Windows Phone 7 development principles revealed

February 24, 2010 | By Surur

windowsphone Charlie Kindel, Partner Group Program Manager for the Windows Phone Application Platform & Developer Experience, wrote an article explaining the design approach for Windows Phone 7 series.

He notes the their purpose was:

.. to harness the energy, talent, and attention of developers and designers with a platform and ecosystem that delivers on the developer experience end to end; that, combined with the phone’s end-user experience, results in a winning virtuous cycle.

To implement this long-term vision some of their development principles were:

Every decision we make must be made mindful of the effect on end-users.
We will do a few things and do them very, very well; we are better off not having a capability than doing it poorly. There are always future versions.
No API will be created or documented without a clear use case; “build it and they will come” APIs almost always do nothing but create bad legacy.
We will build on the shoulders of giants; where possible integrate instead of create.
We will strive to not show our organizational boundaries to developers.

We can see clear evidence of the principles in action in terms of the integration Windows Phone 7 brings between Xbox, Zune and Microsoft’s Live services. However we also see the downside of reduced functionality in initial releases. “We are better off not having a capability” may result in Windows Phone 7 having many less features than Windows Mobile 6.x had, no matter how poorly implemented.

To get more into the head of the development team read more at Charlie Kindel’s blog here.

Via LiveSide.net

About Surur

Site Admin and Windows Phone enthusiast, he has been using Windows Mobile devices since before they were called PocketPC’s. He is currently sporting a HTC 7 Trophy.

Tagged microsoft, software, windows phone 7

Peter

Sounds like Apple.
Microsoft doesn't realize that the only reason that people still buy Windows Mobile is because of the things it does differently. They are getting rid of all those.

http://twitter.com/Jug6ernaut @Jug6ernaut

i completely agree, wp7s at least in my book as of right now is an epic fail android here i come(so very sadly)
TheAxMan

You guys might be missing the big picture here:

1) This is just the first release — and I'm sure MS has been scrambling to get it out of the door. They're probably saying that for the *first release* it's better to not have any half-baked APIs in there that create a support nightmare. Very similar to Apple taking 1 year to release an SDK, *after* releasing the iPhone.

2) The things WinMo classic does differently results in a totally dwindling market share and very little OEM and carrier support. Continuing down that path almost certainly means the end of Windows Mobile.
Craig S

It still does a lot differently. It looks different from the iPhone to me. However, those like yourself who keep saying that people are buying Windows Mobile so they can hack it together, confuse me. First of all, fewer and fewer people are buying WinMo. If the target market was left to be tweaker geeks, the market share would drop to single digits.

Jonny

All makes sense to me apart from…
We will do a few things and do them very, very well; we are better off not having a capability than doing it poorly.
Thats just wrong, do the things you do very very well, and just release regular updates to the new things (so it might not be fantastic at first but as long as it integrates into the software well), or release them as beta software which is optional.

ROhit

I think that is what they meant. They will release the product and everything which will get released will be great. Other features will follow as updates.
I prefer this to half baked products.

Jay

LIke what? What will i be giving up with this new windows phone? The fact is that most winmo phones have issues, and you over look them when the phone is working like it's supposed to. I think the whole multitasking on the phone is a joke. I think you should be able to run it in the background if you can't see it, but still enjoy it. For example, playing music. I think that is the only thing that should be able to run no matter whatelse is running. So if i want to play a song, and then launch my gps app, then that song should still play. But why do i need a facebook app running that i'm not looking a while i run my gps. There will be developers who will utilize the system. We'll be able to customize. But the core interface will stay the same. So if my friend has a winmo phone and i have one too, even though they are by different companies, they'll look the same, and run the same! Just like if i bought a pc from a different manufacturer. Same computer just different look.
jay

Apple controls everything about their device. Microsoft says here is the OS run it on a phone with these hardware features, and it will run perfectly, because we have things in the os that will use this hardware. This isn't any different than the requirements you see on Windows 7.
Peter

Whatever happens, I hope they don't put very hard security on it (like the Xbox 360). Unauthorized code on the 360 is just now taking off, and it is still limited to consoles that haven't updated in months and even then not all of them.
Basically, if they don't officially support letting you do what you want, I hope they at least don't make it impossible to "jailbreak."
Jos Dewey

I love how the guy quoted threw in the word 'ecosystem' for good measure, typical idiot ass kissing to the Apple crowd in hopes they might switch camps.
Seven mss

They are changing the group of people they make the OS for. Off course there are some sad people (many of them on pocketnow, wmpu and sites like this) that were one of the few that liked Windows Mobile as it was. But microsoft is trying to make EVERYBODY like the new OS. This will off course make them more money.

And everybody keeps saying they are following Apple and the iPhone. Can you blame them? Like it or not, the iPhone is a HUGE success. And it does have many good features, I have used and still do use them once in a while.

As long as they take all the GOOD things from each OS, they are going to have a winner. People are getting bored of the iPhone and if the fourth generation will not have any big changes, they might go to a WP7S device.

http://intensedebate.com/people/peterfares peterfares

They aren't taking only the good things though. What this article says shows that. They are going to leave out a lot of features. It also seems like it is going to be closed down like the iPhone. I'm just happy that Android is mature enough for me. I'm really liking that HTC Desire headed to AT&T but I wish they would get one with a nice keyboard.

http://twitter.com/expectafight @expectafight

arg, i think this is going to be the last time i post this thought until something definitive gets announced…DO NOT JUDGE THE OS YET, THERE ISN'T ENOUGH INFO. WE STILL DON'T KNOW WHAT WE ARE GOING TO GET WITH THIS OS JUST YET. RUMORS, SHORT-SIDED OPINIONS AND HASTY THREATS TO JUMP TO NEW MOBILE OPERATING SYSTEMS ARE RIDICULOUSLY HOLLOW STATEMENTS RIGHT NOW. GRIEF!!