Posts tagged Windows
Microsoft employees to get free Windows Phones
Jul 22nd
Honestly, they’re pretty sweet.
(Credit: Cnet)
Microsoft really is getting aggressive with the Windows Phone 7 platform, it seems. At a sales event in Atlanta earlier Wednesday, Microsoft announced to its employees that all of them–which number almost 90,000 globally–will be getting Windows Phone 7 devices, according to a Tech Flash report. It’s a good move on Microsoft’s part, as it clearly wants its employees using its own products, especially sales and PR people who have to deal with non-Microsoft people.
I live in Seattle, and there are thousands of Microsoft employees I can–and do–come across on any given day. Many of them currently use Windows Phone devices but not a majority, at least not from what I can tell. In fact, Apple’s iPhone, clearly the main target of the new mobile phone OS, is probably the most popular handset among employees at Redmond.
That has to be embarrassing and likely the main catalyst for the move. It echoes something Apple did back in 2007 when the iPhone was first announced; Apple called an all-hands company meeting, where Steve Jobs announced that all full-time employees who’d worked at Apple for more than a year would be getting free iPhones.
No details on when or exactly which models will be available, or which carriers employees can choose from, but two Microsoft employees I’ve talked to welcomed the news. One, an avid iPhone user, is excited about what she’s seen of Windows Phone 7, which I agree is a huge step forward. The other, who’s never had a smart phone, just wants something he can play games on. They should both be grateful they’re getting full-featured, real WinPho 7 devices; we hear there are still a few thousand Kins laying around.
Can Windows Phone 7 Save Microsoft’s Mobile Bacon?
Jul 19th
Windows Phone 7 is inching closer to market. Microsoft has sent the operating system for its brand of mobile phones to the labs of carriers for testing, as well as to developers of applications for the phones, which are expected to reach the market in time for holiday shoppers.
According to one report, the so-called “technical preview” version of WinPho 7 is pretty much what Microsoft promised earlier this year at the Mobile World Conference in January and its own MIX Conference in March.
(See Related: Windows Phone 7: An In-depth Look at the Features and Interface )
After its attempt to create a unified experience for its mobile users, a la Apple, with its own hardware ended in disaster, Microsoft has decided with this version of its mobile operating system to achieve that goal by getting tough with hardware and software makers, making them conform to a basic set of standards for the new WinPho ecosystem. Applications, for example, must be sold through the Microsoft Marketplace, just as iPhone apps are sold only through the iTunes store.
There are hardware requirements, too. Phones must have a minimum of 256MB of RAM, 4GB of flash memory storage, WiFi (b/g) support, capacitive touchscreens and GPS, accelerometer, compass, proximity and light sensors. All the phones will have the same buttons in the same places, including a Bing button for encouraging anyone buying the phone to use Microsoft’s search engine to find things.
In attempting to emulate Apple and Research in Motion by encapsulating its new ecosystem in a silo, Microsoft apparently hopes to emulate the success of those other vendors in the mobile market. That could be shortsighted. Some analysts believe the reason phones based on Google’s Android operating system have surpassed the iPhone is because that ecosystem is open. They argue that semi-closed systems like Apple’s will have to open up to stay competitive. If that’s the case, the WinPho paradigm may be a step behind the market before it’s even out the door.
In addition, no matter how spiffy Windows Phone 7 mobiles turn out to be, Microsoft has some serious challenges facing it in this market. First, it has to overcome its reputation as a bumbler, based on past failures and poorly performing products. Second, it’s facing two very formidable market leaders who know how (at least until the latest antenna fiasco with the iPhone 4) to get things right the first time. Microsoft has a reputation of requiring numerous iterations of a product before getting it right. And third, there’s an 800-pound gorilla named Hewlett-Packard in the wings that, with its newly acquired Palm platform, could be a wild card in divvying up market share.
Can Windows Phone 7 Save Microsoft’s Mobile Bacon?
Jul 19th
Windows Phone 7 is inching closer to market. Microsoft has sent the operating system for its brand of mobile phones to the labs of carriers for testing, as well as to developers of applications for the phones, which are expected to reach the market in time for holiday shoppers.
According to one report, the so-called “technical preview” version of WinPho 7 is pretty much what Microsoft promised earlier this year at the Mobile World Conference in January and its own MIX Conference in March.
(See Related: Windows Phone 7: An In-depth Look at the Features and Interface )
After its attempt to create a unified experience for its mobile users, a la Apple, with its own hardware ended in disaster, Microsoft has decided with this version of its mobile operating system to achieve that goal by getting tough with hardware and software makers, making them conform to a basic set of standards for the new WinPho ecosystem. Applications, for example, must be sold through the Microsoft Marketplace, just as iPhone apps are sold only through the iTunes store.
