this is all a quietly orchestrated attempt to get google to bring Youtube, Gmail, and Other Google Services over to windows phone.
Previously, Google refused to make any apps for WP. Microsoft went ahead and made their own version of youtube, but google threw a fit, and would not allow it. Microsoft said "ok if you dont want us to do it, then you do it." Google said "no thanks"
So if google still refuses with this conversion tool, then i think microsoft has a claim in court to force the issue.
Yeah its great to see Microsoft forging their own workaround, and to think Microsoft was sued some time ago for trying to bundle IE in Windows! It is amazing to see what the likes of Apple and Google are able to get away with without even a hint of the anti-trust rubbish claims made against Microsoft for basically the same kind of behavior.
To get in trouble with anti-trust law, first you need to hold a monopoly. Then you need to use that monopoly in one area to damage competitors in another area.
For Microsoft, they used their Windows monopoly to damage Netscape in the area of web browsers, which were not free at the time but pay software.
Notice that Google is getting in trouble in the EU because they have used their search monopoly to disadvantage their competitors in other areas, like online shopping.
It's worth noting that in the EU you don't need to have nearly as large a share of the market in one area before leveraging that success to your competitors disadvantage elsewhere puts you in the legal crosshairs.
Microsoft was clearly no monopoly as time has shown that in just few years focus shifted and certainly not result of this lawsuit. Also it was started by list of competitors in reality (Netscape wasn't really a player anymore).
Apple holds 100% monopoly on their devices and 100% control them so why are they not sued? It's just bad EU politics that makes no sense and consumers hardly see any money of the outcome (which was supposedly the outcome of Windows that they can buy a version without IE which no one did).
Cause frankly, I'm deeply troubled that it's possible to go to school for 9-12 years, graduate and still be dumb enough to say something as glaringly stupid and misinformed as 'Apple should be sued for monopoly, cause they have a 100% monopoly on their devices."
He meant that they have full control over what is or isn't allowed on their devices, including instances where they are forcing the use of their own products like all browsers essentially being re skinned Safari, having to use iTunes, and in general limiting many essential background services to those provided by Apple themselves.
Also Google packaging all the google services apps with android phones is no different than Microsoft providing Internet explorer with Windows. Except Microsoft got sued for it, and Google is doing even more of it. And yes considering that roughly 95% of the smartphone market is in the hands of Apple and Google, with Google providing their OS for free to increase their monopoly in the advertising market, this is indeed a monopoly, and leveraging one product to make it hard for others to compete in another. This is also why Microsoft was forced to split their operations. To prevent this sort of thing.
But again...none of that against Apple and Google. Just big bad Microsoft. Lol.
Don't be silly. Target holds a 100% monopoly on their stores, yet they are not considered as monopolies in the sense they do not control 100% of the department store market.
Neither does Apple have a monopoly in the mobile computer market.
"Microsoft was clearly no monopoly as time has shown that in just few years focus shifted and certainly not result of this lawsuit. Also it was started by list of competitors in reality (Netscape wasn't really a player anymore)."
By 1999 MS controlled the desktop market. There is no sane argument against that fact. Apple in 1997 was almost dead.
What your forgetting is that Microsoft still lost and was subject to a decade of DOJ oversight. And it was exactly that DOJ oversight that let Apple and Google grow into the companies they are today. Microsoft would have squished them both if the DOJ was breathing down their backs.
IMO. To get into trouble with the EU, all you need is millions of dollars in the bank.
The EU nations RUN on other peoples dollars.
MS never prevented anyone from installing and choosing Netscape as their default browser. That is a FACT no one can deny. The problem is it's very easy to get non-producers to say 'Yes' about taking from people/companies that produce, rather than telling them to build a better solution.
Rather than penalize Google, why hasn't someone on the planet built a better search engine? In my own experience, Bing does not think like I do and try's to give me all sorts of other crap I'm not looking for.
It's NOT impossible, but the EU chooses to go where they can get easy money.....from US companies.
A great woman once said:
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money"
Are you ready for a shocker? It's not just EU that runs on 'other people's dollars'... All governments partake in that particular scam and call it taxes.
And sometimes they use some of those moneys to disrupt a monopolist so that the free market can work more effectively!
Actually, I think this is an attempt to address the app gap, both real and perceived, and make Windows 10 mobile a viable platform for people and organizations that need those apps. Also, along with the Windows 10 mobile to PC-like experience when interfaced with an external monitor, keyboard and mouse that Balifore was showing off, it just opens up a whole new world of possibilities for mobile.
Shorter version: If you're thinking this is just aimed at Google and its ecosystem, you're thinking too small. MS is swinging for the fences.
Agreed. This could become the single most important selling point of Win 10 and Win Phone 10. Letting you do and run pretty much anything, without the hurdles of Linux, has always been a strength of Windows. If this works well enough, it's going be build on this strength and provide users with the best of "all" worlds. The possibilities are amazing: no further vendor lock-in due to a purchased app ecosystem.
In what way do Windows Phone lag "far, far" behind the "big boys" in anything but apps?
And who cares if Apple or Google are upset? There's nothing they can do about it, except maybe try some BS and probably illegal stuff like making developers agree to not compile their apps for Windows in order to get in the Apple/Google stores.
MS isn't leeching their apps. They're giving the developers the tools to easily port their existing apps to their platform. It's up to the devs to port their code or not. I hope Apple and Google don't take legal action because that would be a move against the devs not against MS. Anything that makes cross-platform development easier is good for everybody regardless of which platform you prefer. I don't like MS phone but I wish they are successful because that will keep Apple and Google on their toes and force to continue to innovate. Real competition is what wee need, not litigation.
One of the great tragedies of our time. Windows' interface is so much better than Android's or (to a lesser extent) iOS's. But an entire operating system is garbage if all the biggest developers don't code for it. That requires huge network effects.
