After first glance of Windows 10 Mobile

[hungys]

I have used Windows Mobile/Phone for 10 years and also 3 years experience on Windows Phone app development. I have many expectations on Microsoft and Windows Phone; however, let me share some opinion after the first glance of the leaked screenshots of Windows 10 Mobile, also with some expectations of the SDK from developer’s perspective.

User Perspective

Terrible UI/UX
I'm confused by why Microsoft decided to bring the so-called "hamburger menu" on Android to Windows 10 Mobile. It leads to a bad experience for user who use phablet such as Lumia 1520 with one hand. Another terrible thing is the UI layout, take system settings page for example, the item header has same font size with item description, where is the UI hierarchy? Did you guys forget your Microsoft design principles? Even worse, the appearance of context menu and toggle switch differs from page to page, and the new design is not better than the older one.

Missing Pivot & Hub
More interestingly, there is no more Pivot and Panorama/Hub control in brand new Universal Apps on both PC and phone. Pivot and Panorama bring fluent and unique user experience for Windows Phone user, and I don't think the new iOS-like tab design will do better.

Built-in Call UI
It is a common feature for Android user to search the contacts when you input numbers in built-in Call UI. However, it seems there are no big difference in the Call UI of Windows 10 Mobile besides the UI change (actually I think it’s just a change but not improvement).

Cortana is not smart enough
As we know, there is a huge command database behind Cortana to match user’s input and questions. However, Cortana often return web search results from Bing even you asked for a simple question, but in different way or sentences. Compared to Siri, there are still many room for improvements even if Cortana seems to be a more potential digital assistant.

Fake apps in store
There are too many fake apps on the store, and I believe that it’s partly due to that Windows Phone team need more apps to hit their KPI so that no more store certification now (even if it says it “may” need certification). I ever submitted an app but there isn’t any access log from certification team shown on my backend, haha…

Developer Perspective

Development framework

No more Silverlight please!

Although I still stick in Windows Phone Silverlight App development, it is confused to have both Windows Phone Silverlight App and Windows Phone Store App. I believe that WinRT is the unique road in the future, don’t let the developers learn new architecture again.

Multiple version maintenance
Currently if you want to provide support for all the user from WP7, WP8 to WP8.1, but also want to provide some features to WP8.1 user using some newer API, you may need to maintain 3 different projects even if the most of logics are the same. A common approach is to maintain the business logic in a separated portable class library, but it is still a problem when dealing with version-specific API or namespace. In contrary, Android provides the concept of minSdkVersion, targetSdkVersion and maxSdkVersion, hope Microsoft bring the similar mechanism to Windows ecosystem. It does not make sense to maintain a all new project for Windows 10 Mobile.

App lifecycle vs. contract
Share contract is a good design to provide mechanism for apps to share their app with other apps, even Apple bring the similar Action Extension in iOS8. However, if you open a link from Facebook app and want to share it from IE to Facebook and write a post, you may find that the original Facebook view is gone when you finish your post and back from IE. It’s because the share contract mechanism override the original application instance.

Deep integration with Cortana
The only way to integrate your app with Cortana now is to use natural voice command, but user still need to call your app name first. It might be good to bring the API such as “CortanaContentProvider” for app to provide more information to Cortana view and search results. Google Now has provided a similar way to show data from third-party app in a card format.

More API, more innovative apps
Currently there are many API restrictions on Windows Phone development, such as the background execution, or access to user’s private information like call log and SMS so that many innovative apps cannot land in WP market. I know there are some privacy concerns, but a good way is to provide privilege API access for specific app manufacturer. A good example is that Microsoft has a partnership with Truecaller to provide real-time Caller ID on Windows Phone platform last year, and I expect for much more such cases. However, please don’t forget to bring more APIs to developers, it’s about one year since the live lock screen introduced, but no public API so far…

Broadcast push notification
Both MPNS and WNS use an URI to specify a device, and developers can send a push notification by simply sending a HTTP request to that endpoint. However, sometimes we need to broadcast a message to a bunch of clients, if there are 10M target devices, we need to send 10M HTTP request, which doesn’t make sense. Both Android and iOS provide a way to broadcast to multiple clients in a single request, so please!

Social integration
It takes a high cost to let user login with social account on Windows Phone, because it always need a web browser to input username and password manually. The more ridiculous fact is that even Microsoft Account, we have no way to help user login automatically. It’s possible to use URL scheme to communicate with third-party app, but why not directly integrate with social accounts in People Hub?

