items tagged with Microsoft

The official name is Windows Marketplace for Mobile, rather than the codename SkyMarket as mentioned before in this blog. Unfortently it is only available for 6.5 initially i believe and not will be available to consumers in the second-half of 2009.. According to Mobile Services General Manager Bart Wojciehowski.

Windows market place rich and integrated place for searching, browsing and purchasing mobile applications from Windows® phones or from a PC. The new marketplace will be available with all Windows® phones based on Windows Mobile 6.5, which will allow consumers to easily find, install and experience applications that fit their needs and make the phone truly personal.

In the past, it has been challenging for developers to get their Windows Mobile applications into the hands of consumers. In addition to fragmentation in the distribution channels, there has been no definitive marketplace experience on the device for users to browse and acquire applications and/or content. This has prevented developers from achieving broad reach with their application offering, and inhibited the user’s ability to leverage the power of their Windows phone.  Fortunately, Windows  Marketplace for Mobile addresses these challenges while also including a number of key benefits for developers. Examples of some of these key benefits include:

• An easily discovered on-device application that is installed on every Windows Mobile 6.5 device, and includes prominent placement on the Start menu.
• Global marketplace distribution (30 countries) with flexible payment options for end users through both credit card and mobile operator payment methods.
• Single source developer-focused web site for sign-up, publishing, and management of applications in the marketplace.
• Transparent set of policies that clearly articulate the types of applications allowed in the store.
• Streamlined, yet flexible workflow for getting applications published to the marketplace.
• Leverage existing Microsoft developer tools, such as Visual Studio, for faster time to market.

Microsoft Currently has http://www.microsoft.com/windowsmobile/catalog/cataloghome.aspx how this is going to change into a mobile app will be the most interesting thing for me. Also, there's no indication how Microsoft will split the revenues between itself and the carrier and the developer.However, it's promising to be robust from its initial launch since Windows Mobile already has around 20,000 applications available today. Users will be able to purchase applications by logging into their Windows Live account.

What is a Developer Evangelist? TechZulu's Geoffrey Emery talks about this and more with Woody Pewit at the PDC Underground. Woody tells us how he is here to help business and especially startups  find the available solutions and products available from Microsoft. Microsoft launched a great product for startups this year called BizSpark that allows small business who gross under a million dollars. With BizSpark startups can get free Microsoft software for up to three years. Woody can help with that as well and make  sure you get connected with the right people. Also make sure to check out Microsoft's new website dedicated to startups http://www.microsoftstartupzone.com. All this and more with woody pewit.

Woody’s Blog  - http://blog.pewitt.org/

Microsoft's Startups - http://www.microsoftstartupzone.com

PDC -  http://microsoftpdc.com

Underground – http://underground.socalcodecamp.com

BizSpark - http://www.microsoftstartupzone.com/BizSpark/

Guest post by Jim Alden @TechFrog

Although the Internet was invented years before on the campus of UCLA, It wasn’t until Christmas day 1990 that Tim Berners-Lee, completed the first browser for the world wide web (on a NeXT computer). As the 90’s went on, the web was growing, Mosaic, Opera, Mozilla (and others) continued to change the definition of what the browser would be. Microsoft, late to the game, in 1995 finally understood that the Internet was the future of computing. Gates and his very competitive team at Microsoft built a very good browser and gave it away free with their operating system. The browser wars were on and we’d continue comparing many browsers and their features, speed, compatibility etc. Two decades later, we are still comparing browsers and people like myself are still reviewing them.

December 2009. Enter Google’s Chrome browser for Mac beta (Intel-based only).

Sometimes I’ve found a browser feature that I like so much, that it makes that browser my favorite. There was a time I preferred Opera because it has a text zoom feature that nobody else had, so I would simply use it more than others. Firefox added this feature, and I found myself not using Opera so much, mostly because Firefox had so many add-ons that really allowed for a fantastic browsing experience. I would use both Firefox and Safari. Firefox was feature rich, and Safari was blazing fast and more stable. My current favorite “feature” is an add-on to Firefox called Cooliris, which is simply brilliant. It keeps me using Firefox far more than the faster Safari.