"But you still need to convince a whole lot more than 3% of phone buyers to buy something they know lags far, far behind the big boys." 3% now, but I'll bet that Windows Phone market share passes iOS within 3 years.
If Microsoft get this right, together with what they are doing in the cloud, could make them the investment opportunity of the year.
I'll take you up on that bet. Has anyone ever won any significant market share through the "recompile on our platform" strategy? That gives your users second-class software at best, usually worse.
~ I don't know about that. If candy crush is any proof than I see no quality issues here. I've played the app on both iOS and WP and the UX is practically identical. No lag, nothing. So, before you go off assuming the worst maybe you should hold and be a little more objective here.
If the UI is identical that means one of two things: 1) The UI fits one platform better than the other, and looks out of place on the second. 2) The UI is special and fits neither platform, offering a sub-par experience.
A phone is a phone. There is largely no real difference in the UI of Android vs iOS vs WP. They're all variations of the same theme and having basically identical apps running on any of those platforms works just fine.
I was helping students learn how to program Android apps, and I was appalled to find that they were encouraged to just use all the Google libraries by default so they could do maps or stuff whenever they needed.
"A better Android than Android; A better iOS than iOS"? Yeah, that ended well the last time it was tried. You'd figure MS would remember that, but perhaps everyone involved has retired by now.
What claim do the have? That Google doesn't want to make apps for their platform? Isn't that exactly what Blackberry said? That developers should be forced to make apps for their platform? And they got laughed at all over the net.
Most of google's apps all require GPS to run in the background, and MS already said they can't duplicate that, but can offer their own alternatives.
They still won't do it. And they can't force them in court either to do it; they'll be laughed out the door.
Besides, what is the point? You really want half assed apps from android/ios to ruin the UI consistency that Win8 and WP worked so hard to achieve? This is a big step backwards.
This is a question that will need to be answered. I don't think Android really makes the distinction between categories of screen size, except for offering different layouts based on size. Isn't Windows doing much the same with Continuum? Does Windows actually make the distinction between phone and desktop?
Or did they just mean the only reason Astoria exists is to enable the use of Android apps on phones? (Despite still working on tablets or other devices?)
This is somewhat related:.. i jailbroke my ipad, and added a tweak that lets you connect a bluetooth mouse and keyboard.
Suprisingly, it worked flawlessly. Even games that are built for touch, will naturally take mouse input. Hearthstone for example. I was able to play hearthstone on my iPad with a mouse, just like on PC.
Same thing with Candy Crush.
I dont believe this is a obsticle because ios seems to take mouse input Native-ly. the option just had to be enabled (which is what the tweak does)
Not an obstacle. Both Android and iOS treat a mouse as a finger. Plus, you could get a Wacom tablet or something to make the gestures more natural, so you don't inherently lose the experience on a desktop.
This looks different from Blackberry's emulation approach since it looks like they are actually compiling the source code (as opposed to providing an emulation environment to run apks). It'd be very interesting to see how it impacts performance.
Windows Phone currently has plenty of apps. It's a bit short on apps that are really websites, corporate apps and games though. This should really help with the last two and will probably, unfortunately, also mean more of the first.
This'll be absolutely fantastic -- but only if MS starts to actually vet the applications in their App Store. As it stands, the Windows Phone App Store is an absolute cesspool, to the point of being unusable.
All they really need to do (and Android and iOS at the same time) is stop treating all apps the same. Put in some curation, and then vet all the curated apps so that people can be certain they aren't garbage. And then natively incorporate the features of the often-used apps so that they have first-party support.
This doesn't mean that Windows 10 will *run* Android/iOS apps. It means that Universal Apps can be built using Java, C++ and Objective C, just like it can be built using HTML and Javascript.
That is incorrect. This takes existing code written by developers (not Google's code) and allows developers to recompile it for Windows 10 Phones. Google can't do anything about it (at least for current apps) because it's not their code in question. In fact Google could completely change everything and break compatibility so they don't work, and it STILL wouldn't prevent the developer from taking their existing code and porting it.
Now going forward they can try to make it difficult to port future apps written exclusively to be native apps for some future version of Android. But by that point it might be too late, with too many developers onboard.
You're assuming that the issue that matters is "the program runs (for some definition of 'run')". That is NOT the issue. What people care about is not just that a program runs, it's that it presents the same look and feel as the rest of the platform. The controls need to look OS appropriate, things need to be done in the usual OS way.
This has never really worked successfully. It didn't work on OS/2. It didn't work for Java. It hasn't really worked for web apps (users FAR prefer native apps to wrappers around web pages). The only place where it sorta works is Google insisting on being a dick and forcing material design on its iOS apps which therefore feel completely different from every other iOS app. I don't have numbers, but my guess is that the consequence of that is that they have lost market share on iOS. Certainly I only use Google Maps or Chrome on iOS when I absolutely have to, because it's irritating as all fsck to have the browser suddenly refuse to honor the backward swipe gesture that is standard in the rest of the OS; or to try to figure out how to do anything in Maps where everything is ass-backward from iOS.
Point is. If my choice is run Android, where everything works like I expect, or run Windows, where, sure, I can use the Android apps, but it's a PITA, why wouldn't I just stick with genuine Android? The technologists who get excited about how the fact that they can run these foreign apps never appreciate this point, the value of the entire platform feeling like a coherent UI whole.
"What people care about is not just that a program runs, it's that it presents the same look and feel as the rest of the platform"...
That has been said over and over again, yet only tech blogs cared. People never gave crap about "consistency" unless the entire paradigm was completely off. This was anticipated by Microsoft and could very well be the reason why they completely changed the design of previous Metro to the current Universal App paradigm with vertical scrolling, left margins for navigation, and "hamburger menus".
