sure when that will be as I did not dig deeper into it, but I assume it's rather soon.
    - potatolicious 15y ago
      There's a big fail here, but I don't think it's the lack of native support. What percentage of highly successful, heavily used Android apps rely on native code? It seems that 99% of the dev community is fine writing Java. Hell, why are WP7 devs clamoring for native code anyways? It's because the .NET performance is terrible. The failure IMO is in .NET, not the lack of C++. The capitulation and addition of C++ support isn't a strict win either - devs now have access to performance, at a substantial engineering effort cost. Doing things that would have been simple on other platforms now requires C++ hackery.
jbarham 15y ago
Tight integration between a mobile phone and a desktop OS is IMO a misfeature. I have an Android phone and the only time I've had to connect it to my PC is to download photos. And then it looks just like another other USB drive w/ the top-level DCIM that my digital camera's SD card has. Just drag-and-drop. On the other hand my in-laws bought iPhones and copying photos and MP3s to them via iTunes was confusing and very, very slow. Consider too that for most people in the developing world, a mobile phone is the only "computer" they will own. Requiring integration with a desktop PC effectively cuts Apple and Microsoft off from a market of billions of people.
- tomflack 15y ago
  Tight integration between a mobile phone and a desktop OS is IMO a misfeature. Based on your two examples it seems as if you feel this way because you've only experienced light integration or poor integration, and don't have the imagination to see past that. If Microsoft can make it work, and offer something polished in the process then it could be something special. Remember they're counting the "desktop OS" of Windows as their tablet OS as well now. There exists untold numbers of opportunities for nice little integrations done well. Consider too that for most people in the developing world, a mobile phone is the only "computer" they will own. Requiring integration with a desktop PC effectively cuts Apple and Microsoft off from a market of billions of people. That's why you don't make it mandatory like you're suggesting.
igorgue 15y ago
Did anybody else pressed cmd+f UNIX when reading this article?

63 points by ViolentJason 15y ago

untog 15y ago

The integration between Phone 8 And Desktop 8 is going to be the most interesting part of both OSes, IMO. No details on exactly how it'll work yet, of course, but I don't think anyone has tried to merge desktop and mobile to quite the same degree that MS is apparently planning.

