Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

Auri Rahimzadeh — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 00:06:59 GMT

Is there a more technical explanation of the changes in 6.5 coming to the portal please?

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

BChau — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 01:03:38 GMT

Adobe has released the Flash Lite 3.1 distributable player for Windows Mobile phones. Is this the player that can be accessed by the web widget?

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

JORGEBA — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 01:46:36 GMT

Hi BChau

Yes, you can have flash content inside a widget.

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

GF — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 02:16:39 GMT

Will the widget engine be exclusive to 6.5 or will 6.1 devices be able to purchase the apps too?

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

James Churchman — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 02:53:44 GMT

are these widgets more like lets say adobe air or palmwebOS apps, in that they have proper access to more than just the normal webstuff, meaning they can gain greater privileges like getting gps data, file system access, using the internal camera etc...

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

JORGEBA — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 04:45:02 GMT

There will be more details available soon about the exact capabilities of the widget framework but I can share right now that, out of the box, widgets have access to some information about the state of the device but they are definitively sandboxed, stay tuned :-)

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

Steven Yeung — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 07:14:02 GMT

Will WPF be available for WM6.5?

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

Aleksandr — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 08:10:59 GMT

Well, I have hard question to WM 6.5 creators - will be there any API for new today screen plugins? Or it will be again closed thing as it is now in the WM6.1 Standard with sliding panels? If there will be no such API, I'll wonder why anybody will continue development for the 6.5 because existing programs with today plugins just can't be adopted.

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

Phani — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 09:04:28 GMT

We are developing applications on Windows Mobile 6.1 and using the Windows Mbile 6 SDK.When can I find the SDK for developing applications for Windows Mobile 6.5. Please help.

Thanks

Phani

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

Tai — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 18:16:29 GMT

Will the Windows Mobile Widgets provide access to Platform Services (e.g., Calendar, Contacts, Logs, Messaging [SMS and MMS], device location and landmarks, system information, and sensors) like being offered with the S60 5th Edition widgets?

Hopefully, Microsoft will not sandbox (i.e., tightly-control resources) third party developers too much, especially with Android and Symbian going open source and Nokia opening up platform services via their widgets.

Seriously, in terms of prioritizing deployment of resources, mobile software development companies need both ease and access.

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

raghunandan kamath — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 00:59:52 GMT

Does the Windows mobile 6.5 include maps or location based services in the Live search.

Thanks

Raghu

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

Paul — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 06:37:39 GMT

Can you run WPF Browser Applications via the web widget?

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

Rogelio Solis — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 16:45:18 GMT

Is Windows 6.1/6.5 available for iPhone users?

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

JORGEBA — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 21:59:12 GMT

Hello everyone,

Thanks for all your really good questions and interest. We will be releasing more information about 6.5 in the coming months that will hopefully provide most of the information you need.

Also, I've seen from blogs picking this story up some questions about widget support for standard edition. The good news is that they totally work so I updated the blog entry with some pictures but there are some considerations developers will have to take to make sure they work perfectly on non touch devices.

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

Jaganath — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 10:09:27 GMT

Can you please tell us about the SDK availability, the release date etc.,

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

Pietro Testa — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 14:46:12 GMT

Well another framework to be studied and learn!

Why don't make available WPF on Windows Mobile?

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

Terrill — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 21:28:43 GMT

Have you solved the issue with Bluetooth Com Ports remaining assigned when a Bluetooth device is removed from the Device list?

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

robin.berjon — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 11:23:48 GMT

Hi Jorge,

this sounds like a great step forward and I look forward to playing with it. There's just one thing you didn't bring up: all the other mobile widget platforms out there support SVG (usually at the very least a mobile profile, but often more than that) so in order to compete and allow people to run their widgets the same everywhere you'd need to do the same, yet you don't mention SVG support. Is that an oversight or do you not have it? If not, I'm afraid a bunch of us will have to stick to Opera's widget platform for the time being :(

Also, the widgets specification is still moving, do you have details on which version you targeted? Will you update your implementation to track its final changes?

Anyway, thanks for taking a step in the right direction, it's looking cool!

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

Alex — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 18:02:51 GMT

Hello, I'm an enterprise Java developer and have never dabbled with .NET or any Microsoft technology before. (.NET seems nice enough, but since it's only for Windows I haven't had much reason to play with it) Anyway, I've been a long time windows mobile fan and figured that developing some windows mobile applications in .NET would be a fun way to learn the technology stack.