"It didn't work on OS/2", "The only place where it sorta works is Google insisting on being a dick and forcing material design"
Again, you're thinking like BillBear, which isn't the point nor how it works. You're NOT running iOS/Android apps on Windows 10, you're ***re-using*** your existing code, partially or completely, to PORT your ALREADY existing app(s), and BUILDING a new NATIVE Windows 10 Universal App that works "as expected" on Windows 10. Worst case scenario would be that the app is completely identical in look and function. The average case is that it might work better if the new strong points of Windows 10', Cortana, XBox and Azure services are leveraged. "Consistency" isn't completely compromised as mentioned above. The very fact you mentioned about how Google Apps on iOS don't adhere to iOS design guidelines, yet are very successful, proves that complete consistency with the underlying OS isn't necessary.
-----------------------------------------
The success of Java in the enterprise, and its failure in the desktop are completely different subjects, and neither apply here.
You make reasonable points, but there are enough downsides that I think no-one knows how this will play out. There are obvious legal issues. Presumably they will use Google vs Oracle as precedent, but it seems like the iOS libraries is a rather more substantial body of work than the Java libs. (Of course that may not matter as far as precedent goes.) There may also be Apple patents embedded in what that code does. On the other hand Apple may see no point in suing. It's basically an admission by MS that they don't know how to write a compelling API, which is worth advertising to the world, and a more satisfactory outcome might be something like an agreement with Apple which gives Apple access to anything MS has that may be useful (eg their async technology in C#). It also means MS has to support this forever as iOS keeps changing; and it means those devs never have to spend much effort learning new MS APIs and supporting whatever MS thinks will make their platform stand out from Android+Chrome or iOS+OSX.
I also think you're wrong about "People never gave crap about "consistency" unless the entire paradigm was completely off." I'd venture that a large part of why people are willing to pay 30% for Apple products is precisely because they value consistency and fine attention to detail. Maybe MS has just given up on even attempting to appeal to those customers, and wants to fight with Android for the customers who will change platform tomorrow to save a dollar? That's sad --- I'd much rather see them compete on "we can provide quality every bit as good as Apple" rather than "we can shovel cheap garbage every bit as well as Google".
Doesn't look that way to me. Syntax and library definitions (naming) aren't patentable, it's the implementation (ie: underlying code) that counts.
"It's basically an admission by MS that they don't know how to write a compelling API"
Hehe, that was a cute snark attempt. I like it. Hello? We're talking about Microsoft. They arguably have the most compelling, easiest, and most powerful platform and IDE in the business. The problem isn't the API, it's the timing. When they stepped in, there already were other successful established ecosystem (Android/iOS) with dedicated devs. They're making up for it with support of other APIs/Syntax to make migration that much easier. C# Syntax was originally developed with close resemblance to Java in mind to attract all the former Java developers. It was pretty darn successful. You can think of this attempt as being very similar.
"It also means MS has to support this forever as iOS keeps changing"
Nah. A good 2-3 years is enough until attention is drawn to the more powerful platform that Microsoft provides. Devs aren't idiots. Even if Windows 10 wasn't a huge success on phones in the coming years, they still have the tablet/desktop. What kind of idiot would want to ignore the total PC/tablet install base of Windows 10 in the coming year or two?? Major carrier billing is incoming as well. If their apps are successful there (and most probably will be), it'll be much more viable to invest in more dedicated resource for the additional (or primary by then) platform. There are also other technologies that make cross-platform easier (Xamarin comes to mind).
"I also think you're wrong"
You're entitled to your opinion. However, keep in mind that Windows isn't Android. You build once for Windows and it works literally everywhere as intended, more so than iOS (or similarly at worst). Android is the least easy of the bunch to code for and support, so attention to detail isn't always viable because too many versions exist. It's not as bad as portrayed, but it's definitely NOT easy.
"Maybe MS has just given up on even attempting to appeal to those [premium segment] customers"
Lets not get ahead of ourselves. Apple started off with an empty market, that's how they got their premium-only segment soaring with a relatively great product. This isn't easy now even with arguably better products. Android, for example already has a well established and equally capable ecosystem, but the only real contender in that segment is Samsung as far as sales and profits are concerened (and even Samsung has their bad year(s) too). Quality hardware and "attention to detail" is NOT enough, ask HTC, LG and Sony.
When you don't even have double digit market share in a mature/saturated market, you do what you have to do to increase that number first with more affordable hardware (Windows is a lot, A LOT, cheaper for OEMs to support than Android). You then appeal to all the devs, make their lives easier, and get your ecosystem and identity up to speed (Microsoft is offering devs the entirety of the Windows platform as a *starting incentive*, phone comes second with little to no modification). THEN you storm the market with consistent, quality, and comprehensive hardware that appeals to the high end. That's what I believe is the best strategy to win an already very competitive market. The *key* is UNIVERSAL APPS, and THAT'S what this keynote is all about.
That said, we'll have to wait and see. I initially thought this was their strategy with Windows 8, but Microsoft (and those clowns in management) SERIOUSLY messed up by jumping in before having their Universal App model ready. It would have been much easier than it is now, because they had a serious lead on Android in terms of UI performance/smoothness, especially in the mid/low end at the time. However, Nothing is impossible in a market where consumers change their devices every 2 years on average, software is getting less and less dependent on front-end technologies. This isn't the PC market after all.
As long as they use things like .NET messageboxes in the places where it asks "Are you sure you want to quit? Yes/No?" instead of those ugly custom things Java used, it'll be fine.
This is NOT directly comparable. IBM gave consumers a way to run software that wasn't for their platform. Microsoft is giving *developers* an easy way to port their apps to the Windows Store and run on them on Windows devices. Customers still have to buy/download Windows apps - it's just that developers don't need to change their toolsets to make Windows apps anymore (if they weren't already using something like the pretty awesome Xamarin).
The title is a bit misleading and is adding to the confusion. Windows 10 cannot run native Android/iOS binaries. Universal Apps, however, can be built using/reusing current Android/iOS source code.