nextparadigms 15y ago
Well, both Apple and Google want to all but replace the whole "PC paradigm" with iOS and Android. The iPad already re-uses most of the code for the iPhone version, except with some design tweaks, and with Android it's the same. I can't see how this WP8/W8 "integration" could possibly be anymore "integrated" that what Apple and Google already have for both phones and tablets/hybrid devices. Also, I can't help but think that Microsft will take the whole "homogenization" of platforms between mouse-driven PC, touch-driven tablet, and phones, a little too far. Some form factors do need optimized UI's and code for that form factor or device type. You can't just use a one-size-fits-all for everything. It would be like Google using the phone UI for Google TV. It would be a mess.
- brudgers 15y ago
  >"I can't see how this WP8/W8 "integration" could possibly be anymore "integrated" that what Apple and Google already have for both phones and tablets/hybrid devices." Developers! can use NET and Visual Studio from the compact framework on phones via Silverlight, right on up to Windows Server at your DataCenter. Developers! get a continuous stack. Developers! can integrate everything from an ATM to a Website. [edits: formatting, add quote to which I was responding.]
  - bad_user 15y ago
    Does Visual Studio run on Linux or OS X? I'm asking because IntelliJ IDEA and Java do and I'm not leaving my POSIX toolchain for Visual Studio, no matter how awesome it is. If you want a "continuous stack" there's nothing better than Java. And yet many developers still hate it, while many love the extremely limited iOS platform, which goes to show that this trait is not so important as one might think.
    - untog 15y ago
      It doesn't, no. MonoDevelop is an attempt to make something that will, but it's... iffy. I suspect there isn't any easy solution to this one- same as there's no easy way to make OS X/iOS apps without running OS X yourself.
    - brudgers 15y ago
      Java has its merits. Close integration with the OS is not one of them. Standard graphics libraries which meet contemporary expectations is also unfortunately missing. There's nothing wrong with Java as a development environment, but the cost of "getting Java on the phone" is at best comparable to support for Windows (and at worst you're dealing with Oracle).
      - moonchrome 15y ago
        >Standard graphics libraries which meet contemporary expectations is also unfortunately missing. JavaFX 2, with rumored support for iOS and Android (likely WP8 if it has native code)
        recoiledsnake 15y ago
        Aren't frameworks explicitly banned by the iOS App Store EULA ?
        brudgers 15y ago
        Of course, somewhat ironically, JavaFX 2 runtime is available for Windows only. And it is unlikely that WP8 will have a JVM.
- aik 15y ago
  This is exactly what makes it exciting for me. Microsoft is trying a fairly innovative thing here -- it's risky and perhaps too idealistic, but if they can pull it off so it works well, it'll be hard to beat.
- cooldeal 15y ago
  I think WP8/W8 integration is rather overblown, but the difference in approaches seems to be that Apple and Google are scaling up phone OSes to a tablet OS, whereas MS seems to be scaling down a desktop OS to a tablet, while simultaneously taking the UI paradigm of their phone OS and scaling it up to tablet/desktop. This means you can dock your Win 8 x86 tablet with a keyboard/mouse and be using the power of full Windows. You can write code for the tablet and debug it from the very same tablet using Visual Studio. You can't really do that with iPads and Android tablets which are relegated to being consumption devices only.
  - brudgers 15y ago
    Microsoft sees mobile devices as computers and Microsoft Research is working on a practical IDE for them via TouchDevelop which gives access to most phone features: http://www.touchdevelop.com/help/api http://www.touchdevelop.com/help/api There appears to be a vision of a commodity phone running Windows Phone as the "computer on every desk" for the developing world - it's probably no accident that Microsoft teamed up with Nokia.
    - freehunter 15y ago
      TouchDevelop is powerful as hell. It's not VC++ by any means, but you can access all of the phones features and data, and develop quite complex applications without actually typing any code. Putting that into Windows 8 Desktop would be a great move, and allowing those scripts into the Marketplace (or someplace where they can be sold and marketed) would be even better. Right now there is a repository for the scripts, but it's sorely lacking in features compared to the Marketplace.
- stcredzero 15y ago
  I can't see how this WP8/W8 "integration" could possibly be anymore "integrated" that what Apple and Google already have for both phones and tablets/hybrid devices. I can see how: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3544522 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3544522
drivebyacct2 15y ago
I've said this for a long time and I told them it when I interviewed with them. Tight integration between WP7 (or WP8) and the Windows desktop platform is their killer feature. iCloud is weak in my opinion and Google has no desktop OS presence to tie into and as much as I might want it to, Chrome and "the web" don't allow for (as someone else termed it) a well functioning and syncing "fat cache". If I can make a Metro app for Windows 8 and hit all desktop and Win8-tablet users and get WP8 users for free or very little cost... I see the number of applications for Windows Phone increasing very quickly compared to their slow start thus far.

cooldeal 15y ago

Don't bother submitting news like this. It will be falsely flagged like your other post http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3544173 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3544173 Enough of those flags and your account will be hellbanned for the crime of posting Microsoft-centric news that anti-MS zealots on HN seem sensitive to. I posted this same news from Winsupersite earlier and it was hellbanned.

brudgers 15y ago
It appears that everything from WinSuperSite is killed. Here are two I posted: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3541271 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3541271 http://www.winsupersite.com/blog/supersite-blog-39/android/70-percent-android-devices-covered-microsoft-patents-141881 http://www.winsupersite.com/blog/supersite-blog-39/android/7...
- recoiledsnake 15y ago
  Happened to me too, I guess it's not enough for the fanboys cult to upvote Gruber, they have to flag Winsupersite as well.
  - huggyface 15y ago
    Have you heard the news about Apple profit margins? Let's celebrate the unwavering ASP they have obtained, and cheer on those riotous riches!
  - brudgers 15y ago
    I don't think it's so much about Apple as about Google. The story about the Gmail Man and privacy concerns was down around number 70 (page 3) at two hours old and 59 points. That's a lot of flagging. And Android is far more vulnerable to Microsoft than iOS because the major manufacturers all have licensing agreements in place with Microsoft because of patents. Stories about BN's claims of patent abuse being thrown out by the ITC magistrate on Monday have been flagged down, including this excellent article: http://fosspatents.blogspot.com/2012/01/itc-throws-out-barnes-nobles-antitrust.html http://fosspatents.blogspot.com/2012/01/itc-throws-out-barne...