There are hardware requirements, too. Phones must have a minimum of 256MB of RAM, 4GB of flash memory storage, WiFi (b/g) support, capacitive touchscreens and GPS, accelerometer, compass, proximity and light sensors. All the phones will have the same buttons in the same places, including a Bing button for encouraging anyone buying the phone to use Microsoft’s search engine to find things.
In attempting to emulate Apple and Research in Motion by encapsulating its new ecosystem in a silo, Microsoft apparently hopes to emulate the success of those other vendors in the mobile market. That could be shortsighted. Some analysts believe the reason phones based on Google’s Android operating system have surpassed the iPhone is because that ecosystem is open. They argue that semi-closed systems like Apple’s will have to open up to stay competitive. If that’s the case, the WinPho paradigm may be a step behind the market before it’s even out the door.
In addition, no matter how spiffy Windows Phone 7 mobiles turn out to be, Microsoft has some serious challenges facing it in this market. First, it has to overcome its reputation as a bumbler, based on past failures and poorly performing products. Second, it’s facing two very formidable market leaders who know how (at least until the latest antenna fiasco with the iPhone 4) to get things right the first time. Microsoft has a reputation of requiring numerous iterations of a product before getting it right. And third, there’s an 800-pound gorilla named Hewlett-Packard in the wings that, with its newly acquired Palm platform, could be a wild card in divvying up market share.
Microsoft set to co-fund Windows Phone 7 software development
Jul 16th
Microsoft, which has witnessed competitors like Apple and Google grab the spotlight in the mobile phone space, acknowledged Thursday that it is willing to co-fund software development projects for its Windows Phone 7 platform.
This tactic, however, is not new to Microsoft, according to a statement from the company. But a company representative said Microsoft itself had not previously co-funded development projects in such a manner.
[ InfoWorld's Paul Krill reported this week that developers' initial reaction to a Windows Phone 7 beta software development kit was tepid. ]
“Windows Phone 7 is a significantly more ambitious effort than anything we’ve attempted before; the target customer base is bigger, the developer community and opportunity is bigger, and our efforts to redesign the UI and developer platform have been significant,” Microsoft said.
“This expanded scope offers a tremendous new developer opportunity that we are supporting with investments in traditional activity that predominantly benefit the majority of our extensive developer community: free professional tools, online as well as personal support, test devices, events and hands-on labs, training, marketing support, and in some more limited cases, co-funding strategic projects,” the company said.
Microsoft said the scope of its opportunity is new but its developer evangelistic tactics are not.
“We have a long history of engaging with developers to offer support in the creation of compelling apps. The limited use of co-funding to help initiate strategic projects is not new to Microsoft; furthermore, developers tell us that we do not engage in any co-funding activity outside the scope of our competitors,” the company said.
A Microsoft representative brushed aside the notion that the company was undertaking such ambitious moves to bolster Windows Phone 7 because its profile is overshadowed by other companies in the mobile phone market.
“Microsoft is doing this because Windows Phone 7 represents a significantly more ambitious effort than anything they’ve attempted before,” the representative said.
Windows Phone 7 was announced in February. The first phones running the OS are due this coming holiday season. Meanwhile, Apple’s iPhone and Google’s Android have built prominent profiles in the smartphone arena, with Microsoft taking a back seat.
This article, “Microsoft set to co-fund Windows Phone 7 software development,” was originally published at InfoWorld.com. Follow the latest developments in business technology news and get a digest of the key stories each day in the InfoWorld Daily newsletter and on your mobile device at infoworldmobile.com.
Read more about developer world in InfoWorld’s Developer World Channel.
Windows Phone 7 can be remotely located, wiped
Jul 13th
Lose your phone much? If so, you may want to consider one running Windows Phone 7 (WP7) for your next replacement.
With this new OS, Microsoft will offer a service that will help locate missing phones. And if the phone can’t be retrieved, a free service will also lock or wipe the phone so the information can’t be accessed by others, said Andy Lees, Microsoft senior vice president of mobile.
Lees mentioned this feature during his presentation of Windows Phone 7 Tuesday at the Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference in Washington, D.C.
Although Microsoft has admitted to falling behind in the heated race for smartphone OSes, it is working to leapfrog the Apple iOS and Google Android with its next generation smartphone OS.
The company has scheduled WP7 for release toward the end of the year.
One of the services that Microsoft will offer with each running copy of the WP7 will be a companion Web page, Lees said. From this Web page, a user can call their phone and listen for its ring, or get information about its location.
“If you lost your phone, it will tell you where it is. You can ring it, lock it, wipe it whatever you like,” Lees said.
For the audience, Lees demonstrated the WP7, which is markedly different from the iPhone and the Android. Instead of filling the screen with individual app icons, the phone interface will be based on tiles, or small blocks that serve as clickable entry points to topics, or “hubs,” as Lees called them.