Again with this Google will mess with MS stuff. Baseless. Do you understand how fragmented the Android OS is? The majority of handsets and tablets do not run the latest and greatest version of Android and never will. If you break the AOSP just to mess with MS. you break it for all those users of Android devices running older versions of the OS as well. Not gonna happen.
Google is already pushing to move core APIs out of AOSP and into Google Play Services. This allows Google to maintain a semi-stable set of APIs across a fragmented ecosystem of different Android versions, but it also allows them to make it difficult to provide Google-less Android platforms. This is harmful to both AOSP and Microsofts porting efforts.
As a Lumia owner I can't say I'm that jazzed about this. There are enough apps and I like the phone because I like the way it does UI compared to other platforms. I don't really need 9 zillion non-native apps and a halt to native development because of this easy way out. If that happens I'll probably just end up getting an iPhone, where the apps'll run better anyway.
You don't seem to understand. These aren't being emulated. They will be complied and run on Windows phone natively. There is a concern about UIs being all over the place, but at this point it's either use an app with a UI designed for iOS/Android or none at all. This won't do anything to already existing apps and newly created apps for Win Phone that follow the UI paradigms.
It is interesting how MS is positioning itself between a rock and a hard place.
On one hand they need the apps to arrive to Windows Phone.
On the other hand this Blackberristic approach means apps in windows phone will potentially be even slower than Android itself. Plus, binding their fate to whatever Google decides to do with Android is risky.
I guess the idea is to get small devs onboard and let them optimise their apps to "native" apps in the future, but it's risky anyway.
(The alternative is to brutally lag behind competition anyway)
It won't bring apps. Not enough to make a difference anyways.
Why? It still requires the developer to play a part, and we know from experience how that went with BB10...
Among other reasons, Windows Phone doesn't have enough users toile it worth the developers times and efforts.
"But, but it's a market of millions of potential users!"
And? It would be relatively easy to port many existing apps and games from iOS to Android. But you still see many of the best ones remaining exclusive to iOS. If they're willing to miss out on a market of hundreds of millions, what makes you think they'll come running to Windows Phone?!?
Anyone know what technology they are using to make the iOS ports happen? Anyone care to guess if Apple will try a DMCA lawsuit for copying Apple API's. They specifically said they support UIKit and Core Animation, and I don't know how you could do that without stepping on Apple's copyright. Did Microsoft pay Apple a licence fee?
Oracle hasn't stopped Android yet despite it being built on IBM's implementation of the class library. Your free to convert API's and you wouldn't even need a runtime on the device to support it if it's done as a conversion/compiled to native api's by the toolkit. API's aren't copyrightable, not yet at least and you don't need to copy any software to support a subset of the API.
Stuff that stops porting to WP is that it's quite hard to just port normal C or C++ apps from the mobile platforms (and PC). Most early ports were complete rewrites in C#. The C support has pretty much been unofficial and there's no OGLES support either which means companies that don't do DX (or use an engine that supports it) might need to do a DX port of their game. C++ is still a bit different than on other platforms/frameworks.
Edge browser is still a Win32 library (dll) in Windows 10 and 10 mobile for example. VLC still hasn't managed to do a decent port of VLC to Windows Runtime. On a platform like Android (using the NDK or third party tools) it's perfectly fine to port (portable) C and C++ (or use a third party implementation of C#) and do stuff like a full blown browser on the other hand. A C/C++ game engine can port fairly easy between iOS and Android using much of the same code on both.
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Morawka - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
this is all a quietly orchestrated attempt to get google to bring Youtube, Gmail, and Other Google Services over to windows phone.Previously, Google refused to make any apps for WP. Microsoft went ahead and made their own version of youtube, but google threw a fit, and would not allow it. Microsoft said "ok if you dont want us to do it, then you do it." Google said "no thanks"
So if google still refuses with this conversion tool, then i think microsoft has a claim in court to force the issue.
chizow - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
Yeah its great to see Microsoft forging their own workaround, and to think Microsoft was sued some time ago for trying to bundle IE in Windows! It is amazing to see what the likes of Apple and Google are able to get away with without even a hint of the anti-trust rubbish claims made against Microsoft for basically the same kind of behavior.BillBear - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
To get in trouble with anti-trust law, first you need to hold a monopoly. Then you need to use that monopoly in one area to damage competitors in another area.For Microsoft, they used their Windows monopoly to damage Netscape in the area of web browsers, which were not free at the time but pay software.
Notice that Google is getting in trouble in the EU because they have used their search monopoly to disadvantage their competitors in other areas, like online shopping.
It's worth noting that in the EU you don't need to have nearly as large a share of the market in one area before leveraging that success to your competitors disadvantage elsewhere puts you in the legal crosshairs.
Luc K - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
Microsoft was clearly no monopoly as time has shown that in just few years focus shifted and certainly not result of this lawsuit. Also it was started by list of competitors in reality (Netscape wasn't really a player anymore).Apple holds 100% monopoly on their devices and 100% control them so why are they not sued? It's just bad EU politics that makes no sense and consumers hardly see any money of the outcome (which was supposedly the outcome of Windows that they can buy a version without IE which no one did).
GotThumbs - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
Well said.Apple controls ALL aspects of it's ecosystem. ITunes should be a HUGE violation, yet Apple has skated along unscathed.
V900 - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
That was ironic, no? A little sarcasm, right?Cause frankly, I'm deeply troubled that it's possible to go to school for 9-12 years, graduate and still be dumb enough to say something as glaringly stupid and misinformed as 'Apple should be sued for monopoly, cause they have a 100% monopoly on their devices."
