KennyB123
AT&T’s Fall Mango Lineup Pictured
The Windows Phone Blog just unveiled some official press photos of all three new phones being released on AT&T in the coming 1-2 months. These include the Samsung Focus S, the budget-minded Samsung Focus Flash, and the giant 4.7″ screened HTC Titan. Although pricing and official release dates are still unknown, let’s just let the photos speak for themselves. See the all of the photos after the break.
IM+ getting update to version 1.4 – with extra features and a large caveat
When IM+ was originally released on Windows Phone 7, it was missing Windows Live Messenger capabilities. It was cited that Microsoft asked them not to include it. Then, an update came out, and it was included. Now, it appears Microsoft has once again requested IM+ to remove this functionality.
From IM+’s Facebook page…
Dear IM+ Windows Phone users,
This is sort of good news / bad news announcement.
Good news: IM+ Windows Phone version 1.4 has been submitted to Microsoft Marketplace with new awesome features, complete list will follow.
Bad news: MSN/WLM support has been dropped due to Microsoft request. For those of you who care more about MSN/WLM support than new features (again, new features list will follow), we strongly recommend to do not update once version 1.4 is released.
You have every right to ignore the update once it goes live, if you use WLM with IM+. Of course, we all know that WLM is integrated into WP7 Mango, and I can personally attest that it works flawlessly. If you choose to ignore the update, this is what you miss…
- Significantly improved contact list scrolling and overall application performance
- Push-to-Email option allows incoming messages to be forwarded to your email
- Autoreply feature will instantly notify your contacts that your are in Push mode
- ICQ / AIM / AOL / iChat group chats
- ICQ contacts can now be added into your AOL/AIM/iChat contact lists and vice versa
- VKontakte and Yandex IM services are now supported
Will you update? Or will you hold off until you have Mango on your phone?
WP7 Challenge – Molly Wood’s Week 1 Thoughts
Molly Wood has accepted Brandon Watson’s WP7 Mango Challenge as we reported HERE and HERE. Today, she posted her Week 1 impressions.
In the Pro’s section, Molly loved the Live Tiles, lock screen notifications, and the Metro scrolling interface, particularly in her email. Once she discovered the long-press back button to access the multi-tasking menu, she loved it. Although her first impressions of the built in Facebook and Twitter integration were mostly negative, she’s decided that she likes it. She loved Local Scout, and loved the clean interface.
She’s quickly discovered just how good the on-screen keyboard is in Windows Phone 7, and how smart the auto-complete feature is. She enjoyed the speech-to-text options, but had some very poignant complaints, which fall into the Con’s section.
In the Con’s section, she pretty much goes off on Mango’s speech functionality, or lack thereof. She hates that the speech feature is not prevalent throughout the entire OS – namely, email, mapping, and in the browser. She found that Android has speech throughout, and that it seems to be much more accurate, especially with punctuation. Finally, she hates that she cannot speak one or two sentences at a time, and then append more afterwards.
Her experience with turn-by-turn directions has been abysmal. She hates having to click on the screen to get her next instruction, and found the re-routing to be horribly implemented.
She rants about the little things that annoy her. She mentions many little issues with her address book, most of which are problems Microsoft will need to figure out soon. She also hates that addresses aren’t clickable directly to Turn-By-Turn directions. She quips that she would crash while trying to cut-and-paste an addresses into Maps.
Lastly, she has some serious complaints about the available apps in the Marketplace. Coming from a different OS, she has grown used to apps like Words with Friends, Google Voice, and the Square app.
Read the entire article by clicking HERE.
Now, my personal reaction to her Week 1 Summary.
First, I’m glad she doesn’t forget that this is a beta build of Mango. I do, however, wish she had a friend who was a savvy WP7 user to help her out. She is discovering features as she goes, and slowly discovering all the configurable options that she needs.
She complains, “It’s really hard to click the screen and place a cursor at a specific location; you always end up selecting an entire word, when you just want to edit. And again, a long-press for “select all” in a URL field window or similar would be super useful.”
Molly, if you just press and hold anywhere on the text box, a cursor pops up, allowing you to place it anywhere you need, extremely accurately.
