WM7 - rumors of a possible resurgence of the platform

It seems that they really decided to throw WM6. Perhaps even with the old team. Honor and praise, what can I say?


(Yes, Zune is not a very popular player. But for the developer it’s * an order of magnitude more meaningful than WM. And this is now a determining factor, because it’s miserable because of the difficulty of moving to WM, compared with the simbo, what’s with the iphone, that with android. Well, the kernel (which is native api, that the implementation of the same Compact Framework) will be more decent there, as for mobile devices

Here is the translation of the original article on MobileCrunch , and my comments on it.
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Major changes:

1. WinMo 7 - this is in fact a copy of the core Zune HD . It is sharpened to one screen size and is designed for OLED devices. Microsoft will provide requirements for hardware manufacturers and will allow installing the OS only if they are followed. In particular, the minimum screen size and RAM are regulated, as well as the minimum processor speed.

This allows us to hope that at least there will be no brakes, see also p.3

2. The interface is similar to Zune HD's with the elements of the phone. Since HD defines the style of use and the interface, most likely the device will be with a capacitive multi-touch screen and buttons from the player.

And the devil knows. We'll see.

3. Now about the insides: in WinMo 7 there are no background processes , but there is an Apple-like event service. There is no access to system resources and multithreading. That is, no.

Less than 5 years, as they say. Although Maemo looks cooler. But such a system also has the right to life, in contrast to the battery-burning horror that was.

4. WinMo 7 will not support programs under 6.x. Point. It is based on Silverlight and .Net . Everything except some basic programs will not work on WinMo 7. We (mobilecrunch) do not expect it to be a “business device”, and the focus is now on games, including some of the XBox Live functionality for games and communication. There will be a Microsoft App store with a simple software publishing process .

Yes, lack of compatibility is bad. But what to do? Make a wrap for the kernel and return the image of the eternal brakes? In addition, the other logic of working with background processes is not so easy to twist.
Instead of being compatible with WM6, the Small Grain of MS Crossplatform Compatibility (Win / Mac / Linux / Zune / Xbox / WM) may well be obtained. From a strategic point of view - this is very serious.
But the “non-business device” is a much more controversial step, alas. On the other hand, the business ecosystem will live on WM6 much longer, they are not one of those who immediately change to cutting-edge devices. Perhaps, in 7.5 or 8.0, they will add a keyboard and other similar buns when developers try WM7.

5. There is no voice mail, possibly due to patent issues. The developers are a little upset. As far as we can tell, they are not sure that they want to move to a new platform. This is the “point of no return” and most likely marks the beginning of a global change in the Windows Mobile ecosystem. Also, most likely there will be an analogue of the Zune sync client for Mac , a thing that, in principle, has been long awaited.

And we will see. At least, Mac support at the expense of the client software on the dotnet is good and right. Some developers will leave, others will come. MS has already grown a good base on XBLA and Zune Marketplace, so the move is quite logical.

Let us see now whether the rumors will be confirmed.

This post can be commented on in my LiveJournal .

UPD: translated into Russian quotes :)