Socius - Friday, May 1, 2015 - link
He meant that they have full control over what is or isn't allowed on their devices, including instances where they are forcing the use of their own products like all browsers essentially being re skinned Safari, having to use iTunes, and in general limiting many essential background services to those provided by Apple themselves.Also Google packaging all the google services apps with android phones is no different than Microsoft providing Internet explorer with Windows. Except Microsoft got sued for it, and Google is doing even more of it. And yes considering that roughly 95% of the smartphone market is in the hands of Apple and Google, with Google providing their OS for free to increase their monopoly in the advertising market, this is indeed a monopoly, and leveraging one product to make it hard for others to compete in another. This is also why Microsoft was forced to split their operations. To prevent this sort of thing.
But again...none of that against Apple and Google. Just big bad Microsoft. Lol.
steven75 - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
Don't be silly. Target holds a 100% monopoly on their stores, yet they are not considered as monopolies in the sense they do not control 100% of the department store market.Neither does Apple have a monopoly in the mobile computer market.
sprockkets - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
"Microsoft was clearly no monopoly as time has shown that in just few years focus shifted and certainly not result of this lawsuit. Also it was started by list of competitors in reality (Netscape wasn't really a player anymore)."By 1999 MS controlled the desktop market. There is no sane argument against that fact. Apple in 1997 was almost dead.
TEAMSWITCHER - Friday, May 1, 2015 - link
What your forgetting is that Microsoft still lost and was subject to a decade of DOJ oversight. And it was exactly that DOJ oversight that let Apple and Google grow into the companies they are today. Microsoft would have squished them both if the DOJ was breathing down their backs.GotThumbs - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
IMO. To get into trouble with the EU, all you need is millions of dollars in the bank.The EU nations RUN on other peoples dollars.
MS never prevented anyone from installing and choosing Netscape as their default browser. That is a FACT no one can deny. The problem is it's very easy to get non-producers to say 'Yes' about taking from people/companies that produce, rather than telling them to build a better solution.
Rather than penalize Google, why hasn't someone on the planet built a better search engine? In my own experience, Bing does not think like I do and try's to give me all sorts of other crap I'm not looking for.
It's NOT impossible, but the EU chooses to go where they can get easy money.....from US companies.
A great woman once said:
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other peoples money"
M. Thatcher
steven75 - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
Business 101 fail right here. Zero understanding of antitrust laws.V900 - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
Zero understanding of around a handful of issues from what I can tell.V900 - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
Are you ready for a shocker? It's not just EU that runs on 'other people's dollars'... All governments partake in that particular scam and call it taxes.And sometimes they use some of those moneys to disrupt a monopolist so that the free market can work more effectively!
Romberry - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
Actually, I think this is an attempt to address the app gap, both real and perceived, and make Windows 10 mobile a viable platform for people and organizations that need those apps. Also, along with the Windows 10 mobile to PC-like experience when interfaced with an external monitor, keyboard and mouse that Balifore was showing off, it just opens up a whole new world of possibilities for mobile.Shorter version: If you're thinking this is just aimed at Google and its ecosystem, you're thinking too small. MS is swinging for the fences.
MrSpadge - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
Agreed. This could become the single most important selling point of Win 10 and Win Phone 10. Letting you do and run pretty much anything, without the hurdles of Linux, has always been a strength of Windows. If this works well enough, it's going be build on this strength and provide users with the best of "all" worlds. The possibilities are amazing: no further vendor lock-in due to a purchased app ecosystem.Mark_gb - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
Maybe it is. But you still need to convince a whole lot more than 3% of phone buyers to buy something they know lags far, far behind the big boys.I also cannot imagine that either Apple or Google are going to be too thrilled with Microsoft trying to leech their apps.
kyuu - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
In what way do Windows Phone lag "far, far" behind the "big boys" in anything but apps?And who cares if Apple or Google are upset? There's nothing they can do about it, except maybe try some BS and probably illegal stuff like making developers agree to not compile their apps for Windows in order to get in the Apple/Google stores.
Zak - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
MS isn't leeching their apps. They're giving the developers the tools to easily port their existing apps to their platform. It's up to the devs to port their code or not. I hope Apple and Google don't take legal action because that would be a move against the devs not against MS. Anything that makes cross-platform development easier is good for everybody regardless of which platform you prefer. I don't like MS phone but I wish they are successful because that will keep Apple and Google on their toes and force to continue to innovate. Real competition is what wee need, not litigation.steven75 - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
Anything but apps... Yeah, so they *only* trail in the thing that 80% of a user's time is spent doing. That's no big deal at all!mkozakewich - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
One of the great tragedies of our time. Windows' interface is so much better than Android's or (to a lesser extent) iOS's. But an entire operating system is garbage if all the biggest developers don't code for it. That requires huge network effects.Speedfriend - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
"But you still need to convince a whole lot more than 3% of phone buyers to buy something they know lags far, far behind the big boys."3% now, but I'll bet that Windows Phone market share passes iOS within 3 years.
If Microsoft get this right, together with what they are doing in the cloud, could make them the investment opportunity of the year.
steven75 - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
I'll take you up on that bet. Has anyone ever won any significant market share through the "recompile on our platform" strategy? That gives your users second-class software at best, usually worse.Schnydz - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
Second class software at best??~ I don't know about that. If candy crush is any proof than I see no quality issues here. I've played the app on both iOS and WP and the UX is practically identical. No lag, nothing. So, before you go off assuming the worst maybe you should hold and be a little more objective here.
mkozakewich - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
If the UI is identical that means one of two things:1) The UI fits one platform better than the other, and looks out of place on the second.
2) The UI is special and fits neither platform, offering a sub-par experience.
