HarryWEB DesignStudio

Big App on Campus: Two Weeks Left!

Back in November, we announced a developer promotion for US students called “Big App on Campus.” There are exactly 18 days left to enter. Though we think it’s a no brainer, some of you have asked “Why should I enter?” Let’s recap:

1. For the experience of a lifetime -> 10 finalists, along with one of their friends, will win a trip to SxSW in March. If selected as a finalist, you and your friend will get to come hang out with The Gracious Few (featuring members of the bands LIVE and Candlebox) and attend a rocking concert.

2. $30k in prize money -> the top paid app and the top free app will each win $15,000!

3. Serious bragging rights -> finalist apps will be featured on our Facebook page and the developers behind these creations will have some crazy stories to tell about their time in Austin at SxSW.

<aside reason=”toAppeaseTheLawyers”>No Purchase Necessary. Open only to US university students 18+ who are legal residents of the U.S. and D.C. Submissions due 02/14/2012 and game ends 03/13/2012. For Official Rules, click here</aside>

All Windows Phone applications published since August 1, 2011 are eligible for entry. However all apps must be published to the Marketplace by February 14^th. Make your Valentine proud and enter your app today – I’m sure she/he won’t mind helping you spend the $15k in winnings up for grabs. Check out our Facebook page for all details and information on how to get started on building your first, or next, Windows Phone app.

#WPAppItUp Wrap-Up

Starting back in October, we challenged students to create Sketchflow prototypes of their app ideas for Windows Phone. I’m happy to announce the full list of winners:

@cbarretopy

@simzzdev

@m_naveed4u

@sp990

@gowtham1337

@3xdev

@utebolatas

@sakarshkumar

@sriharsha_63

@luciomsp

Congratulations to all the winners!

Ben

@benlower | phoneninja@microsoft.com | +1 (206) 659-NINJA (6465)

We created this infographic to provide a retrospective look back on Windows Phone in 2011, with a specific view to information developers would want to see.

We’re pleased to start off the New Year with an update to App Hub that will enable you to distribute apps and games to even more customers in more markets. App Hub now allows you to submit apps for distribution in 6 new markets; Argentina, China, Indonesia, Malaysia, Peru and the Philippines.  Although you will be able to now select these markets for distribution in App Hub, the Windows Phone Marketplace is not yet available to customers in these markets. We will provide more information about availability of the Marketplace for customers in these markets in a future post.

You should be aware that applications submitted to three of these six new markets – China, Indonesia and Malaysia – will be subject to additional requirements due to local laws, regulations or norms. You can find information on these additional requirements in the Application Certification Requirements.

Given the Marketplace is not yet available for customers in these markets and the addition of new requirements, we’re opening the submission process early to give those of you interested in distribution to these markets a head start on certification. We’re viewing this as an early access period and you can expect the certification process to take a little longer during this time period.

As usual, when submitting either an update or a new application in App Hub, you can choose to publish the app “worldwide” to the full set of 41 markets to you can select specific markets.  When you select worldwide, the additional requirements of the new markets apply.  As a result, if your application fails certification, you will need to either update and resubmit your app to meet all worldwide requirements, or de-select the markets where your application will not meet requirements.

Also included in this release are a number of minor enhancements and bug fixes, including improvements that will streamline the payout process and enhance reporting to provide data like crash counts and exceptions to assist in improving your apps.  These are a result of your feedback and we’ll continue to provide other improvements in each release.

We’re pleased to start the New Year off by expanding markets to which you can submit apps for distribution, and will provide more information on the consumer experiences for those markets when we are ready to go live.

Attention US university students:  Have you ever dreamed of going to SXSW? Do you like pure, bad-a**rock & roll? Ever wanted an exclusive concert experience (backstage passes, dinner with the band)? Would you like to have an extra $15k in your pocket? If you answered “yes” to any of these questions, please read on to learn about Big App on Campus (BAOC).

As the academic guy for Windows Phone (that doesn’t mean I’m sporting a pipe and leather arm patches, although the arm patches are seemingly enjoying a bit of a come-back) I get to work with our team to create programs and experiences for our amazing student developers. Why students? Because they have unique insights, amazing passion, and are helping to shape the future.

Today I am thrilled to announce our Big App on Campus campaign! There’s a lot to win: two students will receive $15k each (money) and ten finalists (plus a guest of their choice) get to join The Gracious Few (bad-a**rock & roll and exclusive concert experience) in Austin next March for SXSW.

So let me share a bit more about the BAOC deets, timeline, rules, and how you enter.

What is Big App on Campus?

