
Microsoft Announces Continuum, Turning Windows 10 Phones into Desktops - redknight666
http://techcrunch.com/2015/04/29/microsoft-announces-continuum-turning-windows-10-phones-into-desktops/
======
bhauer
This gets incrementally closer to an ideal computing model I call "personal
application omnipresence" [1]. Notably it brings a presumably-standard means
for applications to scale their views to myriad input/output capabilities on
the fly. Attach a monitor and the view expands and adjusts accordingly; attach
a keyboard and the UI adjusts accordingly.

This is great progress, but I remain fixed in my desire for singular running
instances of my personal applications to run on an application server I
control and to which I attach views from all of my devices. I want to have a
singular e-mail application that I see on all of my devices. I want to have a
singular web browser application that I see on all my devices. And so on.

We need to make my many devices appear as one rather than making a single
device act as many devices.

[1] [http://tiamat.tsotech.com/pao](http://tiamat.tsotech.com/pao)

~~~
alyx
You can technically do this today albeit with some overhead.

Spin up an Azure VM, install all the apps you desire and configure it as you
want.

Every other PC you own, becomes just a head display, using RDP you can use a
single dedicated VM.

The overhead here becomes that you still need to have full blown OS installed
on the heads, however their specs can be very limited (compared to the VM).

~~~
stephengillie
As well as double-digit latency, maybe even triple-digit at times, solely from
general internet transit.

~~~
freehunter
And being blocked by basically everything in existence. I installed a desktop
on Linode and Google blocked me from even their search product. Many other
sites had blocks set up or at least CAPTCHAs. If you have browsing activity
coming from a datacenter, everyone assumes it's a bot. Geo IP gets messed up
too. Really hard to get any work done like that.

~~~
walterbell
Does this blocking also apply to VPNs which are likely routing through data
centers? One would think that most botnets are running on compromised consumer
networks.

~~~
stephengillie
Botnets must leverage their infected host's internet connection. Almost all
anti-bot tools use IP/rate metrics to identify the classic DOS: a large number
of connections from a few IPs.

To get around Threatstop, Distil, and other solutions, we see attackers having
to use 100+ different source IPs during their coordinated attacks.

~~~
walterbell
Low-traffic botnets could be clicking on ads, simulating normal usage
patterns.

------
techwizrd
This is something Canonical and Ubuntu have been trying to do for a while.
It's definitely interesting to think about as phones become the de factor
computing devices.

~~~
shock
It appears Canonical are already doing it:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3PUYoa1c9M](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3PUYoa1c9M)

I found the demo pretty impressive.

~~~
emehrkay
This is really really nice. I'm glad to see that they didn't abandon the phone
to desktop model that they originally promised. This is the future right here.
Its just so bland looking. I know that doesn't really matter, but they need
some good ui/ux people to really sell this thing.

------
clumsysmurf
As a long time Android developer this has me super interested!

After years of writing apps (toys), struggling with design decisions made to
get java running on 2007-level hardware like: 64k method limit, components
with crazy life-cycles making concurrency difficult without leaking things,
frankenstein Java ecosystem, brittle and complicated build system...

Microsoft comes along and says "screw that shit", write mobile Applications as
/desktop/ applications using C#, F#, or C++.

This is also masterful because, as Windows Phone market share is hovering at
almost zero, many people who simply need a low-powered device like chromebook,
tablet, can just get a phablet Windows Phone and presto, they are now Windows
Desktop /and/ Phone users.

From an app monetization standpoint, its great because now I can make money on
form factors from phone, tablet, laptop, desktop with one code base - instead
of Android (phone) and which has more or less failed on tablets.

~~~
lcedp
What do you mean by "write mobile Applications as desktop application"? How
would it be possible on mobile devices e.g. with limited RAM?

------
andor
This was demoed in the Build Keynote presentation, jump to 3:55:15:

[http://channel9.msdn.com/?wt.mc_id=build_hp](http://channel9.msdn.com/?wt.mc_id=build_hp)

~~~
blinkingled
Wow. Parts of that demo really seem to be inspired from Android. The hamburger
menu, the black navigation bar at the bottom, the slide out menus etc.

But the potential really is in the Phone->PC continuum. If I can take a beefy
x86 phone (Intel seems to be inching closer to that reality) running windows
and use it like phone most time and then dock it onto a big screen with
keyboard and mouse - that really is a killer feature. It could change things
in Microsoft's favor if they manage to get the integration and hardware parts
right.