Molly’s hatred of the current functionality of the turn-by-turn directions are completely accurate. I’m hoping that the non-Beta version fixes this. But Molly, if you hate the turn-by-turn directions so badly, why not give other options a try? There are several completely capable apps available on the Marketplace that actually perform the way you want it to. The slickest, most fully-featured option is by Garmin, but I don’t know if you’re willing to fork over 40 dollars for the functionality you got for free with Android. Android’s integrated Turn-By-Turn solution is amazing, and you were spoiled. Nothing I can argue about that.
I agree that speech could be more fully integrated into the system, and I also agree that speech-to-text is useful, yet has a long way to go.
If by some chance Molly Wood reads this article, I would hope she at least reads this part. The next few months are going to be amazing, if you stick with it. Nearly all the apps that you want will now be possible, since Mango allows all new apps to do what they couldn’t do before. There are no more limitations keeping top apps like Whatsapp and Words with Friends from functioning. Your app dilemma should resolve itself before we hit the new year, for sure. Hopefully you stick around for the party!
I’m really looking forward to her next article, as she will be writing about her experiences with SkyDrive, ZunePass, and Office. We all know how much she’ll love the ZunePass. Now, if only she could find someone knowledgeable with WP7 to help her with the little things, and also help her find comparable apps to what she is used to!
Via: CNET.com
WP7 Mango Demo – Google Music Beta
In the video above, you’ll see just how the Google Music Beta works in Internet Explorer 9 Mobile on Mango. The video is taken on a Samsung Focus running the Mango beta 7712.
If you’re unable to view the video – here are the bullet points. It works, but with issues. The webpage is clearly for large screen devices, as the only way to really get around with it is to zoom into the different sections of the page. After you upload albums to Google Music, the albums will be playable. Getting an album to play is quite simple. The music plays smoothly, and at a decent sound quality. The drop down menu controls do allow you to pause the music, but not jump to different tracks. The music continues to play seamlessly after leaving the browser, allowing for true background music streaming from something OTHER than Zune music.
The biggest issue arises when a music track ends. If you are not viewing the Google Music webpage when a track ends, it will not continue to the next track. You will have to get back to the page, advance the track, and press play again.
It is unknown whether or not this is a flaw with Google Music Beta or IE9, but my bet is on how IE9 treats background music through HTML5. It is doubtful that this will be fixed by the official version 7720.
This is essentially a dealbreaker. But, it’s very cool that it even works.
Clearly, Zunepass music streaming is the best streaming option on our WP7 phones at the moment. Since Mango allows for Smart DJ, our options are even better with the integrated music service.
What am I looking forward to? I’m looking forward to some great Mango apps that utilize the new API’s in Mango with Skydrive. I can see a great multi-tasking enabled app allowing you to stream your albums uploaded to your Skydrive. This would easily replace any need to use the Google Music service.
Exciting things are coming soon!
Custom HTC WP7 ROM’s Iminent?
Windows Phone Hacker have just reported that the Dark Forces Team (DFT) have successfully created an RSPL / HSPL solution for a majority of HTC’s Windows Phones. This of course comes our way via XDA-Developers. If you are unfamiliar, HSPL is the bootloader that allows for custom ROM’s to be loaded onto phones. Chefs on XDA-Developers have done an amazing job releasing custom Windows Mobile 6.x ROM’s for the past few years. In fact, this was normally the only way you could get WM6.5 on your device, because software updates were very inconsistent between phone manufacturers.
With Microsoft’s new update approach for all devices, will HSPL be necessary for Windows Phone 7? There are a couple scenarios I can personally think of. First, there has been a lot of “hackery” lately to allow for Mango beta versions to be installed onto non-developer phones. With HSPL, you could theoretically flash a Mango build in minutes, and flash back to a NoDo build just as quickly, once your device has the official Mango version update available. This avoids the need for making a backup before flashing.
Another scenario would be truly customized ROM’s. How about a completely jailbroken Mango build? Chefs could cook amazing homebrew apps and custom settings directly into the ROM. Custom tile colors, backgrounds and additional ringtones are possible.
As of now, the DTF release does not include the Verizon HTC Trophy or the Sprint HTC Arrive, but only because they don’t have their hands on these phones yet. Expect more devices to be supported soon.
