Linked by Thom Holwerda on Tue 11th Dec 2012 23:09 UTC
So, last night, Windows Phone 8 got its first update - specifically for the HTC 8X. In this day and age, where iOS is the gold standard and shows the industry how it ought to be done, and Android is the exact opposite, Windows Phone 7 was a bit of an in-between - every phone got every update, but the staggered rollout was slow and frustrating, often due to carrier meddling. How will Windows Phone 8 fare?
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Member since:2005-06-29
Except Windows Phone 7 handsets are getting an update in the form of Windows Phone 7.8.
So, what exactly were you saying again?
So, what exactly were you saying again?
Fcuk 7.8. It's a pointless update. It's like saying that silly feature pack for Gingerbread Samsung pushed out is the same as ICS.
Nobody knows when 7.8 is coming out, and on top of that, it adds virtually nothing to 7.5 except for smaller tiles. Big whoop. I know you have a thing for promoting Microsoft, but this is really unpromotable.
Member since:2005-11-29
Fcuk 7.8. It's a pointless update. It's like saying that silly feature pack for Gingerbread Samsung pushed out is the same as ICS.
That's your opinion, but the fact remains that it is incorrect to say that there are no post Tango updates for Windows Phone 7. It is simply not true.
Nobody knows when 7.8 is coming out, and on top of that, it adds virtually nothing to 7.5 except for smaller tiles. Big whoop. I know you have a thing for promoting Microsoft, but this is really unpromotable.
And APIs for Lock Screen access for apps, and APIs for controlling the new Start screen via apps.
Plus, if you own a Lumia, Nokia is adding a bunch of their own value-add to 7.8 . Other OEMs can do the same, if they have not, then that's unfortunate.
Besides, they are still selling Windows Phone 7 devices. The Lumia 510 went on sale, which comes with Windows Phone 7.8.
Leaked Nokia roadmaps show future updates to the WP7 in the pipeline.
The difference between WP8 and WP7, when it comes down to apps is almost nothing. Most apps maintain WP7 and WP8 versions, with near feature parity. The main reason to recompile for WP8 is to remove the letterboxing on 720p devices.
In fact, on WP8, WP7 apps merely run in a "Quirks mode". Its largely the same.
Member since:2010-06-25
Member since:2005-11-29
Can you differentiate between them? Or point out concrete differences in their API subsets that would make maintaining two versions difficult?
Hint: I maintain a shared codebase between WP7, WP8, and Windows 8. All without a hitch, which is my entire point in that the fact that WP7 devices won't get WP8 has mitigating factors.
Of course, it's much easier to brush it off as me being a shill, as if what I did was much more than just correcting a few people on their facts.
I'm sorry that me telling people to actually speak truthfully is me shilling for MS.
News
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/20/13 22:43 UTC
The Verge pointed me to a blog post by Leap Motion - which reveals how their Kinect-like motion control works with Windows 8. "From the second you plug in your Leap Motion Controller, you'll be able to browse the web and interact with your computer just by moving your hands and fingers in the air. With Leap Motion technology and Windows, you can do everything that's possible with multi-touch inputs - without actually touching anything. This also means that existing applications in Windows 7 and 8 will respond to your natural hand and finger movements. Soon, we'll show you how Leap Motion will work with Mac OS X." Quite cool.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/20/13 21:50 UTC
PocketNow interviews Marc Dillon, and there's an interesting note about why Jolla is keeping the display properties under wraps: "We're leaving some of those details out because we do understand that there are a lot of really big players in the market and they tend to take certain components in the market and dominate them. We created the ability to actually be able to run Sailfish on multiple hardware displays and be able to swap components, so this is part of the demand and supply planning phase. We are committed to this industrial design which is a 4.5-inch display, an 8 megapixel camera on the back and a front-facing camera at the front, and the exact specs of the display we'll provide when we're close to delivery." Something you rarely hear anything about.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/19/13 23:15 UTC
