Unutterably Silly So what are you doing RIGHT NOW?

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by Iridal

I just found out I've won a HTC Snap:


Hmmm, I wonder what I'll do with it

Congratulations! Please keep us informed! How did you win it?

[Iridal]

Originally Posted by kennyc

Congratulations! Please keep us informed! How did you win it?

I'm part of an online panel, I just fill in a questionnaire every now and then. This is the first time I've actually won something. Seems like I hit the jackpot

[kennyc]

Should be a nice phone. It's going to be interesting to see how the Windows phones play against iPhone and Android....

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by Iridal

I just found out I've won a HTC Snap....

Originally Posted by Iridal

I'm part of an online panel, I just fill in a questionnaire every now and then. This is the first time I've actually won something. Seems like I hit the jackpot

Sweet! Congratulations!

[GeoffC]

Congratulations ....

[desertblues]

Congrats, Iridal. You're a lucky girl.

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by kennyc

Should be a nice phone. It's going to be interesting to see how the Windows phones play against iPhone and Android....

MS has done a rewrite of Windows Mobile, and is trying to get back into the smartphone market. Nokia's new CEO has signed a deal with them, which is interesting, considering that Nokia owns Symbian, and was in the process of making it open source to spur developer activity.

Part of Nokia's problem seems to be that they haven't had a home run product lately, and that tends to induce phone manufacturers to toss out the abby with the bathwater.

Given the popularity of Android, and the raft of products out and in the pipeline using it, I think Nokia has an uphill battle.
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Dennis

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

MS has done a rewrite of Windows Mobile, and is trying to get back into the smartphone market....

Do you have any knowledge on how successful the re-write was? By all accounts I've heard, the old Windows CE (a version of Windows Mobile, I believe) was pretty pathetic.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

Do you have any knowledge on how successful the re-write was? By all accounts I've heard, the old Windows CE (a version of Windows Mobile, I believe) was pretty pathetic.

There is this: http://download.cnet.com/8301-20_4-1...in;contentBody

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by kennyc

There is this: http://download.cnet.com/8301-20_4-1...in;contentBody

Thanks for that, Kenny. While the tone of the article was overall upbeat (it can sync with Macs!), it does seem as if a few goodies were noticeably missing, like copy-and-paste. And no flash? Who do they think they are, Apple?

[kennyc]

Welp, the Xoom was released without Flash as well but it is supposed to be available to update in a few weeks.... I actually tried using it to go to my bank last night and got a "flash is required to log in" error -- that's only the second time I've inadvertently run into that (movies and videos are an issue as well)

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

Do you have any knowledge on how successful the re-write was? By all accounts I've heard, the old Windows CE (a version of Windows Mobile, I believe) was pretty pathetic.

None whatever.

MS has been through several iterations. What was originally Windows CE became Windows Mobile, which was reportedly an improvement. The previous version of Windows Mobile was 6. I believe the current is Windows Mobile 7.

I don't have and have not used a Windows Mobile based device, so I can't say from experience how well they work or what the experience of using them is.

It looks like Nokia's CEO may be hitching his wagon to MS's star, which is risky: it depends on whether "Powered by Windows Mobile" will be seen as a desirable feature by the smartphone market.

It's curious. Previously, the majority of smartphones ran some flavor of Symbian, and Symbian was developed by a consortium of smartphone makers with Nokia owning the biggest share of it. But it was relatively invisible, and I wonder how many users of Symbian based phones were even aware Symbian was under the hood. They weren't buying the phone because it ran Symbian.

Nokia decided a while back to buy the shares of Symbian it didn't own from the other members of the consortium, then began the process of making it open source to stir developer involvement. Nokia also has Maemo, a Linux based OS they use in their Internet Tablet line. The newest N900 model adds phone features and joins the smartphone ranks. (A friend bought one while getting Droids for wife and daughter because he could get root on it without jumping through hoops.)

The Internet Tablets were apparently a stealth project within Nokia, whose developers had to beg, borrow, and steal the resources needed and do a lot of development on their own time, because senior management wore smartphone blinders. It was also open source, another source of speed bumps in the development road, because Nokia still used the traditional corporate development model.

The original Internet Tablet sold well enough that Nokia couldn't keep it in stock, and has spawned several further models. I've no idea what the effect of Nokia's move may be on them.

But we seem to be moving to a state where what OS a phone runs is a selling point, as witness the success of Android. MS certainly has recognition in the market, but the main users I can think of of Windows Mobile devices were business users who wanted devices running a flavor of what also ran on their desktop/laptop and on the servers in the computer room, to make life easier in terms of support and network access. The consumer market doesn't have that motivation, and buys phones as much as fashion statements as for functionality.

Will a Nokia phone powered by Windows Mobile be seen as "cool"? I think Nokia may find out the hard way.
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Dennis

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

Thanks for that, Kenny. While the tone of the article was overall upbeat (it can sync with Macs!), it does seem as if a few goodies were noticeably missing, like copy-and-paste. And no flash? Who do they think they are, Apple?

Maybe they are hoping HTML5 will take over the world, and they won't need Flash for video support.

Yes, HTML5 has a <video> tag, and can embed video without using Flash, but you still need a video codec, and HTML5 does not specify what to use. Right now, the leader is H.264, but that's proprietary, based on patented technology, with license fees. Firefox does not support it because they can't offer the code in source form like the rest of the browser, and Google, whose Chrome browser did support it, has announced pending dropping of support because they want to make everything available in source form, too, and a couple of open source codecs have reached comparable performance levels to H.264. The main folks I can think of using H.264 for video are YouTube, who have a beta HTML5 site, but Google owns YouTube, so I expect that to change.

Meanwhile, MS has an interesting relationship with Adobe. For example, you can get a free add-on from Microsoft for MS Office that will let you Save As PDF in Office apps. Why not just include it with Office? Apparently, because if they did, they'd have to pay Adobe license fees, whereas offering it as a free download from the Microsoft Update site, they don't...
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Dennis

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

Maybe they are hoping HTML5 will take over the world, and they won't need Flash for video support.

Yes, HTML5 has a <video> tag, and can embed video without using Flash, but you still need a video codec, and HTML5 does not specify what to use. Right now, the leader is H.264, but that's proprietary, based on patented technology, with license fees. Firefox does not support it because they can't offer the code in source form like the rest of the browser, and Google, whose Chrome browser did support it, has announced pending dropping of support because they want to make everything available in source form, too, and a couple of open source codecs have reached comparable performance levels to H.264. The main folks I can think of using H.264 for video are YouTube, who have a beta HTML5 site, but Google owns YouTube, so I expect that to change.

Meanwhile, MS has an interesting relationship with Adobe. For example, you can get a free add-on from Microsoft for MS Office that will let you Save As PDF in Office apps. Why not just include it with Office? Apparently, because if they did, they'd have to pay Adobe license fees, whereas offering it as a free download from the Microsoft Update site, they don't...
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Dennis

And Adobe just released a Flash to HTML5 converter.....

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by kennyc

And Adobe just released a Flash to HTML5 converter.....

Ah, yes, this: http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/wallaby/

(Which is apparently in response to Apple iOS non-support of Flash. )

It will be interesting to see how this does.
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Dennis