(Official) What WP needs to succeed

[E Lizzle]

Or u could just say find Starbucks ??? And click the button

No, bmaclean is pretty much right. Even if you "find starbucks", you then usually have to swipe to the local results, find the correct place on the map amongst 2/3rds outdated POIs, click drive, etc.

 

[bmaclean1]

Or u could just say find Starbucks ??? And click the button

I don't like Google as a company, and I really want to see WP8 succeed. I ditched my Android because I want to support WP8.

The "find Starbucks" tip is along the right lines, but still way short of the mark. Maybe I am missing some much easier method (and I'd be grateful for a pointer), but as I see it, here are the steps needed in WP8.
1. Hold home button and give 1st voice command: "Open maps"
2. Click Map search button
3. Click little mic icon in search bar of map
4. Issue 2nd command: "Find Starbucks"
5, Get a map that shows something like ten flags of Starbucks close to my location
6. Examine map for correct location
7. Tap on map flag to expand it
8. Tap on expanded flag to open it
9. Tap on "Drive"
10. Tap on the app I want to use


It's even worse if I want to go somewhere not near my current location. If I am in Chandler (a suburb south of Phoenix) I don't want to find the Starbucks near my current location. I want to DRIVE to the starbucks near Tatum and Shea. Android figured this out long ago. I hit the mic button from the home screen and say "Navigate to Starbucks near Tatum and Shea". The GPS app starts up and begins giving me instructions, even if I am in Chandler 30 miles away from Tatum and Shea.

With all the steps, it is dangerous and frustrating to set the WP8 navigation while driving. It is easy and not dangerous to set navigation with Android.

Google is a picture of much that is wrong with the tech industry, so I have an innate dislike of the company, but they have got the navigation thing nailed. If you've never used Android navigation, WP8 may seem okay, but if you've used both, WP8 is terrible by comparison.

The other consideration is how directionally challenged one is. I need directions to the mailbox (almost!) so I probably find myself wanting to use navigation a lot more than the average user.

Thanks,

Bill

 

[ajftl]

Wasup guys. Here we go again. I'm disappointed on the apps not the hardware. Love Nokia phones but the apps is what makes this phones a joy there is still no love for windows phone the lack of apps still huge. The new Facebook sucks. notifications just work like crap. There is still not official soundcloud I know there is third party soundcloud apps and there is actually a cool one(I forgot the name) but no notifications instagram... still nothing. There is third party ones but now instagram is blocking them. Wtf I keep buying nokias just cause their cameras like this 1020 amazing camera love it. the whole windows phone thing works well fluid yadayada but there is nothing to use. ugh. Wish Nokia come up with a android phone lol. Nokia is what is keeping windows phone alive the way I see it. Microsoft should thank them daily just frustrated after stupid instagram blockin third party apps ridiculous.

I also noticing apps are loosing the metro look lately. for example Facebook. .

 

[Leart369]

In my opinion wp needs theese things to succeed:
1.Notification centre(with all notifications, wifi,bluetooth etc. switches, better music play/stop plus seek option)
2.Real-time live tiles(updating every second for ex.clock, battery status etc.)
3.Maybe it's not their fault but they need to insist to develop official apps for Facebook, Youtube and get Instagram
4.It looks like the most things are to be paid in the store, and some of the apps that are for free in android and ios in wp they have to be paid(which is unfair)
5.Smart dial would be great for the wp phone app(if they would make this happen it would be great if the app would open the numpad not the call history)
6.Make a bold font option(if you can change the size, why not the font make a bit bolder), because for older people it's a bit hard to read. Even better would be a total change of the fond. I personally like it but others maybe don't so much.
7.Add a bit more colours to it like some gradient background or more background colours plus more tile colours for ex.blue background and black tiles with white font or something like that.
Hope you guys agree with some of them..
:smile:

 

[kingkoopa09]

No, bmaclean is pretty much right. Even if you "find starbucks", you then usually have to swipe to the local results, find the correct place on the map amongst 2/3rds outdated POIs, click drive, etc.

 

[myfirst_wp]

Hi there Mr. and Mrs. Microsoft,

this is Peter from Germany and I`ll give my very best to tell you what I think in English, becouse you dont hear me in Germany!

The thing is, that I?m coming during my buisiness time from the BB world and in my my free time from the IOS or Apple universe. I?m really a big smartphone freak and round about10 years ago there was a short connection with Windows phone...absolutly terrible. There was a short Symbian time after that, mostly BB starting in 2006 and now 2 years in the Apple world.

In October 2012 released Windows 8 and I started with the new System.....some month later I loved it and indroduced it to my family and friends (age class between 18 and 75) and the loved it too, becouse they gave the System a chance...during the last month I?ve read a lot over WP8 in the German Forums and now we are on my topic.

Please remember, I?m a fan from IOS, it works absolutly perfect and I?m only a short step from my first mac. But I love my Windows 8 and I tought, check out WP8 before you change all.

And here I am. One week with my Samsung Ativ S and Wp 8 and it is great. The OS is fast, really good to use with a perfect finish...but with bad Apps when you compare it with ios. Please tell a smal and poor german boy why don?t you work on it as much as possible??? There is a absolutly great system and believe me that I say something like that is a suprise for me too, why don?t you do as much as possible that the user experience is better???

