[1-24-11 Update][Discussion] Windows Mobile Last Stand New Thread UP!!

WM Last Stand HQ Codeplex Source

New Project Thread

Why Save Windows Mobile?

im just combining all the ideas that i know many of you want to see happen:

In my opinion. the WM UI is so barebone and versatile, all the resources we have now can make this last alot longer. just put the pieces to the puzzle together. If any of you developers out there are interested. please let me know so i can update the post.

TEAM WM

I will try to post more info as i create it or find it


TO BE CONTINUED......

ok guys i got an invitation to this "WM Group" and i fully support it. Yes i am one of those people that believe, that winmo can do all the things that other platforms can do.
Tell me what android can do better than winmo for example. All that it has (and winmo cannot have) is animations. You wanna talk to me about the marketplace? Yes sure, it is a nice free library that you can find almost anything fast, but still this can work on winmo too, the only problem is that a lot of apps are paid in winmo (and they should be, developers need support, they don't work for fun)

WP7 is a useless thing. Microsoft had something with 1000 potentials, and they gave us something with 100. All it can do is play xbox games. The guys didn't even include silverlight or flash or countries support (good luck with that). Don't tell me that it will come with the next update and blah blah blah. They had like 5-6 years at least in order to complete this "operating system", and the final result was a black themed iphone with boxes.

I was testing WP7 on my HD2 earlier, and i was thinking that at least 60% of the things i was seeing there, can be transfered to winmo.

Anyway, it is true that a lot of developers have moved over to android or wp7 or iphone. I don't think that there is a chance of bringing them back, but i do believe that a new developer team can take place, and fill in the "gaps". But these people need motivation, and most of the time, this means donations. People go where money go.

I am doing my part with RapidRead , when i saw that TapaTalk was not going to happen on winmo, i was pissed, so i decided to do it on my own.

Not alone

LOL I'm so glad that there are other people here who can see past the shiny. I have both a Rhodium and a Leo, and if the two had a baby that had the CPU and RAM of the Leo with the form factor of the Rhodium, it'd be awesome. I've always felt that if Microsoft decided to buy Sense from HTC and market the hell out of it that there'd be a whole lot more people using the phone.

Just the other day, I went into the T-Mobile store and the guy was trying to get me to buy an HD7. He was like, "Have you tried it out?"
Me: "Not really. Why would I want it?"
Him: "Try it, you'll like it."
Me: "So...does it do Swype?"
Him: "No."
Me: "Does it do Remote Desktop?"
Him: "No."
Me: "Does it sync SMS messages with Exchange 2010?"
Him: "No."
Me: "Can I use the SD card in mass storage mode?"
Him: "No."
Me: "Can I play XviD files natively?"
Him: "No."
Me: "So basically what you're telling me is that every feature I actually USE on my present phone is unavailable?"
Him: "...yes"
Me: (plants tongue in cheek) "You might want to work on your sales pitch a bit"

We both had a good laugh.

Joey

Good idea.
Personally I have tried Android on my HD2 and come back to WM 6.5.2 as WM still has convinience of functionalities relevant to corporate/business environment.

I'm not sure that other OS are easier to develop for, but then again I don't think this is the problem; in fact this might be the problem with other OSs. Frankly there are a lot of 'developers' that someone should take away their compilers, for example let’s consider background tasks. I have WM apps that do real time monitoring of something, and if an event occurs, they alert the user (who is rather happy and grateful to be alerted of the situation), now can I move that app to the iPhone or Windows Phone, nope, because they decided that since so many 'developers' have problems with running a task when it shouldn't, that they would fix the problem by simply removing the OS's ability to run apps in the background, certainly one way to fix the problem, but certainly not the only or perhaps the best way to fix the problem. Certainly there was some education presented around apps handling a WM_Hibernate event etc, but I think some user education is also needed no matter what platform is used as you can expect a small battery to run your phone, music, screen, GPS, Bluetooth, Wifi, etc as there are limits as to how much power you can store in a battery small enough to fit into a mobile device. Again the solution from a number of the platform vendors seems to have been to simply drop that capability, and again perhaps not the best solution as it again penalizes those who know how to manage power on their system and wanted to do those things for reasonable amounts of time or in powered situations (maybe this is the domain of a tablet for example, given its larger and can have a larger battery, but it’s not as mobile as a phone for example).

Now Gestures are another area supposedly where Windows Mobile is lacking and I have been spending a lot of time lately thinking about Gestures and what they are and how they are used, and I don't think that most people understand them or what they mean to an OS or app. The reality is a double click is as much a gesture as anything else, but the real issue with gestures is, there has to be a meaning associated with a gesture. Nodding or shaking my head is a gesture, but it only has meaning because there is a previous agreement between people as to what it means. An OS or an App is very much the same, either it knows that a gesture means or you provide it with a way to learn a gesture, but this is actually very difficult to do and really no OS or app is doing this currently.

So ultimately the question is, what is wrong with Window Mobile? Certainly the graphics are somewhat dated, but otherwise whats the problem? One huge problem is the Telco's. The concept of locking a phone means it can be locked to a contract and updating the phone means the contract can be updated (extended), and this is counterproductive to the technology. Telco's really don't want you getting an update as you might not update your phone and hence your contract (extend your contract). XDA is a threat to telcos in that if you update your own phone with the uber cool firmwares the chefs here make, then you are less likely to 'need' a new phone and less likely to extend your contract (you’ll likely keep your contract, but not in a locked in state) . It comes down to a simple question, why do people get new phones, what new functionality does a new phone offer? Some might claim that a new phone is more reliable, possibly (no doubt given in some ways its less capable it should be more reliable), I know my old HTC Universal was pretty good, and my HTC HD2 has been great, functionality wise I'm not sure what I'm lacking, in fact I often feel the newer OS are lacking. In short I don't know why people use other OS's on their phone as I can't think of a killer reason to move away from Windows Mobile other then lack of interest, but that hasn't been a problem yet.

Now how prevent lack of interest from becoming a problem? Developers go to where the money is (and the tools). Windows Mobile has some really good and mature development tools etc, but is there enough reward to motivate them. Certainly folks on XDA should chip in a donation to their favourite chef or two to help motivate and enable them to continue cooking up great firmwares. We need to hear some developer success stories so developers understand that worthy efforts will gain a worthy reward and certainly users need to understand that encouragement is needed otherwise Windows Mobile will lose what interest is remaining (certainly there are forces which are trying to suck away interest from Windows Mobile, so it really is up to the user community to resist and create its own interest). So what do users need to maintain or grow their interest in Windows Mobile?