We see new, amazing experiences created every day by student developers and we wanted to come up with a way to return the favor: we are partnering with the band The Gracious Few (featuring members of the bands LIVE and Candlebox) to create an amazing experience for ten (10) US college students (and their guest) in Austin, TX at SXSW: attend a private concert, receive backstage passes, go to a private dinner with the band, and be interviewed on national radio about their apps.

(check out TGF’s video for Honest Man)

 

We’re topping all this off with two $15,000 cash awards (one for the top free app and another for the top paid app) for the two apps that will be named “Big App on Campus.”

BAOC is open to US College and University students who build apps for Windows Phone. Each app created from August 1^st, 2011 until February 14^th, 2012 can be entered and students can submit multiple entries.

<aside reason=”toAppeaseTheLawyers”>No Purchase Necessary. Open only to US university students 18+ who are legal residents of the U.S. and D.C. Submissions due 02/14/2012 and game ends 03/13/2012. For Official Rules, click here</aside>

Timeline & Judging Criteria

There are a few dates of note:

• February 14, 2012 -> deadline for all entries to be submitted (and for you to buy chocolates and flowers for your Valentines)
• February 15, 2012 -> Round 1: Judging to select 20 semi-finalists
• February 23, 2012 -> Round 2: Public voting to select 10 finalists
• March 1, 2012 -> Round 3: Public voting to select Big App on Campus
• March 13-18, 2012 -> SXSW Music festival in Austin, TX

Every app submitted will be judged on three criteria:

• Innovation (40%): How innovative is the app? Does it do something new or does it accomplish something in a new way?
• Experience (40%): Does it feel seamless and like a native experience on Windows Phone? Does the app have a polished feel?
• Potential (20%): Does the app have potential in the market (lots of users, making money, both) or not?

Public voting will include a combo of number of downloads of the app + “Likes” on Facebook. Semi-finalists will definitely want to think about how they can get their friends, family, fellow-students, and even complete strangers to download and “Like” their apps.

How to Enter

Obviously entering requires building & publishing an app. Each student must also complete the Official entry form (takes 49.7 seconds on average…I timed it and I’m no Usain Bolt when it comes to typing). Here’s what to do:

1. Register for DreamSpark at http://www.dreamspark.com and for an App Hub membership (both are free of charge for students) at https://users.create.msdn.com/Register/. Also check out our great Getting Started Guide for more info and resources. https://www.dreamspark.com/Products/Product.aspx?ProductId=28
2. Create & publish a Windows Phone application to the Windows Phone Marketplace. Make the apps free, charge money, put ads in them…it’s up to you.
3. Visit http://wpdev.ms/BAOCApplication and complete an Official entry form. Do this after you’ve published your apps because you’ll need the App ID.

The full details are in the Official Rules so make sure you check them out.

With Thanksgiving next week we are entering the holiday time period. For most students in the US, that means wrapping up classes, eating some great food, and having some time off. The downtime is perfectly suited to working on apps. Build something great and you might find yourself and a friend joining The Gracious Few in Austin for an experience of a lifetime. You might even win the title of “Big App on Campus” and return home from Austin with an oversized check (sorry but we can’t pay out via big bags of money)

Ben

@benlower | phoneninja@microsoft.com | +1 (206) 659-NINJA (6465)

Three weeks ago we kicked off “Idea of the Week”. Students are challenged to prototype their app idea for a chance to win a $50 Amazon gift card. I’m happy to announce the first two winners:

• Johnny Simmons (@simzzdev) posted his idea which brings friends together through GPS treasure hunts.
• Carlos Barreto (@cbarretopy) created a prototype of how to turn your phone’s camera into a tool to help you arrange objects so they are straight & level.

We are selecting the best idea each week thru December 25^th, so there is still time. To take part in the competition, you must be a student and have an idea for a Windows Phone app. To join in the fun, follow these simple steps:

1. Sign up for DreamSpark (www.dreamspark.com), get Expression Studio (free of charge for students from the DreamSpark site) and the Sketchflow Template for Windows Phone
2. Create a Sketchflow prototype of your app idea and post the prototype online
3. Tweet out the link to your prototype using the hashtag “#wpappitup”. For example, “Check out my idea, UltimateApp, at http://www.findyourcolony.com #wpappitup”

The official rules are posted here. No Purchase Necessary. Open only to students 18+. Game ends 12/25/11.

Looking for a Great Idea?

We often hear from developers that they are looking for the next great app idea. They know how to build apps but just haven’t found the right thing to work on. Last month Core77 launched “Fast Track to the Mobile App Contest”. The focus is on getting amazing designs for productivity apps. We expect that many of the participating designers will need help from developers to get the apps built and released.