UI automation and CI
Both UI automation and CI is very popular in mobile development recently to improve the quality of the applications; however, the third-party support and resources on them are very limited in Windows ecosystem. Maybe Microsoft should bring some official solutions.

Oh it's just a preview. Let's wait for more news about Windows 10 Mobile!

 

[WDavis4692]

Your quote at the end pretty much sums it up mate.

 

[rhapdog]

Wow. A lot of assumptions based on screen shots on how some of those screens will function "in action" without actually seeing the screens in action.

That spells "stupid" right there.

 

[Geddeeee]

Wow. A lot of assumptions based on screen shots on how some of those screens will function "in action" without actually seeing the screens in action.

That spells "stupid" right there.

My thoughts exactly!!!!

I can't understand if the WP community realises how lucky they are. Switch back to Android or iOS, then you will see how superior WP is in it's execution!!!!

 

[anon(5969054)]

Wow. A lot of assumptions based on screen shots on how some of those screens will function "in action" without actually seeing the screens in action.

That spells "stupid" right there.

Uhmm he is right. You don't have to see those screen in action. The settings page won't suddenly transform into anything else. It is ugly as ****. The header is completely off. If this is their current sense of design then w10 is going to be an ugly mess.
All those bars with headings at the top.. Screens don't look immersive anymore because of that. You have 1 bar with time and icons and battery and then a heading bar and then the app. It looks ****. No more immersive feeling. Yes it is not even beta, but they are designing this. And if they are not focusing on design yet they could have spared time and not design this ugly mess. But they did. So I'm actually pretty sure they are going for this messy design.

 

[zorb58]

I am also concerned about the development situation. It seems live lock screen does not operate as well as Microsoft thought it would, judging from their in-house efforts. It's unfortunate... I have a great idea for an app in this space. Been learning C# and general development skills since I saw the demo for 8.1 just so I could build this app with a friend. Ah well. MS misses out on my app and I now am working on skills to make myself a more marketable IT professional. I really do enjoy coding.

 

[Praxius]

All I read was nothing but complaints... Was there anything that the OP actually liked or thought was a good idea in W10M?

Kind of makes me wonder why this person has stuck around for so long if he/she hates so much about the OS.

There's already plenty in the 7/8 os's that need two hands to do on large screens and there are many things that have menus and options at the top of the screen, but it seems some think every single thing on the screen that can be clicked has to be at the bottom. Why not go back to a Balckberry Pearl or something with no touch screen and all the buttons at the bottom if all you want to do is avoid touching anything near the top of the screen because it may involve having to use a second hand.... Heaven Forbid!

I know there are a few people with disabilities relating to having only one hand or a couple of fingers, but for the rest of us, it isn't an issue.

Try setting up the Ease of Access settings to help with your laziness... Or stop texting when you're driving and pull over to use two hands.

Frig.... Needing to use two hands on your phone sometimes? That sure is a deal breaker for me. Ruined my whole life.

 

[WDavis4692]

The header is completely off. If this is their current sense of design then w10 is going to be an ugly mess.
All those bars with headings at the top.. Screens don't look immersive anymore because of that.

Oh, be quiet. Have you not been paying attention in school? The screenshots we saw were LITERALLY THE EARLIEST BUILDS. Nobody polishes a preliminary build. Misaligned headers? That's a minor detail that they can fix in literally no time at all. The whole idea was they threw out early concepts; hell, a lot of what we've seen is subject to change and probably will do numerous times prior to release.

I'm just sick how many times i'm having to explain this simple fact. If you're going to get all OCD about a header being slightly too far left, then you've got bigger issues. It's far more important they get the core functionality in, and worry about tidying up LATER. Screens look less immersive you say?

Dude, how many screens have we seen with a misaligned header? One or two, right? Way to judge the whole OS based on that.

Was the old-style settings menu ever immersive? I suppose it was, in the sense that you got frustrated trying to find what you were looking for. That's not good immersion - that's bad immersion. A settings menu/email client/calendar needs to be functional, not immersive.

Just for the record, I actually think it looks better. I like WP, but I'm not massively fond on the current 'panoramic' UI. For instance the panoramic UI doesn't let me easily know what screen I can swipe right to reach, since the header for it is off the edge of the screen; they could centralise the header for the current screen so you can see either ways. In many ways I welcome change, although most of you seem resilient to it. What I realise though, is that change doesn't happen overnight and always requires some time to polish up. You'd be far more productive taking your criticisms to MS directly, rather than here where nobody can do anything about it.

 

[hope4wp]

The preview is still not out and here come the haters!

