Long story short, I gave up on WP after BUILD and the announcement of Astoria but held off until a few weeks ago when its leak expedited my move to iOS.
To sum up, I am really hoping the rumored Surface Phone uses x86 code without Astoria so I can go back but I just wanted to point out a few drawbacks of the only choice, namely iOS, from someone that has made the jump.
Some of the problems might be related to the fact that I haven't explored iOS to its fullest yet, but having gone through all the obvious settings, I find myself struggling with the following:
Driving mode
There is nothing similar on the iPhone. I try to drive on the safer side and used to have calls dropped and a SMS sent while having incoming texts read by Cortana. Maybe Siri can do that using CarPlay or something, but if you don't like wires, car/phone integration is nothing but the basics.
Multi-language support
If you use 3 or more languages to text, the iPhone is a nightmare. Switching languages is severely more unfriendly since the key to cycle languages in the emoji keyboard is in a different position from the regular keyboards.
It also seems that iOS is a lot less flexible recognizing errors so when I accidentally start type a text in the incorrect language setting, it tries to correct EVERYTHING so the message becomes unintelligible for the intended recipient. On WP, I would just get a lot of squiggly lines in the text but in most cases, I could send the message to the recipient.
To complicate issues a bit more, there is no predictive text for Cyrillic alphabets it seems. So if your 3rd language does not use the Roman alphabet, you are in for a rough ride. I must admit it is helping me a bit to improve my skills but it is still a deficiency.
Apps
This is the part I figured I would be thrilled with but far from it. I was happy to have a banking app again but that is pretty much it.
The Vera app (home automation) for instance is absolutely garbage compared to Grasshopper, a third party app which despite not being as good looking, runs circles around the official Vera app. It takes me so long for it to respond that most of the time I just go and switch the lights off manually. Often my door sensors don?t send notifications and I gave up testing flood sensors and getting even the proper status of climate control when I am out of range of my AP.
The Insteon app is not much better. I am yet to get the cameras to work even once in the iPhone and while it was pretty crappy on WP as well, at least I could just reopen the app and get the feeds.
Not being a fan of sharing information, I only use Twitter to follow some friends and some people that actually have something interesting to say. But on iOS, the app is riddled with ads (disguised as promotions), something not present on the WP version. Alternatives, sure. But it was so much easier and simple on WP.
I probably need to search and test more news apps but I am yet to find anything like Magnify. Most of the news aggregators in iOS have ?curated? content or are too plain or cumbersome.
I have used an iPhone 6 for about 4 days now, so I haven?t had the need to fly or use any convenience that some apps may provide. I have used Apple Pay and while it is great, the US is far far away from the day I don?t need to carry a wallet.
There are other examples if you are invested in the Microsoft ecosystem such as games with XBL integration, Microsoft Band (namely FanBand), etc.
Lack of live tiles
With the exception of the clock, iOS has the most boring UI I have used since Windows 3.1. On WP, a few seconds would give me the weather, upcoming appointments, latest messages in general, favorite pictures, etc., all without more than a double tap on the screen.
Development
Since Windows Mobile 2003, I have been writing apps to suit my specific needs. I never published an app publicly since I absolutely suck as an UI designer and to be honest, I don?t fare that much better as a developer either, but all my computers always had Visual Studio installed (or eMbedded VC++ for that matter).
Since I also own a MacBook for work purposes, I tried Objective C and I honestly think that the team who made it were all into BDSM with a big emphasis on the M.
There are plenty more issues, but they fall under the category of nitpicking which would make this post far longer and pointless.
WP may still need some work but it was getting there even if lacking apps. So if you are thinking about switching to iOS, make sure you will have the things you actually need. There is plenty to like about iOS but IMHO, there seems to be a huge dichotomy between the perceived and obtainable productivity levels when comparing the two platforms.
To sum up, I am really hoping the rumored Surface Phone uses x86 code without Astoria so I can go back but I just wanted to point out a few drawbacks of the only choice, namely iOS, from someone that has made the jump.
Some of the problems might be related to the fact that I haven't explored iOS to its fullest yet, but having gone through all the obvious settings, I find myself struggling with the following:
Driving mode
There is nothing similar on the iPhone. I try to drive on the safer side and used to have calls dropped and a SMS sent while having incoming texts read by Cortana. Maybe Siri can do that using CarPlay or something, but if you don't like wires, car/phone integration is nothing but the basics.
Multi-language support
If you use 3 or more languages to text, the iPhone is a nightmare. Switching languages is severely more unfriendly since the key to cycle languages in the emoji keyboard is in a different position from the regular keyboards.
It also seems that iOS is a lot less flexible recognizing errors so when I accidentally start type a text in the incorrect language setting, it tries to correct EVERYTHING so the message becomes unintelligible for the intended recipient. On WP, I would just get a lot of squiggly lines in the text but in most cases, I could send the message to the recipient.
To complicate issues a bit more, there is no predictive text for Cyrillic alphabets it seems. So if your 3rd language does not use the Roman alphabet, you are in for a rough ride. I must admit it is helping me a bit to improve my skills but it is still a deficiency.
Apps
This is the part I figured I would be thrilled with but far from it. I was happy to have a banking app again but that is pretty much it.
The Vera app (home automation) for instance is absolutely garbage compared to Grasshopper, a third party app which despite not being as good looking, runs circles around the official Vera app. It takes me so long for it to respond that most of the time I just go and switch the lights off manually. Often my door sensors don?t send notifications and I gave up testing flood sensors and getting even the proper status of climate control when I am out of range of my AP.
The Insteon app is not much better. I am yet to get the cameras to work even once in the iPhone and while it was pretty crappy on WP as well, at least I could just reopen the app and get the feeds.
Not being a fan of sharing information, I only use Twitter to follow some friends and some people that actually have something interesting to say. But on iOS, the app is riddled with ads (disguised as promotions), something not present on the WP version. Alternatives, sure. But it was so much easier and simple on WP.
I probably need to search and test more news apps but I am yet to find anything like Magnify. Most of the news aggregators in iOS have ?curated? content or are too plain or cumbersome.
I have used an iPhone 6 for about 4 days now, so I haven?t had the need to fly or use any convenience that some apps may provide. I have used Apple Pay and while it is great, the US is far far away from the day I don?t need to carry a wallet.
There are other examples if you are invested in the Microsoft ecosystem such as games with XBL integration, Microsoft Band (namely FanBand), etc.
Lack of live tiles
With the exception of the clock, iOS has the most boring UI I have used since Windows 3.1. On WP, a few seconds would give me the weather, upcoming appointments, latest messages in general, favorite pictures, etc., all without more than a double tap on the screen.
Development
Since Windows Mobile 2003, I have been writing apps to suit my specific needs. I never published an app publicly since I absolutely suck as an UI designer and to be honest, I don?t fare that much better as a developer either, but all my computers always had Visual Studio installed (or eMbedded VC++ for that matter).
Since I also own a MacBook for work purposes, I tried Objective C and I honestly think that the team who made it were all into BDSM with a big emphasis on the M.
There are plenty more issues, but they fall under the category of nitpicking which would make this post far longer and pointless.
WP may still need some work but it was getting there even if lacking apps. So if you are thinking about switching to iOS, make sure you will have the things you actually need. There is plenty to like about iOS but IMHO, there seems to be a huge dichotomy between the perceived and obtainable productivity levels when comparing the two platforms.