Core77 is accepting design submissions through November 18^th and will be awarding some great prizes to those who make the cut (see here for the details). If you have been looking for your next app idea, we encourage you to visit http://fasttrackapp.core77.com/developers. Winning designers want to see their ideas come to life and you, our diverse developers, have the skills to get the job done.

Ben

@benlower | phoneninja@microsoft.com | +1 (206) 659-NINJA (6465)

At Nokia World yesterday, Nokia unveiled two new amazing Windows Phones; the Nokia Lumia 800 and the Nokia Lumia 710. Today, Nokia’s Head of Developer Ecosystem, Marco Argenti and I delivered a keynote where we detailed the fresh new opportunity that Nokia and Microsoft have created by establishing a third ecosystem.

Following months of excitement and anticipation, Marco was finally able to give developers a true end-to-end view of the Nokia developer opportunity. He showed off a range of beautiful new phones, unveiled a variety of new apps and services and clearly articulated how Nokia is combining innovation and marketing acumen to create an unmatched global developer opportunity.

For my part, I am honored to be at Nokia World to show developers the unique advantages of the Windows Phone app platform and Metro UI. I used my portion of the keynote to explain how we’re delivering on our three key platform goals;

1. Enabling end user customization through a thriving and safe marketplace that features thousands of compelling apps and games

2. Giving developers what they want most; fun, fame and financial reward

3. Enabling cloud scenarios with one stack that connects multiple device types via the cloud.

When you put all of these pieces together, you begin to really appreciate how powerful the Nokia + Microsoft relationship is for developers. There’s simply nothing like it. And we’re just getting warmed up!

Read more on the Nokia Developer site, here.

Matt Bencke
GM, Windows Phone Apps

The Windows Phone Marketplace continues to grow each & every day. Over the past few months, we’ve seen some great, innovative apps created by students. Here are three recent examples:

• Gary Roumanis (gary@8tracks.com) created a slick app for 8tracks internet radio and is in close collaboration now with 8tracks to have his app become the official version for Windows Phone!
• Achia Shaag (@achiash), E-dan Bloch (@TwinBlackEyes), and Maayan Negbi are all CS students at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and published Colorful to help color blind people recognize and compare colors
• Fahim Karim (@fahim_k) built ColorSwerve to have fun creating & sharing pixelated photos

I love nothing more than to help spread the word about innovative experiences created by students.  If you know of a great student app that’s been published to the Windows Phone Marketplace, I encourage you to get in touch with me (contact information is below) to let me know.  Shameless self-promotions are welcome!

We know students have big ideas and that contests can give them an extra push to take action:  Gary, Achia, E-dan, Maayan, and Fahim were all inspired, in part, by past contests that we’ve run for students.  This week, we kicked off something we’re calling “Idea of the Week.” We will select one winner each week and give them a $50 USD gift certificate for Amazon.com (or one of its local sites like Amazon.co.uk).

Here’s what to do for your chance to win:

1.  
   1. Make sure you’re signed up for DreamSpark (www.dreamspark.com)
   2. Download Expression Studio (from DreamSpark and free of charge for students) and the Sketchflow Template for Windows Phone from http://wp7sketchflow.codeplex.com
   3. Create a Sketchflow prototype of your app idea and post the prototype online
   4. Tweet out the link to your prototype using the hashtag “#wpappitup”. For example, “Check out my idea, UltimateApp, at http://www.findyourcolony.com #wpappitup”

<aside reason=”toAppeaseTheLawyers”>No Purchase Necessary. Open only to students 18+. Game ends 12/25/11. For Official Rules, click here</aside>

We’re going to judge the ideas based on three criteria:

1. Innovation (40%): How innovative is the idea? It does something new or does it accomplish something in a new way?
2. Experience (40%): Since this is a prototype, we don’t expect the UX to be polished. However, we are looking for a quality experience in the flow of the app. Does it feel seamless and like a native experience on Windows Phone?
3. Potential (20%): Does the app idea have potential in the market (lots of users, making money, both) or not?

Want to go even deeper and learn more about building & publishing apps for Windows Phone? We have great resources and free developer tools for students at FindYourColony.com.

We’re looking forward to seeing what you come up with!

Ben

@benlower | phoneninja@microsoft.com | +1 (206) 659-NINJA (6465)

Developers often ask us “how can Microsoft help me promote my app?”
Beyond looking at the best practices we published, we’ve heard you, and as a result have launched a program called [Your App Here].

The goal is to highlight great applications and give them a chance to shine. The program is available to developers in the United States.