Many would argue that Windows Phone 7 doesn’t need tweaking like Windows Mobile did. Let’s wait and see what the creative community comes up with! What custom features would you like built into a specially-crafted ROM?
Source: XDA-Developers
Via: Windows Phone Hacker
Editorial – “The Resurrection of Nokia”
Matt Brian, an editor over at The Next Web, has published an article entitled, “The Resurrection of Nokia: What it can do to succeed with Windows Phone.”
The article is extremely well written, and brings some really great insights into the future of Nokia’s gigantic bet with Windows Phone.
Here is the conclusion:
Many of the points discussed in the article have been touched on by Elop, who has already said Nokia will use its established position within the industry to deliver top-end smartphones on a large scale. Nokia’s CEO admits we are just at the start of the “mobile revolution” and will utilise Microsoft’s position in the document publishing, gaming and Internet service markets to drive the company forward.
Nokia knows it must adapt its offering to stand out from its rivals, but keep its products and services familiar so that consumers aren’t embarking on a new learning curve if they buy a Nokia Windows Phone.
Elop hasn’t made the mistake of copying Apple and Google. He has detailed a unique path that will see his company’s efforts focused on what could be its last chance of staying relevant as a smartphone vendor. We are but months away from seeing what Nokia has planned for its new devices, only then can we truly see whether the Finnish mobile giant stands a chance at reversing its fortunes.
Read the full insightful article by clicking HERE.
Do you have any thoughts or disagreements? Let us know in the comment section below.
Source: The Next Web
Get the AT&T HTC HD7S for $150 Off!
If you’ve been craving a beautiful, 4.3 inch Super LCD screen on your new Windows Phone 7, this is the deal for you. Best Buy is currently offering the HTC HT7S for AT&T for a low $49.99 with free shipping. Of course, this is only applicable to new 2 year contracts.
My personal advice – if you just HAVE to have a Windows Phone 7 device now, don’t hesitate with this one, or the Samsung Focus, if you’re locked into AT&T. If you can wait, a whole new wave of devices with new, higher specifications and the gigantic Mango update preloaded are coming in just 4-5 months time.
And on another note, my 2 year contract won’t stop me from getting a Nokia WP7, if it’s as awesome as I think it will be!
Source: Best Buy
Via: WPCentral
Verizon HTC Trophy Still Available on Wirefly
If you are desperately in need of the Verizon model of the HTC Trophy, and can’t seem to find it in stock anywhere online, we’ve got you covered. Wirefly is offering this phone for 99.99 dollars with a new 2 year contract, saving you 50 dollars off of the normal Verizon price.
Some readers are experiencing the Verizon HTC Trophy being unavailable in their region on the Verizon Wireless website. The phone is also backordered on AmazonWireless.com.
Link: Verizon HTC Trophy on Wirefly
SMS Dictation Gets Demonstrated on Video
The guys at Windows Phone Hacker have posted the above video, demonstrating how to dictate and send an SMS. It works flawlessly, and is really encouraging.
At the end of the video, he states “In the meantime, while we wait for Mango, please refrain from texting and driving.”
Finally, we’ll have a quick and easy way to text while on the road. It is still not 100% safe, as you have to find your start menu button on the phone, but still tons better than the current “look ma, no hands on the wheel!” method.
Source: Windows Phone Hacker
The Fall of the Mobile Carriers?
Kevin Fox on his Fury.com blog has written a very interesting editorial today, entitled “Is Microsoft trying to end the reign of mobile carriers? (MSFT+Skype+Nokia)“.
In it, Kevin describes all of the recent acquisitions and deals Microsoft has made which puts them in a very unique position to introduce some independence from the mobile carriers. He also describes how Google and Apple could easily be in a similar position.
Here is a snippet:
Are Microsoft, Apple and Google quietly preparing for war with mobile carriers? I think so.
With all the advancements made to mobile phones in the past ten years, the part that’s been woefully slow to improve is the act of calling. Making calls, placing calls, searching for signal and scrimping minutes hasn’t changed much since the mobile phone came out, because carriers have little incentive to innovate. Mobile carriers make their money either way, and ‘innovation’ comes down to increasing the bottom line, whether it’s charging $1,300/megabyte for text messages or adding 20 seconds of instructions on how to leave a voicemail so that the carrier might get an extra minute’s revenue.