 

[Blkacesvf41]

Longest post I've ever read! I'm exhausted!

 

[Legoboyii]

Oh, be quiet. Have you not been paying attention in school? The screenshots we saw were LITERALLY THE EARLIEST BUILDS. Nobody polishes a preliminary build. Misaligned headers? That's a minor detail that they can fix in literally no time at all. The whole idea was they threw out early concepts; hell, a lot of what we've seen is subject to change and probably will do numerous times prior to release.

I'm just sick how many times i'm having to explain this simple fact. If you're going to get all OCD about a header being slightly too far left, then you've got bigger issues. It's far more important they get the core functionality in, and worry about tidying up LATER. Screens look less immersive you say?

Dude, how many screens have we seen with a misaligned header? One or two, right? Way to judge the whole OS based on that.

Was the old-style settings menu ever immersive? I suppose it was, in the sense that you got frustrated trying to find what you were looking for. That's not good immersion - that's bad immersion. A settings menu/email client/calendar needs to be functional, not immersive.

Just for the record, I actually think it looks better. I like WP, but I'm not massively fond on the current 'panoramic' UI. For instance the panoramic UI doesn't let me easily know what screen I can swipe right to reach, since the header for it is off the edge of the screen; they could centralise the header for the current screen so you can see either ways. In many ways I welcome change, although most of you seem resilient to it. What I realise though, is that change doesn't happen overnight and always requires some time to polish up. You'd be far more productive taking your criticisms to MS directly, rather than here where nobody can do anything about it.

You dont like the panorama views? I love it xD
I just hope they bring hubs back, was absolutely moronic to remove them in a lot of places.

 

[Mike Gibson]

You are dead on with the framework and version maintenance issues. The WP8 platform is already significantly fragmented. How much time and energy does MSFT expect ISVs to expend on WP when you get almost nothing sales-wise for it? Also, the app lifecycle is a joke. The "AndContinue" crap to get just a freaking filename in WinPRT81 is the worst design decision I've ever seen in an OS. I can only imagine the "jewels" we'll find in WinPRT10.

 

[TheCudder]

All I read was nothing but complaints... Was there anything that the OP actually liked or thought was a good idea in W10M?.

I've been annoyed of everyone starting threads as if they've used W10 for phone as well, but OP actually made some valid points, although some are in reference to the lack of functionality in Windows Phone 8.x --- but no one knows if these flaws were addressed in W10 yet. Issues such as the lack of app share actions, automated login via Microsoft or social media accounts and fake apps. Yea yea ye, Play Store and App Store has their share of fake apps, but the ones we have in the WP store show up as top results when searching. You'll see 15-20 legit quality and functional third party apps in Android or iOS results before the garbage appears. Microsoft's ecosystem isn't supported well enough to allow so much garbage to brag about having X number of apps to lead people to believe the "gap" I'd really being closed --- this I'd likely part of the reason WP hours up and down from 3-4% market lol. People go buy a WP device to find out the apps are trash, knock off's, web wrappers, stuck in beta, lacks functionality or simply don't exist.

 

[ajst222]

I think we've found our new Microsoft CEO!

Maybe actually wait for the final product (or even USE the technical preview) before you go off and make judgments. I think we owe them that, and it makes the most sense...

And am I the only one who finds it funny how the OP criticizes how Windows 10 is becoming more like Android and then other points he says where he wishes it could be more like Android? lol

 

[ajst222]

Also, on a side note, I think the new settings menu looks great, both for desktop and mobile. I don't get the complaints.

 

[Praxius]

The other thing people need to realize is that if you are so upset about your 1320/1520 being too big to use with just one hand, then maybe you should have got a phone more your size. Can't please everyone.

 

[ajst222]

The other thing people need to realize is that if you are so upset about your 1320/1520 being too big to use with just one hand, then maybe you should have got a phone more your size. Can't please everyone.

THANK YOU! If you get a phablet, you should know what to expect. It has its own purpose. It's not catered for one handed use. It's like getting a Corolla and complaining about how you can't tow anything.

 

[oussama ait]

Relax guys it's just a phone OS if you're frustrated with windows phone simply switch to IOS problem solved

 

[Ma Rio]

Relax guys it's just a phone OS if you're frustrated with windows phone simply switch to IOS problem solved

If I ever leave WP (which I doubt), it will be for SailfishOS on a Jolla phone.

 

[Praxius]

If I ever leave WP (which I doubt), it will be for SailfishOS on a Jolla phone.

If I ever do, it'll be for a Blackberry.... Or maybe an Ericsson DF388.