"This is my NeXTstation Turbo Color booting the Mac System 7.1 Operating System using a hardware add-on called 'Daydream'. The Daydream has a Mac ROM and a few custom ICs in it and hooked up to the NeXTs DSP port. Turns your NeXT into a full fledged 68k powered Mac." So cool.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/19/13 23:11 UTC, submitted by Drumhellar
"The NetBSD Project is pleased to announce NetBSD 6.1, the first feature update of the NetBSD 6 release branch. It represents a selected subset of fixes deemed important for security or stability reasons, as well as new features and enhancements. Please note that all fixes in the prior security/bugfix updates (NetBSD 6.0.1 and 6.0.2) are also in 6.1."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/18/13 21:06 UTC
"At the end of a week in which Electronic Arts confirmed it wasn't developing a thing for the Wii U, one of the software engineers in EA Sports' Canada studio, in a series of since-deleted tweets, disparaged the console as 'crap' and suggested Nintendo should give up on hardware altogether. 'The Wii U is crap. Less powerful than an Xbox 360. Poor online/store. Weird tablet', tweeted Bob Summerwill, listed as a senior software engineer at EA Canada, in a reply to a tweet posting a link about EA's no-Wii U news. 'Nintendo are walking dead at this point'." The Wii U is turning into the 21st century's Virtual Boy.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/18/13 7:37 UTC
"In NixOS, the entire operating system - the kernel, applications, system packages, configuration files, and so on - is built by the Nix package manager from a description in a purely functional build language. The fact that it's purely functional essentially means that building a new configuration cannot overwrite previous configurations. Most of the other features follow from this." Interesting approach. A Linux distribution, sure, but with some very refreshing ideas about system configuration.
Linked by fran on 05/18/13 1:38 UTC
Appfour added, among other features, C/C++ support to its new version of AIDE. From Android-IDE, "Now you can write parts of your app or your whole app in C/C++ on your device. AIDE supports the Standard Android NDK toolchain (GCC 4.6 + Bionic, STL, ...). No changes are necessary if you want to build an app developed on a PC with Eclipse. C/C++ development is fully integrated: Build errors appear in the error list and files can easily be navigated to with Go to file. The editor supports C/C++ syntax highlighting."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/17/13 23:35 UTC, submitted by kragil
Ars nails it: "The answer is that Google did announce what amounts to a fairly substantial Android update yesterday. They simply did it without adding to the update fragmentation problems that continue to plague the platform. By focusing on these changes and not the apparently-waiting-in-the-wings update to the core software, Google is showing us one of the ways in which it's trying to fix the update problem."
Linked by MOS6510 on 05/17/13 22:22 UTC
"It is good for programmers to understand what goes on inside a processor. The CPU is at the heart of our career. What goes on inside the CPU? How long does it take for one instruction to run? What does it mean when a new CPU has a 12-stage pipeline, or 18-stage pipeline, or even a 'deep' 31-stage pipeline? Programs generally treat the CPU as a black box. Instructions go into the box in order, instructions come out of the box in order, and some processing magic happens inside. As a programmer, it is useful to learn what happens inside the box. This is especially true if you will be working on tasks like program optimization. If you don't know what is going on inside the CPU, how can you optimize for it? This article is about what goes on inside the x86 processor's deep pipeline."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 05/17/13 22:15 UTC, submitted by Tom
"It was the only moment I heard regret slip into Otellini's voice during the several hours of conversations I had with him. 'The lesson I took away from that was, while we like to speak with data around here, so many times in my career I've ended up making decisions with my gut, and I should have followed my gut,' he said. 'My gut told me to say yes.'" The world would've been a much different place - Apple would have been less dependant on Samsung for its chips, which probably would've meant less money for Samsung to develop its Galaxy business.More News »
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Member since:
2005-11-29
Except Windows Phone 7 handsets are getting an update in the form of Windows Phone 7.8.
So, what exactly were you saying again?