(I should say that the concept is not new - Motorola tried that with the Atrix
- but it was underpowered hardware, flakey software and little integration
that killed it. From the looks of it Microsoft seems to be geared to address
all three rather well.)

~~~
walterbell
This future would benefit from universal, non-proprietary docking stations,
for the same reason we have standardized plugs/sockets for power, ethernet,
USB, etc.

~~~
vidarh
The new USB Type C standard can provide up to 100W of power, while at the same
time letting you use it to send DisplayPort (and you can connect to HDMI or
DVI devices with a simple adapter) signalling. And your network connection.

But with wireless charging + wireless data/display casting chances are it
won't be that long before you won't need a wire for any of this most of the
time.

~~~
walterbell
There are still some security advantages to dedicated KVM ports, compared to
shared transports like wireless and USB.

~~~
vidarh
That may be so, but how many people do you think will care?

~~~
walterbell
The few with financially valuable digital assets?

~~~
vidarh
In my experience, the people I know with the most assets are also the most
careless people I know when it comes to security (passwords includes initials
+ birth date, name of children, name of the family dog and similar...)

That includes several quite wealthy tech founders...

------
late2part
I'm no MSFT fanboy, but this is a big deal. Within 10 years, if not 5, we'll
plug all of our phones into keyboards and monitors; and only the odd geek nerd
will have a desktop or proper laptop.

~~~
wampus
I'm excited about this, too, but I'm not going to hold my breath. I can't
connect a bluetooth keyboard to my Lumia 920, or treat it as a USB mass
storage device, or mount a thumb drive in its USB port, etc. Why should I
believe they'll let me connect "future devices" to an external display? When I
install Windows 10 on my phone, will I be able to remote desktop to it?
Probably not.

~~~
anonymfus
>I can't connect a bluetooth keyboard to my Lumia 920

You can since WP8.1 GDR2.

>Why should I believe they'll let me connect "future devices" to an external
display

People can connect latest Lumias with Miracast support to external display for
mirroring. Sadly, 920 is not one of them.

[http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/how-
to/wp8/connectivity/pr...](http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/how-
to/wp8/connectivity/project-my-phone-screen)

> mount a thumb drive in its USB port

This will be supported on future devices according to this:

[https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-
us/library/windows/hardware/dn...](https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-
us/library/windows/hardware/dn957036.aspx)

>treat it as a USB mass storage device

This will probably be never supported because implementing it will require
disconnecting storage from phone's OS and MTP is supposed to be enough.

Edit: miracast is not supported on 920.

~~~
voltagex_
I wish I knew enough about Android USB to write a USB gadget driver that
emulated FAT and Mass Storage - no reason it couldn't read/write sanely back
to the host FS. Sure it wouldn't be as quick as native but it'd be enough to
play MP3s on car stereos and the like.

------
josho
Two thoughts here. I love the contrast between Apple and Microsoft. That is
Microsoft frequently announces products/technologies with no shipping dates.
While on the other side of the spectrum Apple builds out their products in
secrecy announcing only when they have a ship date. As a developer building on
their platforms I prefer Apple's approach as it lowers my risk of developing
against a vapourware product.

Second, I'm betting Microsoft announced this before its ready in order to get
out ahead of Apple and Android's mobile dominance and be seen as a leader in
mobile. Though, I'd also bet that given where current technology is Apple's
Continuity approach provides the better experience today. But, no doubt what
Microsoft showed is the future.

~~~
melling
Microsoft did invent the term vaporware and they've been using it to their
advantage for decades:

[http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaporware](http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaporware)

~~~
kemiller
I suspect it doesn't work as well when you're a marginal player (as they are
in mobile today) as when you're the 800-lb gorilla.

Edit: I suppose this is a case of them trying to pull the conversation back to
the place where they ARE an 800-lb gorilla. I just don't see them as being as
dominant even on the desktop as they once were.

------
mrmondo
This is the first thing Microsoft has done in 10 years that truly interests
me. This is exactly what I was hoping for with a Linux based smartphone
similar to what Ubuntu was going to do.

------
mark_l_watson
I was hoping for this from Android phones. My Note 4 has 3 gigs of RAM and a
fast processor. I bought a HDMI converter to hook it up to a large monitor but
the connection was problematic.

I would argue that the amount of SSD storage on phones is not too big of an
issue. More as a learning experience than anything else, I augmented my Linux
and Mac laptops with a little Windows 8.1 HP Stream 11 this year that only has
a 32 gig drive (with another 32 gigs added via a memory card). With OneDrive,
not having much disk space is not much of an issue. I installed git, bash,
IntelliJ, Java 8, and my current writing projects with enough room to spare
because a lot of what I access (infrequently) can live in the cloud and only
be cached locally if needed.

Anyway, my Android Note 4 has a pretty good Java IDE, useful apps (including
Office 365 and my favorite games) and really could be my primary computer with
excellent docking support. Add cloud development tools like nitrous.io, web
version of visual studio, etc., and we are getting close to what should end up
being the future of the way most people interact with productivity and
entertainment devices.

------
IanDrake
They said they're waiting for hardware for this to actually work. I believe
they're waiting for new Intel chips for phones.