Here’s the overview of the [Your App Here] program:

• Each month from December through February, up to seven apps will be selected and promoted in campaigns created and funded by Windows Phone.
• The prize: Winning apps will be featured in a digital Windows Phone advertising campaign, with banner ads and up to one million ad impressions across the MSN Network of sites. During the campaign, apps will also get a featured placement on the Windows Phone Marketplace.

Deadlines:

• 10/25 – For December 2011 Campaign Consideration
• 11/16 – For January 2012 Campaign Consideration
• 12/22 – For February 2012 Campaign Consideration

Interested in participating?
Visit www.wpyourapphere.com for details, app submission, rules and deadlines.

For future details around this promotion such as winners, developer spotlight and general update please visit AppHub.
Submit now, deadlines are fast approaching.

JC Cimetiere - @jccim

Today we’re sharing several new Marketplace and App Hub enhancements that dramatically expand your opportunity with Windows Phone 7.5.

Expansion in China & India
To start, we’re pleased to announce that as of today developers in China can now register via App Hub and begin submitting apps for availability in any of our supported Marketplace countries (sorry, not including China at this time). This opens up the Windows Phone opportunity to the tens-of-thousands of talented and creative developers in China. We’ll continue working to bring Marketplace and App Hub to even more markets. In the meantime, we offer the Global Publisher Program in major markets around the world, giving developers in those countries access to Marketplace via local intermediaries.

Similarly, we’re pleased to announce that as of today Windows Phone customers in India are now able to purchase your apps and games via Windows Phone Marketplace!

Maintaining Windows Phone 7.0 and 7.5 Versions of Your Apps Simultaneously
Effective today, developers who have updated their Windows Phone 7.0 applications to Windows Phone 7.5 (OS 7.1, aka Mango) have new options for how they manage updates for both apps. The 7.0 and 7.5 versions of an application share the same catalog details, pricing (including trial and geographic distribution options), ratings & reviews and hidden/live property if in a published state. However, each version of the application can now be updated, unpublished and re-published independently. You can view both versions of the application on the lifecycle tab in App Hub.

It is important to note that there can only be one in-progress update at any time across both versions of an app. The update in progress must be published to Marketplace before another version of the app can be updated. Also, catalog details and pricing changes made as part of a 7.0 app update will affect the 7.5 version of the app and vice versa. Finally, be aware that if you publish a new 7.5 app there is no way to later add a 7.0 version.

More information about maintaining Windows Phone 7.0 and 7.5 versions of your app can be found here.

Fewer Keywords, Better Shopping
We know that app discovery and merchandizing are critical to your success. A customer’s ability to search for an app and quickly find what she or he is looking for is a core characteristic of an efficient Marketplace. To further improve the Marketplace shopping and download experience, we have started enforcing the published guideline of 5 keywords per application. While this should help maintain a more productive marketplace for everyone, you should take this opportunity to review the keywords you’ve submitted for your applications to ensure that the first five keywords best describe your app to potential customers. App Hub will still allow you to enter more than five keywords as part of your submission or application update; however, the search functionality across Marketplace will now use only the first five keywords.

As you can see, we’re working across all aspects of Marketplace to make sure we’re giving you the best and broadest opportunities possible. Marketplace is always evolving to give you and our mutual customers a consistently great experience. Your input is a major factor in determining what features and enhancements we prioritize. Please keep it coming.

As always, we thank you for your time and energy and encourage you to keep exploring the potential of Windows Phone 7.5.

Todd Brix,

Senior Director, Windows Phone Marketplace

IE9 Mobile is full steam ahead on HTML5. We will be doing a series of blog posts specifically devoted to introducing new HTML5 features enabled on IE9 Mobile. Our goal is to get mobile web developers excited about our browser platform and offer a better mobile browsing experience for users of their websites. Stay tuned!

HTML5 video is one of the most visible and easily adoptable features of the HTML5 standard. It is even more important on smartphones, because there isn’t another standard for delivering video that works across all major mobile browsers, making HTML5 video the only interoperable way to embed video on web pages. With the Mango release, we are adding support for the HTML5 <video> tag to the browser in a way that is standards-compliant, hardware-accelerated, and optimized for a mobile viewing experience. YouTube is already taking advantage of this support as they rolled out a new mobile site tailored for the Mango browser. While you can certainly rely on the excellent MSDN articles on the what’s and how’s of HTML5 video in general (please see reference links at the end of the post), in this blog post I would like to talk about some aspects of the HTML5 video feature from the IE9 Mobile’s point of view.

