Hence it shouldn’t come as a surprise that a team in France built the Ave Comics app, shown in action above, which lets you preview, purchase and read digital versions of comics.
Last night, I attended my friend Alexa Clark’sphoto exhibit, which took place at Camaraderie, a downtown Toronto coworking space for indies and entrepreneurs. This sort of event at this sort of location tends to bring out techies with an interest in design and designers with a technical bent, and they all came up to me with the same question: So, do you have one of those Windows phones?
I pulled out my Samsung “Taylor” phone, let people take try it out, and here were the responses:
“I like the main screen. Less cluttered than my iPhone’s.”
(Flipping through the People hub) “That’s a great way to organize pages!”
(Seeing my wife’s tile on the Start screen, pinned to the top) “So people can have their own icon right on the home page? That’s great!”
(Seeing the way pages animate as you navigate) “That’s a nice touch.”
(On the overall design) “This is a Microsoft phone?”
Glow Air Hockey is a game Social Indulgence that lets you play air hockey game against the phone or a friend. There’s a little more information about the game at Glow Air Hockey’s page.
(In the video above, the red dots are the players’ finger positions as shown in the emulator; you won’t see them when you’re actually playing the game on the phone.)
BulletAsylum by UberGeekGames is a gorgeous game for Windows Phone 7 that’s part Missile Command, part Geometry Wars and all awesome. It’s written using XNA and coming soon to both WP7 and Xbox live and coming out later this year.
Here’s their blurb:
BulletAsylum is a new spin on the classic defend-the-city-from-meteors genre. Simply touch the screen on a WP7 device, or push the thumbstick on the Xbox 360 to create a literal fireworks show out of your enemies with an impenetrable wall of firepower. Instantly purchase new towers and cities without breaking up the action. Split your fire in two directions by touching the screen in two places or using the right thumbstick. Unleash the screen-clearing Overdrive when you’re in a tight spot.
I’m going to throw you a curve ball right now: if you want to develop apps for Windows Phone 7, one of the must-read books is one written for iPhone developers and designers. It’s Tapworthy, written by Josh Clark and published by O’Reilly.
While Tapworthy was written with people building apps for The Esteemed Competition’s phone in mind, much of it is applicable to WP7 developers and designers. That’s because it’s not about the act of programming, nor is it about marketing phone apps. It’s about creating applications that are useful, usable and delight your users. It’s about good application design, understanding your users’ situation, wants and needs, and what separates “just good enough” from “awesomesauce”. As the book says in its introduction:
You’ll learn how to conceive and refine your app’s design in tune with the needs of a mobile audience—and their fingers and thumbs. Designing a handheld device that works by touch is entirely different from designing any other kind of software interface. Experienced designers and newcomers alike will uncover the shifts in mindset and technique required to craft a great app.
If you are about to embark upon designing your first commercial mobile app, stop what you’re doing, buy this book, read it, and then proceed with your design efforts. It will save you countless hours of headaches, frustrations, and dead ends. If you have been building mobile apps for a while and have not had the success you think should be yours, then this book may have some suggestions to help you get better returns on your development dollars. If you are looking to kick up your UI designing game a few notches, then you should stop what you are doing, log on to Amazon, and order a copy immediately. You can certainly read this book from cover to cover in one sitting, but we are certain you will be returning to it again and again.
I’ve heard the back-and-forth debate about whether you should write your phone app as a native app or as a web app more times that I care to recall, but it’s never been done as well as Jason Alderman and Matthias Shapiro do it…rap battle style!
By the bye, if you’re building stuff for WPF, Silverlight or Windows Phone, you really should be reading Matthias’ blog, Designer Silverlight. I’ve already bookmarked it, and so should you!
And for the truly nerdcore, here are the lyrics:
Jason: You bought three coding books for reading on your Kindle, They never got read, the whole deal is a swindle, Pony annual fees for app sales, then they tax it, I’m telling you man, that app store is a racket! You are MUCH better off with HTML– The web page markup that I know you know well– The latest spec lets you store data on phones Even when offline, but the browser phones home! Your iPhone, Android, Palm, soon Blackberry: Local data storage! SQL! it’s no worry!
Matthias: Cross platform apps are a real seduction But you give up your form, and most of your function And your app, it hobbles in the passing lane Like a one-legged zombie but with far less brains Running your crap on the web, no performance Mine is greased lightning, you run like a tortoise You don’t understand the mental model users are adopting They don’t want to hit the web, they want one-stop shopping Here’s how you make an application fun Turn it on, do your thing, turn it off and you’re done
Jason: When the iPhone came out, sure the browser was slow, But the new smartphones? half a gigahertz or mo’ That’s faster than the box on which your mom does her taxes Pretty snappy–WinME!–, but now it’s like molasses In praxis? I already write scripts, it’s easy Better than compiling native code till my teeth bleed Time that I saved, I put in media queries, add UserAgent switch statement, stylesheets fear me! Custom chrome, each phone? Modus operandi. Willy Wonka’s schooled by my custom eye candy!