Nagorak - Friday, May 1, 2015 - link
A phone is a phone. There is largely no real difference in the UI of Android vs iOS vs WP. They're all variations of the same theme and having basically identical apps running on any of those platforms works just fine.SirPerro - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
Actually that makes no sense because all google apps make extensive and intensive use of the common Google APIs obviously.Google opening the APIs to windows phone? Yes, that's not gonna happen.
mkozakewich - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
I was helping students learn how to program Android apps, and I was appalled to find that they were encouraged to just use all the Google libraries by default so they could do maps or stuff whenever they needed.name99 - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
"A better Android than Android; A better iOS than iOS"?Yeah, that ended well the last time it was tried. You'd figure MS would remember that, but perhaps everyone involved has retired by now.
Zak - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
What claim do the have? That Google doesn't want to make apps for their platform? Isn't that exactly what Blackberry said? That developers should be forced to make apps for their platform? And they got laughed at all over the net.sprockkets - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
Most of google's apps all require GPS to run in the background, and MS already said they can't duplicate that, but can offer their own alternatives.They still won't do it. And they can't force them in court either to do it; they'll be laughed out the door.
Besides, what is the point? You really want half assed apps from android/ios to ruin the UI consistency that Win8 and WP worked so hard to achieve? This is a big step backwards.
sprockkets - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
clarify, GPS = google play servicesmkozakewich - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
They're basically playing the same game as Amazon, here. I wonder if they could team up to find a solution.Penti - Wednesday, May 6, 2015 - link
Your free to do a YT-app as long as you use the public API's. You know that the Microsoft app lacked ads and so on. YT doesn't lock out WP.kpkp - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
Did they give any reasoning on why Android ports are strictly for the mobile version of windows?Kayon - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
I think this was picked up by press incorrectly. If the Android App is ported to UA it should run on all windows devices, mobile and Full. Right ?Brandon Chester - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
Astoria is explicitly stated to only be for phones, while Islandwood says universal apps.https://dev.windows.com/en-US/uwp-bridges
Kayon - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
My Android code was written for an ARM phone. Will Astoria compile for ARM and X86 phones ?Brandon Chester - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
Not sure. This will be the session where lots of questions get answered tomorrowhttp://channel9.msdn.com/Events/Build/2015/2-702
mkozakewich - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
This is a question that will need to be answered. I don't think Android really makes the distinction between categories of screen size, except for offering different layouts based on size. Isn't Windows doing much the same with Continuum? Does Windows actually make the distinction between phone and desktop?Or did they just mean the only reason Astoria exists is to enable the use of Android apps on phones? (Despite still working on tablets or other devices?)
Romberry - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
Lack of mouse and keyboard support is the obstacle.Morawka - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
This is somewhat related:.. i jailbroke my ipad, and added a tweak that lets you connect a bluetooth mouse and keyboard.Suprisingly, it worked flawlessly. Even games that are built for touch, will naturally take mouse input. Hearthstone for example. I was able to play hearthstone on my iPad with a mouse, just like on PC.
Same thing with Candy Crush.
I dont believe this is a obsticle because ios seems to take mouse input Native-ly. the option just had to be enabled (which is what the tweak does)
mkozakewich - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
Not an obstacle. Both Android and iOS treat a mouse as a finger. Plus, you could get a Wacom tablet or something to make the gestures more natural, so you don't inherently lose the experience on a desktop.mgl888 - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
This looks different from Blackberry's emulation approach since it looks like they are actually compiling the source code (as opposed to providing an emulation environment to run apks). It'd be very interesting to see how it impacts performance.Stochastic - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
Battery life, too.Morawka - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
well this is not emulation.. Emulation would require more CPU and more battery. But this is native code, so the impact will be 0Gigaplex - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
They'll need to provide shims/"emulation" for Google Play services, so it's not going to be completely unaffected in all cases.lorribot - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
Oh great, does that mean Windows will have a billion all the same apps that nobody wants like Android and iOS?mgl888 - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
Better than having no appsalthaz - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
Windows Phone currently has plenty of apps. It's a bit short on apps that are really websites, corporate apps and games though. This should really help with the last two and will probably, unfortunately, also mean more of the first.johnnycanadian - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
This'll be absolutely fantastic -- but only if MS starts to actually vet the applications in their App Store. As it stands, the Windows Phone App Store is an absolute cesspool, to the point of being unusable.Romberry - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
A cesspool? Nah. Ain't great for sure, but it's not a hole full of digesting crap either.mkozakewich - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
All they really need to do (and Android and iOS at the same time) is stop treating all apps the same. Put in some curation, and then vet all the curated apps so that people can be certain they aren't garbage. And then natively incorporate the features of the often-used apps so that they have first-party support.BillBear - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you OS/10 Warp.This represents a capitulation to the competing touch ecosystems and should prove as successful as OS/2 Warp was.
lilmoe - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
Totally not the same thing.This doesn't mean that Windows 10 will *run* Android/iOS apps. It means that Universal Apps can be built using Java, C++ and Objective C, just like it can be built using HTML and Javascript.
It's a game changer.
BillBear - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
How does that make it any less fragile when Google starts making changes just to mess with Microsoft, as we all know they will?Romberry - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
Google can't make changes that mess with AOSP without breaking all those phones and tablets in the very fragmented Android ecosystem as well. So...no.Alexvrb - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
That is incorrect. This takes existing code written by developers (not Google's code) and allows developers to recompile it for Windows 10 Phones. Google can't do anything about it (at least for current apps) because it's not their code in question. In fact Google could completely change everything and break compatibility so they don't work, and it STILL wouldn't prevent the developer from taking their existing code and porting it.Now going forward they can try to make it difficult to port future apps written exclusively to be native apps for some future version of Android. But by that point it might be too late, with too many developers onboard.
name99 - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
You're assuming that the issue that matters is "the program runs (for some definition of 'run')".That is NOT the issue. What people care about is not just that a program runs, it's that it presents the same look and feel as the rest of the platform. The controls need to look OS appropriate, things need to be done in the usual OS way.