Same Implementation on Mobile and Desktop
In the Mango release, we are sharing the same browser as desktop IE, with all the same greatness of HTML5 and the amazing hardware acceleration capability. For video, this means three things:

1. Same markup: the same <video> HTML markup will run on bothIE9 desktop as well as on IE9 Mobile, i.e. the embedded video will play without any modification of your code.

2. Same format: IE9 on Mango will play HTML5 video in H.264, the most widely used video format on the mobile web. For a thorough treatment of the topic regarding IE9’s support for H.264, the IE blog has a few excellent posts here, here and here.

3. Same hardware acceleration: On Mango IE9, video playback is accelerated by the GPU on the device, the same way desktop IE9 video performance leverages the GPU.

Optimized Playback Experience
On top of the standards-compliant video HTML tag support, we designed the video viewing experience to be as simple and efficient as possible, while optimizing the viewing experience for small screens to be full-screen. As a result of this design, the controls attribute of the <video> tag is ignored because the full-screen native media player will always have the controls. The width and height attributes specify the width and height of the video thumbnail, and the poster attribute specifies where the thumbnail image comes from. For example, here is an example of a 300x180 video thumbnail:

When you see a HTML5 video thumbnail such as the one above on IE9 mobile, simply tap on it and the media player will start the playback in full screen mode. To exit the video, just press the “back” button or wait for the video to end and you’ll be returned to the web page that hosts the video.

Start Using HTML5 Video on Your Sites

If you are already using feature detection then you are all set – the video served up on your IE9 Mobile webpage will be HTML5-based. If your site is still doing User-Agent sniffing, then Charles has a great post on the IE9 Mobile UA that you can refer to for specific details. Unless you are tailoring your content for very specific browsers, we recommend websites to use feature detection on new HTML5 features, so that the same markup will work across different browsers. Here is a simple example of how to use the <video> tag with a fallback mechanism on browsers that do not support it:

<video>

<source src="video.mp4" type="video/mp4"/>

This text only displays in browsers without video support.

</video>

You can refer to this IE blog post on detecting HTML5 video feature.

Flash / HTML5 Video Coexistence

For developers who want to target as many devices and platforms as possible, but don’t want to maintain multiple versions of the same website, it is possible to offer both Flash-based and HTML5 video in the same markup. This way, older browsers sans HTML5 video can play video using Flash, while modern browsers on either desktop or mobile platforms will happily recognize the <video> tag and start from there. Below is one example of how this can be done:
<video controls autoplay>

<source src="video.mp4" type="video/mp4"/>

<object>

    <embed src="video.mp4" type= "application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" />

</object>

</video>

That’s it. If you haven’t already, upgrade your retail device to the pre-release Mango build to start testing your sites with HTML5 video the Mango browser. You can also test on the latest emulator as well, but keep in mind that the emulator might not be able to decode H.264 due to platform differences. Let us know in the comments of any questions you have!

Some MSDN resources and blog posts on HTML5 video:

HTML5 - Internet Explorer 9 Guide for Developers

HTML5 Audio and Video

Same Markup: Using <canvas>, <audio>, and <video>

HTML5 Video

Follow Up on HTML5 Video in IE9

Another Follow-up on HTML5 Video in IE9

HTML5 and Web Video: Questions for the Industry from the Community

Rick Xu

Program Manager, Windows Phone

Windows Phone 7.5 “Mango” is just out of the door, smoothly going to users’ phones. So, if you or your friends haven’t started to look at Windows Phone, this is great timing.

Today I’m excited to announce new guidance based on migration samples and a SQLite to SQL Server Compact database conversion tool. We hope that these new items combined with our previous extensive guides (for Android, iPhone, and Symbian Qt) will accelerate your ramp up time and improve your experience in porting apps to Windows Phone from iPhone and Android. Read below to see what we’ve got for you.

Learn by example, from what you know

First we have built a series of samples to aid you in the process of migrating your iPhone & Android applications over to Windows Phone by providing a look at the differences and similarities of each platform. Through analysis, you'll see how to implement the same functionality on Windows Phone as you have within your iPhone and Android application. We’ve started with 3 samples:

• In-App Advertisements
• Geo-Location
• Group Messaging
• The content is available here for Android, and here for iPhone

And for each sample, you’ll find the source code on Android/iPhone, the Windows Phone ported version and the porting notes. And since we had a little bit of extra time, we added a bonus track for Android developers, with a “10 simple tasks: tips & tricks” article, where we explain how common simple tasks performed during Android development can be done when doing Windows Phone development.

Finally, we also included a sample “Notification Service”, which shows how to build a multiplatform push-notification services supporting the different providers used by Android, iPhone and Windows Phone. Documentation is available here and sample code is here.