Matthias: Did that school teach usability cause I think you missed it With apps for devices the use is holistic Gotta look act like you belong, not draw their attention Like a steam punker crashing an Avatar convention Use is more than just Chrome and colors, look at navigation Modern users look for standard gestures, menus, animations, And what about the richness of movement & location Do you want to surf the web or record your whole vacation? When I tilt your web app, it’s just stuck in a groove With my purely native code I can bust a move.
Jason: But that’ll only improve–heck, web apps get location And if the case came where I needed acceleration I’d wrap my web app in the library Phonegap–
Matthias: Excuses, excuses, You’re giving mobile a bum rap Try adding 3D to your list of what apps do Or write a game that’s not scrabble, chess or sudoku And you know CSS competes with OpenGL Like a cub scout against 10 marines with a 50 cal Boom! 3D mushroom cloud filling the room Now go back your text adventure version of Doom
Jason: Sure games make money, but think of their use, They’re casual, waiting in line at Jamba Juice, You’re making the mistake of the hardcore PSP, When a simple DS meets the goal just as easily Heavy duty third-dimension graphics drain the life Of your battery, more than the scripts I’m paid to write. But, hey, if you want 3-D page flip transitions, Perspective transforms of element positions, Web apps can do that, CSS has you covered, To your Mel Gibson, C-S-S is Danny Glover! (I’m too old for this!)
Matthias: CSS animations, are you out of your gourd? That’s a terrible sin in the eyes of the web lord. Every time I bring up something hard You just dance around it, pulling out your library card Or some spec or framework only halfway done As if javascript and CSS are rainbows and fun Look, there’s only one way that this thing can go Build your web apps for free or jump into the cash flow Advertising won’t help you survive But just one little iFart can get you set for life No app store, no eyeballs, no business plan. Making just enough dough to pay the rent on your trash can I hate to play the role of Scrooge McDuck But without a good market you’re pretty much… well, you know
Jason: Trash can? Your app waits in limbo for a month, You’re stuck eating ramen, watching reruns of Monk. Your funk? Only lifted if the app store approves it And we both know the king of the process is ruthless! The truth is, even if it does get approved There’s a chance that your make-it-rich dream comes unglued When a bug in your app that slipped through the process Makes users hate it, they leave lots of comments, And you fix it real quick, test patches and submit it But it still takes a month, so your app gets attritted From all the top ten lists, losing all worth, It’s a digital coaster, like "Battlefield Earth"! My apps sell anywhere, and update on the fly. You can’t have your cake OR eat it, ’cause the cake is a lie.
What’s the number one reason why developers choose a mobile platform? According to Mobile Developer Economics 2010 Report, which is produced by VisionMobile (and which I’ll call MDE 2010 from now on), it’s market penetration:
Do mobile developers stick to one platform, or do they develop for multiple platforms?MDE 2010 says that the latter is true:
Most developers work on multiple platforms, on average 2.8 platforms per developer, based on our sample of 400 respondents. Moreover, one in five iPhone and Android respondents release apps in both the Apple App Store and Android Market.
Which mobile platform was most used by developers in 2010? It might not be what you think, going by MDE 2010’s numbers:
Are app stores the way of the future? Quite likely, and that’s because according to MDE 2010:
It provides the fastest time from final GM version to market, and
It’s the fastest way to get paid.
MDE 2010 is a treasure trove of useful information for developers and entrepreneurs looking to make it big by creating software that runs on those little computers that are rarely more than arm’s reach away. Luckily, it doesn’t cost a thing – the folks at VisionMobile have made the download available for free!
If that weren’t enough, VisionMobile is also posting a four-part series of articles on their blog in which they discuss MDE 2010. Part one is here, with the other parts to follow.
A conference devoted to devices that run iOS might be the last place you’d think you’d see a Microsoft developer evangelist, but here I am!
I’m at iP3 Forum, “a one-day event that will explore the changing mobile landscape and the business opportunities associated with Apple’s Touch Platform (iPhone, iPad and iPod touch), as business models adapt to a market where people are always connected.” It’s organized by Interactive Ontario, a group whose mandate is to promote the development of interactive media in Ontario.
iP3 Forum has two tracks: business and technical, with some sessions common to both; if you’re curious about its sessions, take a look at the schedule.
So what am I doing here? Learning. There’s a lot to learn from the mobile app cultures of the Esteemed Competition, and I want to take those lessons (I refuse to use the Microsoft term “learnings”) back to Windows Phone developers. At the same time, I’m also reaching out to iPhone developers to convince them to add Windows Phone 7 to their mobile OS roll, and I need to know about their world. I’m even doing a little noodling with iPhone and iPad development in order to learn more. As they say, travel broadens the mind, and that holds true even for “travel” to different operating systems.
My time at iP3 Forum has been peppered with interruptions – it’s the end of Microsoft’s fiscal year, which means meetings, meetings, meetings – but I’m taking notes for those sessions I’m able to catch and I’ll post them soon.