If technology or product companies were in control of the full telecom stack, you’d be able to get caller ID data for incoming cellphone calls. You’d be able to see someone’s availability before you call them, and that availability could be controlled by the user or automatically by time of day, location, current calling status (“Kevin is currently on the phone.”) You’d see robust competition producing a hundred other innovations to make calling a reasonable mode of communications again.
The article gets MUCH more interesting. Click HERE to read the rest. After you’ve read it, let us know what you think of his article in the comments below.
Via: Fury.com
“More Mango Madness” – 2 More Screenshots Leaked
If you’ve been following the Windows Phone Dev Podcast, or our stories covering it, you’ll know that some amazing new features are coming on the Mango update.
Ryan and Travis Lowdermilk have just leaked two more screenshots on their website, as seen below.
As you can see, we are finally getting Smart DJ mixes! This is great news, as this is a feature some have already been enjoying on dedicated Zune devices. One wonders why it wasn’t included from the beginning, but that’s besides the point. Microsoft seems to making right all the wrongs!
If you’re unfamiliar with the feature, Smart DJ is basically a Pandora service for your Zune music – and if you have the Zunepass, it can stream lots of new music to your phone, based on the Smart DJ mix you are using at the time.
We also see that the music controls are reconfigured, and are visible at all times. It appears we’ll be able to save playlists on the phone as well. It is unclear if we’ll have the capability to edit playlists on the phone, however.
Lastly, we see that the Camera sound can now be disabled in settings. Not a huge deal, but it’s nice to have that option.
May 24th will officially reveal all the things Mango should bring us, so mark it on your calendar! We’ll be covering it extensively.
Thanks Fludlyt for the tip.
New Mango Features – Additional Information and Thoughts
Although the previous article provided the screenshots to many new features coming, Travis and Ryan Lowdermilk also gave us some great information on additional features coming that aren’t yet backed up by screenshots.
On their podcast, Travis and Ryan mention “Native Check-Ins” support is coming. Facebook Places is indicated to have native support, but FourSquare might require a plugin.
Visual Voicemail
- rumored to use the OMTP – Open Mobile Terminal Platform, which is what iOS and Android use. Nice that Microsoft isn’t reinventing the wheel on this one.
Battery Management
- with the addition of 3rd party multi-tasking, more battery management will be necessary. They mention that there should be an additional Battery section under the Settings menu.
WiFi Hotspot Support
- Should be coming with Mango, utilizing Microsoft’s NCSI technology, which is behind the Internet Sharing features within Vista and Windows 7. Expect this to require individual carrier support, carrier pricing, and to go live on a carrier by carrier basis.
Ryan and Travis indicate they have a slew of additional screenshots, and plan on publishing them on their website and through their Twitter account, @wpdevpodcast. Make sure you follow them on Twitter to get this information as it becomes available.
Below is some more information provided on the screenshots that you’ve already seen on Pradeep’s article. Most of these thoughts are provided by Ryan and Travis, and I’ve interjected a few of my thoughts as well as 2 additional screenshots.
Messaging
Facebook chat will be joining the integrated messaging experience along with Windows Live Messenger. Travis and Ryan state that there is other evidence that AOL Instant Messenger will be joining the mix as well.
The People Hub will show you which services your contacts are currently logged into, and the rumors are that when you try to send them an SMS, an option will pop up asking if you’d like to contact them through the chat service they are currently using and showing as online.
Office Hub
It appears a more logical Office 365 experience and integrated SkyDrive support is coming in Mango. We see a link to “docs.live.net”, with an option to “open in browser.” This indicates that you will be able to edit documents in the IE9 Mobile browser.
Games Hub
We see that the Xbox Games Hub is getting a graphical overhaul, bringing a consistency between the Xbox 360, and the Games experience on Windows Phone 7. We also see an added option called “Automatic Sync”. Feel free to speculate what that might be syncing. Hopefully we will be getting some heavily improved online play through Mango.