SQLite to SQL Server Compact database conversion tool

Windows Phone 7.5 “Mango” includes relational database support by way of Microsoft SQL Server Compact (SQLCE). So we thought it might be handy to create a tool to aid developers in getting their database (data, schemas and views) ported over to Windows Phone without too much trouble. Differences in data types between various database platforms can make the manual migration of your data a daunting task. SQLite2SQLCE is a tool developed to make the conversion process simple by converting a SQLite database into SQLCE while simultaneously creating the default classes needed to incorporate the new database into your Windows Phone application.

With the database conversion tool, we’ve also included a nifty tool designed to aid developers in converting their SQL queries to LINQ while simultaneously helping them to learn the new query language. LINQ (Language-Integrated Query) is a native data querying toolset integrated into the .NET Framework and use on Windows Phone.

Documentation and a simple migration sample are available here. And by the way, the source code of these utilities is available on CodePlex.

Updated API Mapping tool

The API Mapping tool has been expanded: it now covers a few more features like sensors (Camera, Compass & Gyro), multitasking (notification, app switching & background agents) , data access (SQL, file access), launchers/choosers.
The API Mapping tool is available here: http://wp7mapping.interoperabilitybridges.com/

Porting apps to Windows Phone: we’re here to help!

Finally, once you’ve be through all our “Porting” guidance, I recommend that you follow at your own pace the “Window Phone Mango Jump Start” online video training.

We encourage developers to leave comments and questions on any article. We are watching and we are open to feedback. If you see something missing or want to suggest new API mapping or porting topic to include just go to http://wp7mapping.uservoice.com.

Jean-Christophe Cimetiere-@jccim

[Cross posted on the Interoperability@Microsoft blog] 

Windows Phone 7.5 is coming very soon and with it we will enjoy a fast and more beautiful mobile web experience powered by IE9! This is very exciting for us since it represents a huge leap forward not only in new features but also in support for web standards that make for a more compatible and interoperable web.  As a side effect of these changes we know some sites designed specifically for IE8 and earlier may not work correctly which could end up affecting the browsing experience for visitors to your site.

To help minimize this problem, we added support for the Compatibility View List to Windows Phone!  This feature will allow us to address compatibility issues rapidly and give developers enough time to update their sites on their own schedule. There is a lot of great information on the IE team blog about this feature but in a nutshell, the CV List is a collection of domains and their corresponding browser settings that gets updated every two weeks ensuring that IE9 works with the maximum number of sites possible.

Compatibility with IE7 Mobile

By default IE9 will try to load any site using the most standards compliant mode, this is great because it allows us to interoperate well with other browsers but it could cause compatibility problems on sites written specifically for IE7 Mobile.  By using the CV List we can address most of the issues by forcing IE to use the IE7 compatible mode on the sites that need it to keep them working and looking great!

As an example we can use the Sounders FC Soccer team’s portal for Windows Phone, on the left is the site loaded on IE9 using standards mode where the score is not on the location it should be, and to the right is the same site loaded using the IE7 compatibility mode which addresses the layout issues.

Standards Mode	IE 7 Compatible mode

Alternatively developers can also proactively instruct IE which mode to use when loading any site by using the X-UA-COMPATIBLE meta header as described here.

Addressing layout problems introduced by our text optimizations

Providing a full desktop browsing experience on a mobile device does not only require having a modern and compatible browser engine, it also requires special optimizations to the original layout to ensure the site is ready for consumption on smaller screens.  Our ultimate goal is to do it without negatively affecting the site’s original style or flow!

We accomplish this by changing the site’s layout in subtle but effective ways, the areas more likely to be affected are text blocks but we do some other small things here and there.  We built the rules used to make those changes based on  data gathered from the most popular web portals from all over and  I’m happy to say that for the most part our changes work great, but for a small number of sites, the changes can end up negatively affecting the layout  and degrading the experience making the end result far from what the designer originally intended.  The good news is that on IE9 mobile we can change the optimization parameters to fix those issues by using the CV List.

One great example you can try is http://reddit.com where on NoDo you will quickly notice that the headlines don’t look quite right and while the site is completely functional the experience is somewhat affected by this.  On IE9 mobile on the other hand the page looks much better as it renders closer to how it is it looks when you access it using a desktop browser. 

Windows Phone 7	Windows Phone 7.5

Fixing incorrect or missing mobile optimization

Another compatibility problem that the CV List allows us to address which is also one of the most common is the incorrect use of the mobile optimization settings. This generally has a direct impact to the end user experience as it prevents desktop sites from being rendered correctly or makes mobile sites too small to be used without zooming in.