Safari’s huge performance edge over Firefox, and the aging and slow Opera, was what keep me using Safari on some particular web adventures. The Java script engine in Chrome seems every bit as lightning fast as Safari’s, if not faster. Without benchmarks, its really too close to call. Clearly the performance in feature rich Firefox lags in comparison, but because of the aforementioned add-on, plus a few others, I’m not yet willing to dethrone Firefox as my main browser.

Although Chrome has been available for PC for about a year, it is now in beta form for Mac. Google designed Chrome to isolate browsers or applications that crash, rather than letting a glitch shut down the entire browser session. Google promised quicker start-up and improved stability when compared to the competition. I have yet to crash it, and yes, it is fast. It’s beta, yes, but this is a fully functional and beautiful browser. Tabs on top may take a bit of getting used to, but one great feature is the ability to search right from the URL bar. I expect this feature to end up on all browsers in coming iterations. History View is strangely missing, but I expect this matter to be dealt with soon. Chrome sports an Incognito mode that allows for private browsing, leaving no breadcrumbs or footprints behind. Overall, this is solid browser and I think Google hit the ground running.

When the Google Extensions come online, we may have a much tighter war. As stated, I will not leave my cozy & comfy Firefox, or stable and super-fast Safari yet, but if Chrome gives me the best of both worlds, who knows? Maybe when I see this in a month or two, I’ll check the little box:

[ ] Would you like to make Chrome your default browser?

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

From PDC ’09 to Xbox Live, Microsoft sure has busy this week, and it’s only Wednesday!

Last week, some of the Zune team invited us to their pad to check out the long-awaited social features Microsoft was releasing for Xbox Live. Yesterday, the event, a casual private party at Zune LA, gave us some hands-on time with those social features: integration with Facebook, Twitter, and Last.fm, as well as the release of Zune-branded entertainment available on Xbox Live. Those features have been well covered on other blogs, but here we answer a couple lingering questions:

1. When I create a party to watch a film from the Zune Video Marketplace, does each person in the party need to rent a copy of the film? According to Zune Marketing rep Paul Chang, yes.
2. Can the Zune sync with content downloaded to the Xbox 360? Chang wasn’t entirely sure, but said he’ll get back to us soon. In the meantime, he did say that the Zune client for the PC is meant to be the main hub for all Zune content.

Chang also gave us a tour of the space Zune employees work:

We also give you a look at Twitter on the Xbox as Jonathan Nafarrete trys to update his status.  Also find out what happens when twitter goes down.

Everyone knows about what an amazing photographer Wm. Marc Salsberry is and you can now enjoy his photos through the Facebook application on the Xbox.  Checkout the video below.

Here is a look at the Xbox party mode:

Oh, and Redmond also told us to give one of our readers 1600 MS points to use on Xbox Live.  So we decided to give it out to the funniest Xbox story we hear.  All you have to do is tell your story in the comments below with the most outrageous experience you have had with your xbox.  whether it be about you and your friends having an awesome battle and your baby sister kicks the plug to having your mom bash it with the vacuum.

The person with the best story will win and will have their story posted on TechZulu for all to see.  All stories will be judged by the TechZulu staff. Contest will end at 12am November 27th 2009

Yesterday I was hanging out at the Zune house in LA for a live ZuneChat with the All American Rejects. That was pretty cool and all but the awesome thing was during the event the new Twitter app for the ZuneHD was released and we got Matt Singley (@mattsingley) to give us a walk through of the app.  At first look it definitely had a sweet looking interface.  There was nothing fancy about it, just simple tweeting and to the point.  It gives you all the support and functionality you are looking for in a small WiFi device.  The two things that I did notice was the lack of Retweet feature and the support for list.  I'm sure in a future update they will include those given they are fairly new features on twitter itself.

A few hours ago I read on Engadget that Microsoft censors your Tweets! Making any swear words appear like this "F**k!".  Although this really is not a big issue for me since I don't really swear on Twitter.  I definitely don't agree with Microsoft filtering Twitter. If they would have made it an optional feature I'm sure the backlash they are going to get from this wasn't going to be so bad.  However, Overall it is a solid first Twitter app for the Zune HD.