People Hub
Bringing back a feature that was already available with Windows Mobile 6.x, we now see a group feature. This allows for sending a text message to a work or family related group, as well as emailing them all at once. This is something I actually used on WM 6.5, and am glad to see its return. Travis and Ryan say that they would love to see the ability to view aggregated tweets or facebook updates. Calling it a “Favorites List”, they love the idea of pinning that to the Start Menu. I have to agree!
Lockscreen Settings
Here we see that Mango can add Album / Artist art as your lockscreen background. Although not indicated, hopefully full Zune controls will also be built into the lockscreen. Also, we see the “never” option for screen time-out, which will hopefully be available for ALL WP7 devices, instead of just certain ones currently.
Via: Windows Phone Dev Podcast
The Story of Copy and Paste
The “Windows Phone Blog” brought us an article yesterday, entitled “10 questions for the “queen” of copy and paste.” Priyanka Singhal was the engineer in charge of bringing Copy and Paste to the Windows Phone 7 platform.
Here is a snippet from the article:
Q: First, I have a confession: copy and paste isn’t a phone feature I use much. But I know many folks are passionate about it. What am I missing?
A: Let’s say your wife sends you an appointment to your daughter’s piano recital, and now you want to save that address in your address book. Or you find something on the web that’s really cool and want to send it to a friend in an email. Or you get an email and you want to quote it in an SMS. Or you want to look up a tracking number—basically anything you want to save or share but don’t want to type again. Your phone should be able to take that burden away from you.
Q: In your previous job, you worked on text editing features like copy and paste on the desktop. How is a phone different?
A: On your desktop you can do things like Paste Special, Select All, Cut. On a phone, more options means more complexity, so you need software that can make the best choice for you. Which means you need to understand your users better and not just say, “Here’s a bunch of choices.” The phone should take away the complexity and make life as simple as possible.
Q: So you’re saying that behind the scenes copying and pasting isn’t as simple as it looks.
A: It is complex. To someone using the phone, it just works. But to make it “just work” you have to make sure that all applications on the phone support the same functionality. That takes a large amount of coordination. Creating copy and paste involved how many teams? Probably 9 to 10 from inception to shipping. A lot of people have a stake and a lot of people have opinions. Making sure that everybody shares your thoughts, understands your vision—that’s the most challenging and most rewarding part of this job.
Click HERE to read the entire article.
Scan QR Codes, UPC, EAN, Code 39/128 or ITF barcodes on your Windows Phone 7 to find best prices online.
Enjoy slots? Blackjack? Video Poker? Play Crazy Casino FREE!
#1 FREE Solitaire on WP7
If your a fan of Pong then you will love this game. Heavenly Skies. Save the universe! Are you ready?
A rewarding mix of match 3 and tetris gameplay
Free, Live Tile support for Word Of The Day and so much more. Why NOT try it out?
Set up reminders with only two taps. Supports also text reminders and voice reminders.
Download the best puzzle game in WP7 Marketplace for FREE!
Are you a good Alchemist ?
Use your brain to discover Atomic Energy, Chuck Norris, Angry Birds and 1400 more !
Fun puzzle game with over 150 levels!
Fully featured, beautifully designed WP7 YouTube app.
u.n.i MEGA PACK (FREE), the ultimate addictive top GAMES bundle for Windows Phone 7! 7+ and growing!
Highly addictive word game designed for adrenaline junkies. Practice locally, but then are you fast enough to compete online?
The smartest Google reader app.
Air Soccer Fever - Realtime Online Multiplayer casual soccer game for FREE
Beat the Story Mode. When your done Bring your skill online. Rank up by winning online matches. Have 1 on 1's with anyone! Global Online Multiplayer!
Newest devices leaks, online charts and ultimate performance benchmark for every Windows Phone.
Every day, get great app deals from Windows Phone developers pushed to you!
Quick Tiles, a fully featured live tile editor for Windows Phone.
Great sports app for NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL. Pin scores/games to live tile on your home screen.
MobileFax gives you the opportunity to send fax pages from your mobile phone anytime, anywhere !
WP7 Exclusive version of Hanging with Friends
Fabulously fun, lovable, crazy! Bubble Pong Championship
A remake of the classic snake game. The snake wants to grow so don't wait and help her!
Promote your app on WMPoweruser.com
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
Youtube
GooglePlus