The most common case of this problem is having an incorrect width on the viewport META tag, sometimes the value is 100px, others is 800px or even device-width which SHOULD be fine except when used on a desktop site.  By using the CV List we can override the viewport settings making the site functional once more but once we do this the new values CAN’T be overridden by the developer!

One quick example of this can be found on http://mobile.airfrance.com where the site’s missing viewport settings causes the site to load all the way zoomed out.

Original site	Fixed by the CV List

Actions you can take to ensure your site looks and works great on IE9 Mobile

• Test your mobile sites on IE9 mobile to ensure they function and behave as expected. Also please take a look at the current version of the mobile CV list here to verify that no further action will be needed to ensure compatibility with Windows Phone 7.5.
• As needed, use the desktop version of the IE9’s improved Developer Tools to resolve compatibility issues.

• Always set the correct viewport values by detecting which device is being used.

• Email iepo@microsoft.com as described here to ask to be removed from the IE9 CV List when your updates are live on the web. Don’t forget to mention that the request is for the IE9 Mobile CV List!

Jorge Peraza
Windows Phone Browser

Updated 10/7 with link to App Hub for information on how to seek an exception to the new policy.

Today I’d like to revisit a topic I raised in June with my post, “How Marketplace Manages Bulk App Publishing.”

Windows Phone Marketplace is committed to providing customers with a wide range of certified applications, increasing and curating app quality and providing a safe, reliable and convenient shopping experience. Delivering on this commitment requires that we carefully track behavior within our Marketplace and share with you when we adjust our policies to improve the Windows Phone experience. The good news is that the growing popularity and global availability of Windows Phone have already begun attracting more developers. However, we have also seen another spike in what we call bulk app publishing. This is the phenomenon whereby a developer publishes a large number of very similar apps in a single day. As a result the popular “New” Marketplace category fills quickly, pushing the other new apps out and reducing the diversity of the shopping experience.

The first step we took to curb this behavior was to limit the number of apps that one developer can have certified in a single day to 20. We are again observing a small number of developers publishing apps in bulk. Therefore, Effective Friday 9/30 we are limiting the number of apps that can be published in a single day without prior agreement to 10. This means that no more than 10 apps by the same developer will be certified per day (down from 20). In addition we will monitor the number of apps published – not just certified – in a given day and be more proactive in correcting instances where the 10 app limit is exceeded. This may include the unpublishing of apps, and in extreme cases, temporary or permanent suspension of an offending developer’s Marketplace credentials.

This new policy should be appropriate the vast majority of you, but we do appreciate that there may be some instances where there is a legitimate business reason to seek an exception to this policy. For more details about how you can request an exception to the new 10 apps per day limit, please read the following App Hub post.

As is generally the case when addressing policy abuse, we fully recognize that there are really only a few offenders. The vast majority of you understand and respect the value of maintaining a great Marketplace experience, where downloads and reviews dictate just how prominently an app is featured. Still, I’ll take this opportunity to share a few related reminders:

• Unique apps can only be published in a single category. Any duplicate apps showing up in other categories may be unpublished, per the Windows Phone Marketplace FAQ’s
• When applying similar templates to multiple types of apps, we recommend differentiating apps through unique iconography, titles and other metadata to help potential customers make informed decisions about downloading apps.
• As mentioned in application certification requirement 2.10, apps must have distinct, substantial and legitimate content and purpose. Differentiation between your apps can help meet this requirement.
• There are several ways for your apps to be featured in Marketplace on the phone and now on the Web. Apps are featured by category based primarily on their number of downloads and customer reviews. The same is true for the cumulative top and free sections. The New panorama that makes up the background is algorithmic based on timing.

Marketplace will remain subject to a fair, transparent and responsive certification process. That’s not to say that we’ll always reflect each individual’s assessment of an app’s value. We will, however, continue to base our judgment on our published policies. As you see today, we will regularly assess our own policies and practices to help ensure that our certification and merchandising efforts deliver the best experience in the industry so that your apps can thrive in a safe, reliable and convenient marketplace.

Thanks for your continued support and feedback on how we can make the Marketplace experience better for you and customers.

Todd Brix,
Senior Director, Windows Phone Marketplace

This is an exciting week for Windows Phone 7.5 developers. Yesterday, we started rolling out the update to customer handsets and shared lots of developer goodness and started rolling out RTM updates to dev devices; today, I’m pleased to announce that the Windows Phone SDK 7.1 RTW release is now available on the Microsoft Download Center for immediate download and update.

