5 ms·

Microsoft OneApp : Microsoft Introducing OneApp

33 points by andrewbadera 17y ago

GeneralMaximus 17y ago
So it's a Mozilla Prism clone for cellphones?
- qeorge 17y ago
  Not at all. Prism is basically just Firefox without a menu bar running in its own process. I don't know why it gets so much attention.
  - blasdel 17y ago
    Because Mozilla employs a bunch of PR people, and has millions of active fanboys, but has very little to actually publicize.
joubert 17y ago
If I go to http://www.microsoft.com/oneapp/ http://www.microsoft.com/oneapp/ I get: The page cannot be displayed because an internal server error has occurred.
- fname 17y ago
  works for me
mmelin 17y ago
This is actually pretty cool. From what I can gather from the website, this is basically a 150 KB client that can run on the low-power, feature-thin phones common in emerging markets (the kind of phones that cost $10-50 to make and that Nokia among others excels at). The client offloads almost all processing and storage to carrier hosted servers. Kind of like X, ironically.
dflock 17y ago
The closest competitor to OneApp appears to be Opera Mini (http://www.opera.com/mini/ http://www.opera.com/mini/) which is a full web browser for the same kind of small cheap cellphones which OneApp targets. Opera Mini is also client-server and pre-processes and compresses web pages on the server side, amongst other things, before the client sees them. The major difference would seem to be that Opera Mini provides access to the whole web, whereas OneApp is more of a walled garden, just running the 'apps' written for it's mini-platform.
mattmcknight 17y ago
It's interesting that they chose to write an app for Symbian. I wonder if other mobile OSes are to follow? Google already has a few things that run on Symbian, maps, search, etc. and a web page compressor that runs anywhere...
rbanffy 17y ago
It would be nice to be able to look at it rather than just perusing the very well built website... This whole idea of rolling it out through telcos is horrible. Just make the damn thing available for download. It can't be that hard...
Poiesis 17y ago
It is very interesting to see such a diligent focus on the low-end, small processor side of things. However, I don't think anyone got rich betting that technology wasn't constantly improving.
CraigBuchek 17y ago
> OneApp’s very minimal on-phone footprint of just 150 KB makes installing it quick and easy. OneApp will launch only the parts of a mobile app that you want to use; that cuts down on additional installation time Can the OneApp developers please spend some time working on Microsoft Office? Please?
JimmyL 17y ago
Top picture shows it running on a Nokia 6300, which is my day-to-day phone... Come on North American carriers!
ovi256 17y ago
Brought to you by ... (drum roll) ... Microsoft's Unlimited Potential group! Yeah! Not the (dreaded) Limited Potential group. These are the Unlimited Group people.
- ratsbane 17y ago
  They've certainly lived up to a very small percentage of their potential.
pavlov 17y ago
The OneApp client is almost guaranteed to be a Java Mobile Edition application, because that's the only widespread software platform for feature phones. It's fairly ironic that Microsoft's "Unlimited Potential" group develops Java software... But perhaps they've been tasked specifically to unleash their potential by overcoming the traditional Microsoft NIH / Embrace&Extend development paradigms.

33 points by andrewbadera 17y ago

GeneralMaximus 17y ago

So it's a Mozilla Prism clone for cellphones?

qeorge 17y ago
Not at all. Prism is basically just Firefox without a menu bar running in its own process. I don't know why it gets so much attention.
- blasdel 17y ago
  Because Mozilla employs a bunch of PR people, and has millions of active fanboys, but has very little to actually publicize.

joubert 17y ago

If I go to http://www.microsoft.com/oneapp/ http://www.microsoft.com/oneapp/ I get: The page cannot be displayed because an internal server error has occurred.

fname 17y ago
works for me

mmelin 17y ago

This is actually pretty cool. From what I can gather from the website, this is basically a 150 KB client that can run on the low-power, feature-thin phones common in emerging markets (the kind of phones that cost $10-50 to make and that Nokia among others excels at). The client offloads almost all processing and storage to carrier hosted servers. Kind of like X, ironically.

dflock 17y ago

The closest competitor to OneApp appears to be Opera Mini (http://www.opera.com/mini/ http://www.opera.com/mini/) which is a full web browser for the same kind of small cheap cellphones which OneApp targets. Opera Mini is also client-server and pre-processes and compresses web pages on the server side, amongst other things, before the client sees them. The major difference would seem to be that Opera Mini provides access to the whole web, whereas OneApp is more of a walled garden, just running the 'apps' written for it's mini-platform.

mattmcknight 17y ago

It's interesting that they chose to write an app for Symbian. I wonder if other mobile OSes are to follow? Google already has a few things that run on Symbian, maps, search, etc. and a web page compressor that runs anywhere...

rbanffy 17y ago

It would be nice to be able to look at it rather than just perusing the very well built website... This whole idea of rolling it out through telcos is horrible. Just make the damn thing available for download. It can't be that hard...

Poiesis 17y ago

It is very interesting to see such a diligent focus on the low-end, small processor side of things. However, I don't think anyone got rich betting that technology wasn't constantly improving.

CraigBuchek 17y ago

> OneApp’s very minimal on-phone footprint of just 150 KB makes installing it quick and easy. OneApp will launch only the parts of a mobile app that you want to use; that cuts down on additional installation time Can the OneApp developers please spend some time working on Microsoft Office? Please?

JimmyL 17y ago

Top picture shows it running on a Nokia 6300, which is my day-to-day phone... Come on North American carriers!

ovi256 17y ago

Brought to you by ... (drum roll) ... Microsoft's Unlimited Potential group! Yeah! Not the (dreaded) Limited Potential group. These are the Unlimited Group people.

ratsbane 17y ago
They've certainly lived up to a very small percentage of their potential.

pavlov 17y ago

The OneApp client is almost guaranteed to be a Java Mobile Edition application, because that's the only widespread software platform for feature phones. It's fairly ironic that Microsoft's "Unlimited Potential" group develops Java software... But perhaps they've been tasked specifically to unleash their potential by overcoming the traditional Microsoft NIH / Embrace&Extend development paradigms.