
Still no Windows Phone 8 SDK - ukdm
http://www.extremetech.com/computing/137621-two-weeks-away-still-no-sdk-windows-phone-8-teeters-on-the-edge-of-failure
======
yenoham
I find the list of Ryan Whitwam's blog posts on ExtremeTech
(<http://www.extremetech.com/author/rwhitwam>) to be almost universally
negative in tone. Maybe we should all just cheer up and see how this one goes.
Microsoft have done some innovation here, and I'm happy to try it out either
way.

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untog
_what are the first questions people ask when they get a new smartphone? They
don’t want to know the best way to expose data on the home screen; they want
to know which apps to download._

Agreed, but if MS shares with the _right_ 'limited audience', it could work
out OK. If they have Facebook, Twitter, Instagram (still looks doubtful), a
few more big names and a few major games, >80% of users will be fine. Us
techies won't be, of course.

Don't get me wrong- this still seems like a weird move from MS. But I don't
think it leaves them "teetering on the edge of failure".

~~~
Toshio
Substitute "Linux on the desktop" for windowsphone in your argument and this
is something we techies have been arguing forever. I would be fascinated if
you could explain how the position of today's windowsphone is in any way
different from the position of desktop Linux for the past 12 years.

~~~
cooldeal
Phones need a much more limited set of apps than a desktop or laptop. Many(not
all) people just use the phone functions plus Facebook, Maps, Twitter and a
couple of other apps and other use cases are covered by web apps. Multiple
studies have shown that most people use very few apps.

While with the PCs, if you don't have some applications(like say AAA games,
Office, Autocad etc.), it cuts away more of the potential audience than on a
phone.

~~~
freehunter
Phones also have the need of "my friends are playing X, I want to play X too".
Words with Friends and Draw Something being two fairly recent examples.
Windows Phone doesn't have these, so when my friends want to play their social
games with me, I have to use my Android tablet. Nokia has said the games will
be released at some point with a two-month exclusivity deal for Lumia phones
(which is ridiculous and hurts the ecosystem), but I don't think they've been
released yet.

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warrenmiller
Seeing as there are over 100k windows phone 7 apps already on the market which
will work on windows phone 8 this seems a little sensationalist.

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Metrop0218
Definitely a click bait title. Since all of the WP7 apps will run on WP8,
there really is not much risk in releasing the SDK with the phones. I agree
that it's not ideal, but I think that they're doing it this way because they
want to announce all of the new features at the same time as they release the
SDK.

~~~
randomfool
I've never _not_ been broken by a .NET update or service pack since .NET 3.0
(.NET 3.0, 3.5, 3.5 sp1, 4.0, 4.5).

This schedule rules out any chance for developers to catch these bugs and
report them.

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josteink
Compare that to Office 2013 which is not even out in beta-form and already has
lots of docs available.

This is pretty bad.