This has never really worked successfully. It didn't work on OS/2. It didn't work for Java. It hasn't really worked for web apps (users FAR prefer native apps to wrappers around web pages). The only place where it sorta works is Google insisting on being a dick and forcing material design on its iOS apps which therefore feel completely different from every other iOS app. I don't have numbers, but my guess is that the consequence of that is that they have lost market share on iOS. Certainly I only use Google Maps or Chrome on iOS when I absolutely have to, because it's irritating as all fsck to have the browser suddenly refuse to honor the backward swipe gesture that is standard in the rest of the OS; or to try to figure out how to do anything in Maps where everything is ass-backward from iOS.
Point is. If my choice is run Android, where everything works like I expect, or run Windows, where, sure, I can use the Android apps, but it's a PITA, why wouldn't I just stick with genuine Android? The technologists who get excited about how the fact that they can run these foreign apps never appreciate this point, the value of the entire platform feeling like a coherent UI whole.
lilmoe - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
"What people care about is not just that a program runs, it's that it presents the same look and feel as the rest of the platform"...That has been said over and over again, yet only tech blogs cared. People never gave crap about "consistency" unless the entire paradigm was completely off. This was anticipated by Microsoft and could very well be the reason why they completely changed the design of previous Metro to the current Universal App paradigm with vertical scrolling, left margins for navigation, and "hamburger menus".
http://www.winbeta.org/news/microsoft-releases-its...
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"It didn't work on OS/2", "The only place where it sorta works is Google insisting on being a dick and forcing material design"
Again, you're thinking like BillBear, which isn't the point nor how it works. You're NOT running iOS/Android apps on Windows 10, you're ***re-using*** your existing code, partially or completely, to PORT your ALREADY existing app(s), and BUILDING a new NATIVE Windows 10 Universal App that works "as expected" on Windows 10. Worst case scenario would be that the app is completely identical in look and function. The average case is that it might work better if the new strong points of Windows 10', Cortana, XBox and Azure services are leveraged. "Consistency" isn't completely compromised as mentioned above. The very fact you mentioned about how Google Apps on iOS don't adhere to iOS design guidelines, yet are very successful, proves that complete consistency with the underlying OS isn't necessary.
-----------------------------------------
The success of Java in the enterprise, and its failure in the desktop are completely different subjects, and neither apply here.
name99 - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
You make reasonable points, but there are enough downsides that I think no-one knows how this will play out.There are obvious legal issues. Presumably they will use Google vs Oracle as precedent, but it seems like the iOS libraries is a rather more substantial body of work than the Java libs. (Of course that may not matter as far as precedent goes.) There may also be Apple patents embedded in what that code does.
On the other hand Apple may see no point in suing. It's basically an admission by MS that they don't know how to write a compelling API, which is worth advertising to the world, and a more satisfactory outcome might be something like an agreement with Apple which gives Apple access to anything MS has that may be useful (eg their async technology in C#). It also means MS has to support this forever as iOS keeps changing; and it means those devs never have to spend much effort learning new MS APIs and supporting whatever MS thinks will make their platform stand out from Android+Chrome or iOS+OSX.
I also think you're wrong about "People never gave crap about "consistency" unless the entire paradigm was completely off." I'd venture that a large part of why people are willing to pay 30% for Apple products is precisely because they value consistency and fine attention to detail. Maybe MS has just given up on even attempting to appeal to those customers, and wants to fight with Android for the customers who will change platform tomorrow to save a dollar? That's sad --- I'd much rather see them compete on "we can provide quality every bit as good as Apple" rather than "we can shovel cheap garbage every bit as well as Google".
lilmoe - Friday, May 1, 2015 - link
"There are obvious legal issues"Doesn't look that way to me. Syntax and library definitions (naming) aren't patentable, it's the implementation (ie: underlying code) that counts.
"It's basically an admission by MS that they don't know how to write a compelling API"
Hehe, that was a cute snark attempt. I like it. Hello? We're talking about Microsoft. They arguably have the most compelling, easiest, and most powerful platform and IDE in the business. The problem isn't the API, it's the timing. When they stepped in, there already were other successful established ecosystem (Android/iOS) with dedicated devs. They're making up for it with support of other APIs/Syntax to make migration that much easier. C# Syntax was originally developed with close resemblance to Java in mind to attract all the former Java developers. It was pretty darn successful. You can think of this attempt as being very similar.
"It also means MS has to support this forever as iOS keeps changing"
Nah. A good 2-3 years is enough until attention is drawn to the more powerful platform that Microsoft provides. Devs aren't idiots. Even if Windows 10 wasn't a huge success on phones in the coming years, they still have the tablet/desktop. What kind of idiot would want to ignore the total PC/tablet install base of Windows 10 in the coming year or two?? Major carrier billing is incoming as well. If their apps are successful there (and most probably will be), it'll be much more viable to invest in more dedicated resource for the additional (or primary by then) platform. There are also other technologies that make cross-platform easier (Xamarin comes to mind).
"I also think you're wrong"
You're entitled to your opinion. However, keep in mind that Windows isn't Android. You build once for Windows and it works literally everywhere as intended, more so than iOS (or similarly at worst). Android is the least easy of the bunch to code for and support, so attention to detail isn't always viable because too many versions exist. It's not as bad as portrayed, but it's definitely NOT easy.
"Maybe MS has just given up on even attempting to appeal to those [premium segment] customers"
Lets not get ahead of ourselves. Apple started off with an empty market, that's how they got their premium-only segment soaring with a relatively great product. This isn't easy now even with arguably better products. Android, for example already has a well established and equally capable ecosystem, but the only real contender in that segment is Samsung as far as sales and profits are concerened (and even Samsung has their bad year(s) too). Quality hardware and "attention to detail" is NOT enough, ask HTC, LG and Sony.