App?s like Whats App, Facebook, Twitter ect....they have to run as good as possible...some other Apps surely too! Basics that every, or the most user use every day. That is an experience with your OS togehter what we have every day. And when that doesn?t work absolutly not hand in hand...if there are mistakes and there don?t coming updates as fast as possible, the user runs back to IOS or Android or what ever..and that has your OS not deserved!

Here I am with my bad english and I want ask you: " Please do more for your and our OS WP8, it is great and better than the other once and we need YOU that it runs stable and together with perfect apps....not the amount is the problem...it is the quality and perfection from the most used apps.....and that together with your OS.

I don?t want back to Apple...I don?t want go to "Mac" please help me to get a ecosystem that works together........


Sorry for my bad English......better is at present impossible for me

 

[psudotechzealot]

More web browsers. Like Dolphin, Firefox, and Opera. Well not really, but it would be admirable of WP to add variety of web browsing apps to WP, as well as having that option to use a different browser than IE10, Beyond, UC & SurfCube 3D. Speaking of options, a startpage and ixquick search app cannot hurt either. I mean, WP8 already have a DuckDuckgo app. So why not include these two search apps? The more apps the merrier right?

 

[Narse77]

Hi there Mr. and Mrs. Microsoft,

this is Peter from Germany and I`ll give my very best to tell you what I think in English, becouse you dont hear me in Germany!

The thing is, that I?m coming during my buisiness time from the BB world and in my my free time from the IOS or Apple universe. I?m really a big smartphone freak and round about10 years ago there was a short connection with Windows phone...absolutly terrible. There was a short Symbian time after that, mostly BB starting in 2006 and now 2 years in the Apple world.

In October 2012 released Windows 8 and I started with the new System.....some month later I loved it and indroduced it to my family and friends (age class between 18 and 75) and the loved it too, becouse they gave the System a chance...during the last month I?ve read a lot over WP8 in the German Forums and now we are on my topic.

Please remember, I?m a fan from IOS, it works absolutly perfect and I?m only a short step from my first mac. But I love my Windows 8 and I tought, check out WP8 before you change all.

And here I am. One week with my Samsung Ativ S and Wp 8 and it is great. The OS is fast, really good to use with a perfect finish...but with bad Apps when you compare it with ios. Please tell a smal and poor german boy why don?t you work on it as much as possible??? There is a absolutly great system and believe me that I say something like that is a suprise for me too, why don?t you do as much as possible that the user experience is better???

App?s like Whats App, Facebook, Twitter ect....they have to run as good as possible...some other Apps surely too! Basics that every, or the most user use every day. That is an experience with your OS togehter what we have every day. And when that doesn?t work absolutly not hand in hand...if there are mistakes and there don?t coming updates as fast as possible, the user runs back to IOS or Android or what ever..and that has your OS not deserved!

Here I am with my bad english and I want ask you: " Please do more for your and our OS WP8, it is great and better than the other once and we need YOU that it runs stable and together with perfect apps....not the amount is the problem...it is the quality and perfection from the most used apps.....and that together with your OS.

I don?t want back to Apple...I don?t want go to "Mac" please help me to get a ecosystem that works together........


Sorry for my bad English......better is at present impossible for me

You do realize that Microsoft has no control on who makes applications for the OS right? The best way to get the applications you need on Windows Phone is to let the developers of those applications know that you want a Windows Phone Application made. Microsoft has been making apps for a lot of services already due to the developers not wanting to develop them. Nokia has worked even harder bringing applications to the Windows Phone ecosystem. Let the developers of the services you need know you want a application for you preferred device!!!!

 

[randyvol]

I am a former iPhone user.
I really like the Windows 8 phone except for one very annoying thing that Microsoft really needs to address in an update immediately !!

With an iPhone I could backup the phone to my computer using iTunes. After a factory reset I just sync'd my phone and got EVERYTHING back - app and app data, contacts, vids, music, photos - literally a full restore.

Windows can do this on my PC and it is just beyond my ability to understand how Microsoft let this product go to market without this crucial ability; and continues to ignore it.

The 'backup' isn't a backup. What it does I can do with an upload to SkyDrive.

THIS IS CRUCIAL. For Microsoft Windows phone to be a serious contender against Android or Apple, they need this and they need it now.

 

[dw852]

First of all, M$ seems to depend on Nokia to sell the WP, and the opposite. But, Nokia is not really doing their job on selling. At least, they are not doing hard enough. For example, the Lumia 925 is pretty new in our city. They have been selling for a month here. But the accessories, such as cordless charger and charging cover for 925, are still not available here. That might not be a big deal, but it hurts the image of Nokia.

 

[Speedygi]

I think a better notification system and just simply a bigger volume of apps would be needed for the platform to succeed, if not survive...