~~~
bryanlarsen
They mentioned HDMI (presumably MHL) in the article, which surprised me, since
I expected it to be USB type C that they're waiting for. That would allow the
monitor to act as a docking station. 11-pin MHL would also allow this, but
it's uncommon and not on any current generation phones, AFAICT.

~~~
Guvante
It depends how you want the hardware to work. If you want people to bring
their own monitors then you need to support HDMI.

I would expect a docking station that charged the phone and had a built in USB
port. Said docking station could hook up via USB-C and use a displayport mode
to send the data across of course.

In either case though saying HDMI is for the best as it sends the signal of
"works with your hardware" versus "works with hardware we will be releasing".

~~~
bryanlarsen
I expect that USB type C support on monitors will become ubiquitous in the
next couple of years.

------
mikelat
I'm surprised the technology isn't "fast enough" yet. Most top end phones are
quad core, output 1080p, have 2-4gb ram, etc. Specs like that easily meet the
listed minimum requirements of windows... odd.

They're now basically giving google and apple time to easily catch up to what
could of been a killer feature that sells windows phones.

~~~
Gustomaximus
This seems an all too obvious entry into the enterprise environment for their
mobile platform whilst strengthening the moat to their current desktop.
Possibly for the education market too.

I'm surprised this hasn't come earlier and would be further surprised if this
isn't a top priority. I'm 100% sold if it remains a snappy platform running a
couple of screens and heavy-ish excel files in a native environment.

------
rgbrenner
This was what excited me the most about Ubuntu's Edge smartphone (2013):
[https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/ubuntu-
edge](https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/ubuntu-edge)
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtNhlVn3ETQ&t=1m56s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtNhlVn3ETQ&t=1m56s)

Happy to see someone copied it.

------
MichaelMoser123
i remember this article from ten years ago by Phil Greenspun; he predicted
that this was going to happen some day.

[http://philip.greenspun.com/business/mobile-phone-as-home-
co...](http://philip.greenspun.com/business/mobile-phone-as-home-
computer.html)

------
Spooky23
It annoys me that Apple didn't ship this a few years ago. We had business
units test switching to 100% iPad with VDI, and many of them actually enjoyed
it.

It would be fairly trivial to deliver a great experience like this. In my
case, I'd have 20,000 iPhone user ditching laptops.

------
castell
HTML5 with CSS3 (offline) web apps offer that, Motorola Android offered that
called "WebTop"
([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_Atrix_4G](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_Atrix_4G)),
Ubuntu Phone offers that, Apple's continuity offers that. Windows RunTime apps
may offer that in future - no specific date.

Microsoft had all the technology already for years inbuilt in Windows and
Win32 API, called Windows Terminal Server and Remote Desktop (RDP) - it works
great with all Windows applications in enterprise. Yet Microsoft hasn't
delivered it yet to consumer devices.

    
    
      Microsoft to agree to license Citrix technology for 
      Windows NT Server 4.0, which resulted in Windows Terminal 
      Server Edition in 1998
    

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citrix_Systems](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citrix_Systems)

------
PhasmaFelis
Heh. So after everyone accused Windows 8 of turning your desktop into a phone,
Microsoft has decided to shift into reverse?

------
alexkavon
Not exactly announced today...but hey who really fact checks these days?

------
dharma1
reminds me of
[https://youtu.be/c3PUYoa1c9M?t=55s](https://youtu.be/c3PUYoa1c9M?t=55s)

------
venomsnake
Will you have administrator privileges? And side loading? Otherwise it is of
no use at all.

~~~
Guvante
I think the huge ecosystem of apps out there thoroughly disproves your point.

Honestly I love the permission scheme of the app stores compared to my
desktop. Being able to control what the app can do is massively better than
the desktop system of "runs as user".

On the topic of root, I would hope we would work towards a time when it wasn't
necessary rather than using it as a crutch.

~~~
venomsnake
On desktop you have more control - you can firewall, code inject, rewrite
dlls, crack, cheatengine stuff and so on. Root means ownership of your device.
And not being confined to a walled garden ... so while a future in which root
is not used is terrific, a future in which root does not belong to the user is
terrifying ...

~~~
Guvante
I would agree that root being an option is a huge win for consumers but I
still believe that root not being the default is good for computing as a
whole.