rbanffy 15y ago

With removable SD cards and network data usage metering Windows Phone will be unstoppable. Windows Phone is on track to take over the market in 2015 as predicted by IHS. Sure. edit: and Windows fans complain they are being downvoted... sigh...

brudgers 15y ago
Snark and sarcasm are often downvoted. Though sometimes downvotes are used to express disagreement, downvotes should be considered editorial feedback - either you didn't make your point clearly, or your comment is considered likely to derail the discussion. Use the "edit" and "delete" links, respectively if you are concerned about the karma score of a particular comment. It is bad form on HN to complain about down votes.
- rbanffy 15y ago
  > It is bad form on HN to complain about down I was trying to make a meta-point. There are root posts complaining every article criticizing Google and Apple is flagged into oblivion while the same happens to comments that are Microsoft-unfriendly. In this case, it could be the sarcasm too. Anyway, it could be more productive to point me why my sarcastic assessment is wrong.
  - deleted 15y ago
    [deleted]
  - brudgers 15y ago
    Well, as you probably know, going meta is also often downvoted. As for your assessment, the two features upon which your sarcasm was centered were obviously among the most trivial mentioned. Therefore, there was little invitation to respond to your argument based upon its merits. Sometimes of course, one just makes a snarky comment and lets the karma fall where it may. Maybe if you had a few hundred karma points, it would be an option. As for the flagging, on most of the internet it has long been socially acceptable to praise Apple and disparage Microsoft in public forums - Apple of course encouraged this sort of thing with their long running "I am a Mac/PC" advertising campaign. This social norm is actually one of the issues which got me interested in Apple and their advertising and the way in which people who like their products feel free to act in public - seriously, every time the Macbooks get a new case or port or processor upgrade, there's been a front page story here on HN. Google of course doesn't have that luxury of a huge consumer following - people use them by default e.g. as their standard search engine or as the free touchscreen smartphone. And they are smart enough to know what that may mean over the long term - particularly when handset manufacturers now have agreements in place with Microsoft in all probability due to their rush to ship Android. Is there a concerted effort to flag Microsoft stories? The killing of stories from WinSuperSite is consistent with it. The killing of the "Gmail Man" story is consistent with it as well - particularly given the quality of the discussion which was taking place.

jobu 15y ago

It's interesting what people find important about news like this. The fact that Win Phone 8 will support native code (C/C++) and cross-app communication is far more important to me than the Windows 8 integration. As a platform I have been very impressed by Win Phone 7, and I hope they continue to execute as well as they have.

pjmlp 15y ago
I agree with you. Since the Build conference I have been hoping that they would make WinRT available on WP8.

stcredzero 15y ago

Something occurred to me the other day with regards to integration, which mobile UX designers may or may not be aware of. What people really want is "Fat Cache." Clearly, "thin client" was hyped and fizzled out, because it isn't quite what people want. They don't want a "thin client" to the cloud. A pure thin client is pretty dead when there's no network or the server's down. A "Fat Cache" would retain all of its functionality and the user's most used data. It would also have most of the advantages of thin client, namely invisible centralized administration. It would also ameliorate all of the disadvantages. iCloud, Chromebook, and Kindle Fire/Silk Browser are all moves in this direction. The focus of a computer user should be their data. This includes apps. The apps should also live in the cloud and just appear on all the user's devices. In fact, the user's application "session" should be in the cloud too. I should be able to start a session on a recipe app on my smartphone in the living room, then walk to the kitchen and just seamlessly continue my session on my tablet. No reopening the tablet version of the app, no repeating a search for the same recipe. At most, just one user operation to "open in tablet." All these form factors should just be seen as interfaces to our data, just instances of a "fat cache."