Sent from my GT-N7105 using Mobile Nations mobile app

 

[dosto]

Although I am somewhat new to WP8, I would like to see a phone more focused on business needs than media focused, as the Nokia 1020 is. For example, although I really like my 925, I'd love to have the same 4.5" form factor with 2 GB RAM, 32 GB hard drive (or 64), and a larger battery (2500+). Considering Microsoft's push of Office365, you'd think they would release a "business-grade" phone. Hopefully, soon.

 

[joshage]

More developers working on applications, lacking popular games&apps.

 

[Daniel Amareen]

For God's sake It's 2013, i love WP8 but how on earth doesn't it have volume control for alarms!, among many missing features of course, but this seems like a very basic feature, one that we had prob on mobiles that are 10 years old now.

 

[CSJr1]

I am more of a visual person. The animations and panoramic hubs of WP8 draw my attention everytime. I would want more visual UI tweaks in the next update(s). Something that is not seen in any competitor OS.

1. Transparent Life tiles that are adjustable from opaque down to 5% transparent of current theme color. These tiles will also have a user setting to all shimmer in the same direction in a gradient animated manner. This will more than likely require extra cpu cycles and run more battery, that is why 4 core and user option is mandatory.

2. I like my XBox Avatar, but he is constrained to static animation in the tile and only is seen with fluid motion in the XBox Hub. Why not have the XBox character pervasive across the OS. Maybe he can be walking behind the tiles on the home screen, slightly push a tile outward to peek at you. Maybe he can tap on the screen in office applications during times of inactivity or be active in the multitask menu. These are probably not very business oriented, but it introduces "character" into the OS. Of course this can also be turned on/off by user.

3. Start screen capable of showing animated images. I would love to see same animation from Bing screen picture on my start screen or a Cinemagraph creation.

Now things more traditional.

4. Unified application store with paid apps that work in W8/Wp8/RT.

5. VPN

6. And the obligatory Notification Center to help with events that I don't have a tile pinned to the screen.

 

[TechFreak1]

Add the following to the list:

1. Ability to have animated / live small tiles
2. The ability to turn live tiles static, a friend i know would rather have static tiles.. lol - to each their own
3. Api access to devs display that to enable accurate display of battery life with ability to choose second by second changes
4. Api access to devs to display cellular / wi fi signal strength on tiles instead of updates every 30 minutes.
5. Options to turn off / on auto hide of cellular reception, wi fi strength etc
6. Option to change battery icon to a percentage or have both
7. Option to disable the slide left arrow on the bottom the start screen
8. Enable users to categorise the App list
9. Pinch to zoom out on start screen or app list like in Windows 8.1
10. Landscape support for the App list and start screen then maybe we will start to see landscape qwerty keyboard phones - this will enable WP to at least address the section of the market that prefers physical keyboards.

 

[sdreamer]

1. Smart dialing
2. Ability to create and manage photo albums.
3. App list categories (I can see this in blue)
4. Fix Bing! Worked better on WP7 to find map results....

 

[P O]

On my 928 , depending on location, and its rare I get a crackling sound during a song. On a few other occasions audio dropped (for a few seconds each time) during calls I think its a design issue,(maybe the antenna is too close to speaker, picking up interference depending on location?) otherwise the audio is superb, issue needs fixing. Its a nice phone but carrier, manufacturers "customer service" needs a lot of work. First you have to acknowledge issues before dealing with em; my experience from VZ "tech support" to Nokia, even these support forums far too may answers to issues get a "hard of soft reset" or "mine works fine" response; neither much help to user trying to understand the issue specially user migrating from Android like I did. Otherwise its a superb phone and being a different platform from Android there is a learning curve for any former Android or IOS user but not as challenging as the one most will experience moving to an Android if you've never used one (VZ even offers android classes now). Windows app store needs work too, far too many 5 star rated apps on that store don't even belong there, lot of them are buggy, though once you find one that does the job it works great.Comparing WP8 with Android, apples and oranges. Different, each has it pluses and minuses . WP8, great looking screen, very quick, user friendly, awesome photos, audio(most of time), minuses, battery life when using nav,music or game apps, audio issues, app bugginess(keep charger handy). Live tiles don't update very well too, but that's minor with me, press tile once seems to update for me.

 

[Ashwin Sanjiv]

Just waiting for Nokia to release the Gdr2 Amber Update for Lumia 720 its been really long

 

[P O]

Work out delayed updating servers issue. Today on highway, nav app on, I get a usage alert, 21% battery left. I clock out of nav and my phone tells me (with 21% battery life left) that I have 8 hrs left on my battery, no way. WP8 platform, by default, uses that off the chart standby battery life you have left on your phone(Ive see it as high as 4 days left if my phone just sits) NOT to be confused with battery life from high usage apps like navigation, music, games even websites and if your phone hasn't updated neither has your battery usage shoing on screen. Work out that audio issue also would be nice. 5 star audio can turn into blown speakers sound then go back to 5 star , in my case, depending on my location. Most of time sound is great.

I give windows phone a good grade. I give Nokia, MS and VZ an F in customer service. Tell people up front the lithium battery gets better with successive charges(in my case bout 30% better than when phone was new and that's with my using same apps as before) vs these "battery saving tips" or feigning ignorance responses I got from Nokia and VZ