So.... after watching some webcasts on getting started with WinMo development and perusing the msdn site, I discover that the WinMo SDK is only supported in Visual Studio 2008 Professional edition, which is around $800. Is this a joke?

I have to say that I'm completely floored by this. With as poorly as Windows Mobile is doing right now, you would think Microsoft would want to do anything possible to attract and retain developers. (especially since they're leaving in droves for the iPhone)

Developing for Android is completely free using Eclipse or NetBeans - both of which are free and better than VS anyway.

Am I missing something here? Does Microsoft really expect me to drop $800 just to play around with developing some Windows Mobile apps? Are there other alternatives (from a tool standpoint) to get me started? Thanks for any feedback.

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

Jeff Schiller — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 15:33:53 GMT

Can you clarify (as Robin has asked) whether you will be including SVG in your widget support? This will be critical if you want to really compete.

Thanks,

Jeff

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

Aleksandr Soshnikov — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 17:04:31 GMT

Could you please tell me if there will be available API for the new today screen scheme? It is a must IMO for the almost any 3rd-party developers.

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

david dailey — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 22:24:28 GMT

Yes: HTML, CSS, AJAX, JavaScript!

I've had a number of students express interest in developing mobile apps and widgets. Both vector graphics and cross-platform deployment are interests; bulk is an obstacle. Silverlight, Flash and VML are proprietary solutions, and but I suppose ya'll would agree that SVG is the cross-platform way to do this?

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

Mike Ward — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 18:54:27 GMT

i was wondering if windows mobile 6.5 will be available as an update to phones like the diamond and the htc fuze and pro?..

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

JORGEBA — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 04:10:51 GMT

Hello Everyone,

Widgets on 6.5 run on top of internet explorer which currently does not support SVG; we do support flash out of the box though which is widely used and is being added to more widget platforms every day.

About the standards question, We targeted the latest draft available to us by the end of December and we are tracking changes as they develop

Thanks!

Jorge

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

Logan — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 23:57:15 GMT

When will i use the option "Edit & Continue" for Windows Mobile's application?

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

Aleksandr Soshnikov — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 20:30:53 GMT

Well, seems I have to ask a few hard questions to the MS WM team:

- did I get it right: WM 6.1 SDK is all what I need for the 6.5 development ?

- will be there ANY available for developers API(besides widgets) for the new today screen scheme?

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

Larry — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 04:53:19 GMT

Can Access be used to develop apps for Windows Mobile?

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

drahn — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 19:03:34 GMT

Regarding the note about managed code, will 6.5 support XNA?

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

nuwan — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 21:12:54 GMT

hmmmm sry if this quis is dumb, bt m a noob, i just wanna knw whether can i run WM6.5 on my htc tuch GSM

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

diego — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 21:36:58 GMT

podes pasarme la informacion de windows mobile en castellano

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

Chandan — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 17:20:36 GMT

Hi, i was interested to know if System Tray icons are still supported in WM 6.5 HomeScreen. I dont see any of them in the WM 6.5 sample snapshots.

Thanks,

Chandan

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

Nigel Peters — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 13:32:45 GMT

The developer support for WM is poor, compared to the likes of apple. the reason they have a Billion Downloads from their app store is because, the developers give the people what they want because Apple Dev gives the Developers what they want.

Simple questions cannot be answered such as:

- WM 6.1 SDK is all what I need for the 6.5 development ?

- will be there ANY available for developers API(besides widgets) for the new today sliding panel screen scheme?

Seriously Pull you fingers out, you only have to go to xda-developers.com to see what potential you have to really make 6.5 a great platform

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

DrewG — Tue, 12 May 2009 18:34:01 GMT

btw, you can develop for free for windows mobile using SharpDevelop

http://www.icsharpcode.net/OpenSource/SD

re: Windows Mobile 6.5 – What’s in for developers?

MobileSpoon — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 18:57:00 GMT

FuzeMobility has just created 50 cool widgets connecting to different websites - all focusing on windows mobile.

I think it's a really cool package which can be found in here:

http://www.fuzemobility.com/wm-65-widget-mania/

and here:

http://mobilespoon.blogspot.com/2009/07/free-windows-mobile-65-widgets.html