One hub might be for people. One might be dedicated to photos. Another may be for music. One might be for the office application. Each hub will bring together data from multiple local and cloud-based applications. A contacts hub, for instance, can group work contacts from Microsoft Exchange, along with personal contacts from Facebook.
Microsoft is also working on ways to more tightly integrate applications. For instance, when the user is sent an invitation to a meeting, the Exchange-based e-mail client can check with the Exchange-based calendar to see if that time slot is also taken. Clicking on an address in an e-mail can bring up a map of the address’ location, and offer directions from the user’s current location. The Bing search client can check the user’s location, so that a query for movies lists the showtimes of the nearest theaters.
Lees also addressed how the audience, mostly Microsoft business partners, could work with the phone. “This phone is for business and consumers,” he said.
Windows Phone 7 is being built with Microsoft’s Silverlight, .NET and XNA, a collection of tools for game development. “This means that you can take assets you have already developed [for the PC and the Xbox] and transfer them over for the phone,” Lees told the audience.
One of the chief virtues of the phone will be its unified code base, Lees said.
The mobile phone handset industry has “a problem with fragmentation with the phones,” Lees said, perhaps alluding to putative fragmentation of the Android code base. With WP7, “you [will] have a very consistent hardware target. You won’t have to worry about lots of screen sizes or the capabilities of the phone. You design once and the app will run with 100 percent consistency,” he promised the audience.
On Tuesday, Microsoft released a beta version of its WP7 develop tool set. The company is also finalizing WP7′s set of application programming interfaces. HTC, Samsung, LG and Dell have all pledged to design WP7 phones, Lees said.
This is an important time in the mobile phone industry, Lees said.
“What happens over the next five years will define the industry for the following 10,” he said. “We believe [WP7] is a completely new strategy, we believe it is a completely different kind of phone.”
Joab Jackson covers enterprise software and general technology breaking news for The IDG News Service. Follow Joab on Twitter at @Joab_Jackson. Joab’s e-mail address is Joab_Jackson@idg.com
First Windows 7 Phone, HTC Gold, is Out Soon
Jul 8th
Omio.com announced an alleged leak from a UK mobile phone operator that includes the release schedule of more than one mobile phone, including HTC Gold.
According to the mobile phone comparison site Omio.com, the first mobile phone that will work on windows-7 software, will be out by November 2010 from HTC, a Chinese manufacturer. This phone is said to be working on dual core.
The widely expected mobile phone named HTC Gold is thought to be similar to the windows-operated phones, released in February 2010, but it will be running at 1.5 Hz with screen resolution of 240PPI.
Despite the rumor being so detailed, HTC has not confirmed this news yet. The rumors’ tendency to be ‘a real thing’ increased when Microsoft analysts stated that the release date of this handset matches Microsoft’s roadmap.
The site also claims other releases from Nokia, Sony, and Samsung. The site includes the launch date of the brand new Blackberry Curve 9300. The release of HTC Gold in November is also accompanied with the release of Android OS 3.0 Gingerbread in October, both working on a dual core platform.
Information regarding the big launch of HTC Gold, came out, when some hackers managed to find the carrier codes of mobile networks in United States.
Motorola targets enterprise with US ES400 PDA Windows phone
Jun 27th
Motorola this week added a mobile phone for enterprise workers, designed to link sales people, health visitors or any SME employee to enterprise resources. It’s a direct attack on the Blackberry market and has a full qwerty keyboard in the familiar fat candy bar design and is aimed at field service, field sales, retail, healthcare, utilities, manufacturing, transportation and distribution businesses. It will partner with Sprint to sell the device.
The device comes out of the Enterprise Mobility Solutions division of Motorola, and is called the ES400 global Enterprise Digital Assistant (EDA). It comes with mobile enterprise apps plus push-to-talk.
Motorola bills this as its smallest and lightest EDA which runs on Microsoft Windows Mobile 6.5, and features the customizable Motorola enterprise UI. The device offers photo annotation, Bar Code scanning and has a super-bright, 3 inch VGA touch screen, which doubles as a light source, and which works best with a stylus. Battery life naturally is a single full work shift in nearly any work environment, although you can buy an extended-life battery as well
The ES400 has WiFi, GSM, HSPA as well as CDMA EVDO RevA connections and allows push-to-talk over VoIP. For the security conscious it can come with a built-in biometric fingerprint reader and Motorola offers a series of centralized apps for managing and keeping track of a bunch of these phones.
This phone also offers GPS, a 3.2 megapixel camera, 3-axis accelerometer and will be the first Motorola mobile computer to be carrier-branded, stocked and sold to enterprises through the Sprint Direct and Business Solutions Partners sales channels.
“This device was built with the business user in mind; with its compact size and advanced applications leveraging the Sprint 3G network, Motorola’s ES400 is a breakthrough enterprise-class device that can meet the needs of business users who are constantly seeking ways to boost individual and team productivity,” said Danny Bowman, president – Integrated Solutions Group, Sprint.