brudgers 15y ago
>"iCloud, Chromebook, and Kindle Fire/Silk Browser" What do you do when the storm takes down your cable provider? Or when you are beyond your cell phone carrier's signal? And you have a project to get out the door.
- theatrus2 15y ago
  What do you do when the storm takes out the road, and you have a project to get out the door? If the "fat cache" still lets you work in a disconnected state (such as iCloud would let you), I don't see this as a problem.
- cryptoz 15y ago
  You work on it locally, with your Fat Cache copy and your offline app. You sync up when the 'net comes back online. Should I ask you how you get your coding done when the power goes out? Either you don't get it done at all, or you write down ideas on paper. There's not much else you can do, and that's the way it is. Frankly, I've only had about 10 minutes of total, unexpected and unavoidable network downtime in the last few years of my life. With a home internet connection and a smartphone in my pocket, if my power goes out I can work away online for hours and hours. Power outages and network outages happen so infrequently that if we have reasonably good offline apps and Fat Caches, we're good to go. And not only that, but we're approaching a place where can continue working almost uninterrupted if both the main power and the network go down.

potatolicious 15y ago

And yet, despite these features, the thing that will make or break WinPhone is still going to be the marketing and the hardware. The Lumia 900 is a very big step in a very good direction. MS needs to double-down on this and stop kowtowing to Samsung et al, who are pushing out half-assed turds of phones that do a disservice to the brand. The "free OS" segment of the market is taken by Android, and I think it'll take an act of god to unseat it at this point. WinPhone's only hope is to compete at the higher end with the likes of iPhone and Galaxy phones. And marketing. God, the marketing. Where is it? MS is betting the company on WinPhone, but where is the marketing message? Why aren't bus sheltered swimming in these ads? Why aren't they all over TV like Android and iOS is? Why are WinPhones still hiding in the darkest corners of the AT&T stores? This is the biggest failing of WinPhone IMO - it's a fine platform and a fine product, but nobody knows about it.

jobu 15y ago
Right now it seems like all of the marketing for Windows Phone is aimed at developers.
- chj 15y ago
  And yet it doesn't support native code. What a big fail!
  - replax 15y ago
    It's been announced (was some days ago on engadget), that native C++ support will come with the next update. Not sure when that will be as I did not dig deeper into it, but I assume it's rather soon.
  - potatolicious 15y ago
    There's a big fail here, but I don't think it's the lack of native support. What percentage of highly successful, heavily used Android apps rely on native code? It seems that 99% of the dev community is fine writing Java. Hell, why are WP7 devs clamoring for native code anyways? It's because the .NET performance is terrible. The failure IMO is in .NET, not the lack of C++. The capitulation and addition of C++ support isn't a strict win either - devs now have access to performance, at a substantial engineering effort cost. Doing things that would have been simple on other platforms now requires C++ hackery.

jbarham 15y ago

Tight integration between a mobile phone and a desktop OS is IMO a misfeature. I have an Android phone and the only time I've had to connect it to my PC is to download photos. And then it looks just like another other USB drive w/ the top-level DCIM that my digital camera's SD card has. Just drag-and-drop. On the other hand my in-laws bought iPhones and copying photos and MP3s to them via iTunes was confusing and very, very slow. Consider too that for most people in the developing world, a mobile phone is the only "computer" they will own. Requiring integration with a desktop PC effectively cuts Apple and Microsoft off from a market of billions of people.

tomflack 15y ago
Tight integration between a mobile phone and a desktop OS is IMO a misfeature. Based on your two examples it seems as if you feel this way because you've only experienced light integration or poor integration, and don't have the imagination to see past that. If Microsoft can make it work, and offer something polished in the process then it could be something special. Remember they're counting the "desktop OS" of Windows as their tablet OS as well now. There exists untold numbers of opportunities for nice little integrations done well. Consider too that for most people in the developing world, a mobile phone is the only "computer" they will own. Requiring integration with a desktop PC effectively cuts Apple and Microsoft off from a market of billions of people. That's why you don't make it mandatory like you're suggesting.

igorgue 15y ago

Did anybody else pressed cmd+f UNIX when reading this article?