I dont think I've ever heard of a Microsoft launch like this.

~~~
ghurlman
Office 2013 is out in beta form (MS calls it a "preview"), and has been for
some time now.

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at-fates-hands
So many rippable quotes in this article. Here are just a few of my favorites:

"If you were expecting Windows Phone 8′s app ecosystem to be one of its main
selling points, think again."

Windows app ecosystem has never been one of its strongest setlling points. At
no time has its app store even come close to competing with Apple or Android.
Its main selling point is the integration with its existing platform. Bing
maps, Skydrive, Outlook, etc. I have no idea why this guy thought it should be
a major selling point now.

"A multitude of pundits have weighed in, and the consensus from them is that
Microsoft might just be buying time because the platform isn’t quite done
yet."

After Apple completely bungled their recent release, I would've thought there
was going to be some praise following this paragraph. The funny thing is, I'm
wondering if this guy even reads the articles on his own site. Just last week
this article was on their front page:

"Microsoft promises major Windows 8 app improvements before Oct 26 launch"
[http://www.extremetech.com/computing/137469-microsoft-
promis...](http://www.extremetech.com/computing/137469-microsoft-promises-
major-windows-8-app-improvements-before-oct-26-launch)

"Microsoft is letting marketing dictate the deployment of software instead of
what’s really best for the product"

FALSE. I would instead give them credit for seeing the failures of Apple's
release and the backlash which ensued. Can you fault them for making sure
their product is ready when it hits the stores?

"Almost any other company on the planet would have washed its hands of Windows
Phone after a second unsuccessful holiday season."

Yes, because supporting a handset manufacturer who just lost a multi-billion
dollar patent infringement case is so much safer right?

There's more, but these are the ones that stuck out at me.

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manojlds
I thought the reasoning was that MS didn't wand devs tomstop developing for
7.x and since these apps would run on 8 anyway, why not wait a while before
releasing the SDK.

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jamesmiller5
Maybe they don't want certain entities on their platform so they are holding
the SDK?

------
ivanbernat
What I'm worried about is MS removing XNA support in WP8.

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cooldeal
Microsoft had already announced previously that the SDK will be out at WP8
launch, there will be 100K+ WP7 apps available in the store at launch. The API
and dev tools went through a huge shift from Win CE as the kernel in WP7 to
the NT kernel in WP8. It makes more sense to launch when it's ready instead of
rushing it out to meet a deadline.

So the "two weeks away, still no SDK" is just trolling for page hits, and
unfortunately getting them.

~~~
katabatic
Actually, there has not really been a huge shift in the API _or_ the dev
tools.

Yes, there is a new native layer called "Windows Phone Runtime", which is a
partial, semi-overlapping subset of the Windows Runtime found in Windows 8.

However, it's partial and incomplete, and mostly targeted at game developers -
to access most of the features of Windows Phone 8, you need to write your apps
in a managed language, accessing the .NET API for Windows Phone, which is
pretty much the same as it's always been, with a few minor incompatibilities,
even in so-called "compatibility mode" for WP7 apps.

EDIT: That was a hideous run-on sentence, but I kinda like it.

~~~
cooldeal
>Actually, there has not really been a huge shift in the API or the dev tools.

I had meant dev tools as in the API and SDK code written by Microsoft. There
is no big change in the app developer facing dev tools, but internally the
kernel has shifted, thus Microsoft developers needed to port the same API to a
different kernel, so that's what I meant by a big change.

~~~
katabatic
Ah, gotcha - I misunderstood what you meant there.

I've seen the current state of the SDK and API, and while I understand porting
to a new kernel was probably a lot of work for them, it makes even less sense
considering that most of the WinRT APIs available in Win8 are not there in WP8
- it leaves me wondering what, exactly, they hoped to gain; so far it doesn't
seem like a win for developers, and you can't write a full-featured native app
for WP8. Maybe you'll be able to for WP9 (if the platform survives that long).

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mikemarotti
This UI they are pushing with Metro (or whatever it's called now) is
horrendous. Has nobody at Microsoft ever read a design book?

~~~
untog
Seriously? Metro (/Modern, whatever) has been almost universally praised by
designers. You're entitled to your own opinion on it, but suggesting that no-
one has read a design book is a bizarre statement.

~~~
dmix
I don't know... this UI would scare my mom away from using her phone:
<http://i.imgur.com/Sbh9x.png>

~~~
MSM
That's perfect, you just wrote their next marketing piece:

" _It's not your mother's phone_ "

~~~
sk5t
Recent Samsung Galaxy phone commercials have been mocking Apple for being
parent-friendly--e.g., hipster man-child 30-something is just holding his
parents' spot in line for an iPhone; they return, and mother asks "Is this the
line for apps?"

It's a nauseating commercial IMO... which isn't to say it isn't effective.

~~~
untog
I thought that part of the ad was an interesting counterpoint to the "I'm a
(boring, businessman-like) PC, I'm a (cool, hip, trendy) Mac" ads.