When you don't even have double digit market share in a mature/saturated market, you do what you have to do to increase that number first with more affordable hardware (Windows is a lot, A LOT, cheaper for OEMs to support than Android). You then appeal to all the devs, make their lives easier, and get your ecosystem and identity up to speed (Microsoft is offering devs the entirety of the Windows platform as a *starting incentive*, phone comes second with little to no modification). THEN you storm the market with consistent, quality, and comprehensive hardware that appeals to the high end. That's what I believe is the best strategy to win an already very competitive market. The *key* is UNIVERSAL APPS, and THAT'S what this keynote is all about.
That said, we'll have to wait and see. I initially thought this was their strategy with Windows 8, but Microsoft (and those clowns in management) SERIOUSLY messed up by jumping in before having their Universal App model ready. It would have been much easier than it is now, because they had a serious lead on Android in terms of UI performance/smoothness, especially in the mid/low end at the time. However, Nothing is impossible in a market where consumers change their devices every 2 years on average, software is getting less and less dependent on front-end technologies. This isn't the PC market after all.
mkozakewich - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
As long as they use things like .NET messageboxes in the places where it asks "Are you sure you want to quit? Yes/No?" instead of those ugly custom things Java used, it'll be fine.althaz - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
This is NOT directly comparable. IBM gave consumers a way to run software that wasn't for their platform. Microsoft is giving *developers* an easy way to port their apps to the Windows Store and run on them on Windows devices. Customers still have to buy/download Windows apps - it's just that developers don't need to change their toolsets to make Windows apps anymore (if they weren't already using something like the pretty awesome Xamarin).lilmoe - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
The title is a bit misleading and is adding to the confusion. Windows 10 cannot run native Android/iOS binaries. Universal Apps, however, can be built using/reusing current Android/iOS source code.lilmoe - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
edit: Universal Apps, however, can be built using/reusing current Android/iOS source code ***with minor modification if necessary***BillBear - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
That change won't stay minor. Google greatly enjoys messing with Microsoft.Romberry - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
Again with this Google will mess with MS stuff. Baseless. Do you understand how fragmented the Android OS is? The majority of handsets and tablets do not run the latest and greatest version of Android and never will. If you break the AOSP just to mess with MS. you break it for all those users of Android devices running older versions of the OS as well. Not gonna happen.Gigaplex - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
Google is already pushing to move core APIs out of AOSP and into Google Play Services. This allows Google to maintain a semi-stable set of APIs across a fragmented ecosystem of different Android versions, but it also allows them to make it difficult to provide Google-less Android platforms. This is harmful to both AOSP and Microsofts porting efforts.althaz - Wednesday, April 29, 2015 - link
Actually, you are incorrect. iOS apps will require a recompile, Android .apks will work on Windows.Jihan Tamim - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
Microsoft doing a great job..and also take some good marketing systemABR - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
As a Lumia owner I can't say I'm that jazzed about this. There are enough apps and I like the phone because I like the way it does UI compared to other platforms. I don't really need 9 zillion non-native apps and a halt to native development because of this easy way out. If that happens I'll probably just end up getting an iPhone, where the apps'll run better anyway.kyuu - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
You don't seem to understand. These aren't being emulated. They will be complied and run on Windows phone natively. There is a concern about UIs being all over the place, but at this point it's either use an app with a UI designed for iOS/Android or none at all. This won't do anything to already existing apps and newly created apps for Win Phone that follow the UI paradigms.Gigaplex - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
Running natively (no emulation) and using the native UI are two separate topics. ABR is worried about the latter.SirPerro - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
It is interesting how MS is positioning itself between a rock and a hard place.On one hand they need the apps to arrive to Windows Phone.
On the other hand this Blackberristic approach means apps in windows phone will potentially be even slower than Android itself. Plus, binding their fate to whatever Google decides to do with Android is risky.
I guess the idea is to get small devs onboard and let them optimise their apps to "native" apps in the future, but it's risky anyway.
(The alternative is to brutally lag behind competition anyway)
V900 - Thursday, April 30, 2015 - link
It won't bring apps. Not enough to make a difference anyways.Why? It still requires the developer to play a part, and we know from experience how that went with BB10...
Among other reasons, Windows Phone doesn't have enough users toile it worth the developers times and efforts.
"But, but it's a market of millions of potential users!"
And? It would be relatively easy to port many existing apps and games from iOS to Android. But you still see many of the best ones remaining exclusive to iOS. If they're willing to miss out on a market of hundreds of millions, what makes you think they'll come running to Windows Phone?!?
TEAMSWITCHER - Friday, May 1, 2015 - link
Anyone know what technology they are using to make the iOS ports happen? Anyone care to guess if Apple will try a DMCA lawsuit for copying Apple API's. They specifically said they support UIKit and Core Animation, and I don't know how you could do that without stepping on Apple's copyright. Did Microsoft pay Apple a licence fee?Penti - Wednesday, May 6, 2015 - link
Oracle hasn't stopped Android yet despite it being built on IBM's implementation of the class library. Your free to convert API's and you wouldn't even need a runtime on the device to support it if it's done as a conversion/compiled to native api's by the toolkit. API's aren't copyrightable, not yet at least and you don't need to copy any software to support a subset of the API.Stuff that stops porting to WP is that it's quite hard to just port normal C or C++ apps from the mobile platforms (and PC). Most early ports were complete rewrites in C#. The C support has pretty much been unofficial and there's no OGLES support either which means companies that don't do DX (or use an engine that supports it) might need to do a DX port of their game. C++ is still a bit different than on other platforms/frameworks.
Edge browser is still a Win32 library (dll) in Windows 10 and 10 mobile for example. VLC still hasn't managed to do a decent port of VLC to Windows Runtime. On a platform like Android (using the NDK or third party tools) it's perfectly fine to port (portable) C and C++ (or use a third party implementation of C#) and do stuff like a full blown browser on the other hand. A C/C++ game engine can port fairly easy between iOS and Android using much of the same code on both.