Windows Phone SDK 7.1

The existing SDK has allowed developer to create and publish apps optimized for Windows Phone 7.5 since August. The Release to Web (RTW) release consists of seven additional release languages, final finishing touches to the tooling experience, a handful of bug fixes, and additional upgrade logic to provide a better installation process for users coming from earlier tools. In total, the RTW release is available in the following nine languages:

With this release, we recommend/ask that Windows Phone developers do the following three things…

1. Download and install the WPSDK 7.1, updating either your WPDT 7.0 RTW or WPSDK 7.1 pre-release installations
2. For already submitted apps (7.0 or 7.5), it’s worth checking into your App Hub account and cross-submit your apps to make them are available in the new WP7.5 markets
3. If you haven’t submitted your Windows Phone 7.5 app yet, it’s a great time to get it going; folks are excited and updating their phones – let your app light up on Mango!
   (If you already built and submitted your Windows Phone 7.5 app using the RC tools, you don’t need to do anything – there is no need to recompile and/or resubmit – it’s all good )

 
The Windows Phone SDK 7.1 and the corresponding developer platform underlying Windows Phone 7.5 is the result of a ton of great feedback from developers over the past year. Of all these updates and changes, I would like to highlight my favorite five things that have resulted from your feedback:

1. With MIX11, we launched the WPDev Feedback site on the UserVoice platform as a place for developers to post suggestions and capability requests; yesterday, we reskinned the site to use the new Windows Phone chrome, and we will start providing more feedback on submitted suggestions starting next month. If you haven’t already, head over there and file your suggestions and feedback for future releases!
2. With the Beta 2, we provided developers with a program to get a pre-release ‘Mango’ update on their retail phones. This has enabled our developer base to build and test their apps in time for Windows Phone 7.5 consumer release (yesterday!).
3. The tools are more widely available: 4 additional languages supported in WPSDK 7.1, and now also available for install via the Web Platform Installer (WebPI) client and using WebPI's Contextual Installation
4. The tools now include some great new capabilities:
   • NuGet allows you to easily keep your plug-ins and code library packages up to date
   • The profiler just plain kicks – who doesn’t love being able to see where performance bottlenecks are occurring in their apps?
   • Time to market for apps has been significantly decreased and first pass rates increased with the inclusion of the Marketplace Test Kit
   • The emulator supports the ability to feed in location and accelerometer data, as well the ability to take screenshots
   • The Microsoft Advertising Ad Control is now included as part of the WPSDK installation (and now available in 11 countries outside the US)
5. The underlying developer platform includes a massive number of API changes and capabilities that developers have been asking for (background agents; fast app switching; Silverlight 4; XNA/Silverlight Interop; what is there not to love here?)

‘Mango’ - MIX11 to Now

This release represents the final step in a journey we started on in April at MIX11, with two betas (Beta 1, Beta 2, and the Refresh) and an RC release. Given that almost everything in the RTW tools has already been discussed here and on many other blogs, I’d like to take a few paragraphs to reflect a bit on the last six months since MIX11; what’s in the tools; and all the great input and feedback that has come from the Windows Phone developer community.

• Hundreds of thousands of pre-release WPSDK downloads over the last few months
• 70,000+ unique developer devices have been successfully updated to ‘Mango’ over the course of the last three months
• 50,000+ visitors to the JumpStart videos, serving up over 450,000+ hours of video
• 20,000+ UserVoice votes submitted against 550 suggestions so far since the UserVoice forum launched with MIX
• 4200+ user posts in the ‘Mango Update’ App Hub forum, with 285,000+ post views
• 50+ cups of Tully’s Coffee consumed while processing Connect invites
• 8 devices came back to Redmond to receive intensive care

All of that being said, I would like to extend a heart-felt thank you to everyone that participated in the ‘Mango’ OS Pre-Release, and to everyone that have evaluated the pre-release tools. Thank you for helping to test the update process, yielding a better experience for our customers; and thank you for getting your apps built and tested in time for our Windows Phone 7.5 roll-out. It’s been great having you on board for the road to Windows Phone 7.5!

Most of all – thank you for being a Windows Phone developer, and collectively supporting our platform.

Today marks the beginning of the widespread consumer availability of Windows Phone 7.5, as well as the new Web version of Marketplace and My Windows Phone; the FREE online service that lets you find, lock and erase your lost phone from the Web as well as giving you easy access to apps, photos and docs. For developers, it’s the realization of the next step in expanding your Windows Phone opportunity and a chance for us to deliver a few MORE features you’ve asked.

By now you know that Windows Phone 7.5 is no minor update. The addition of Twitter and LinkedIn integration to the People Hub, enhanced communication with Groups and Threaded Messaging, a fast and beautiful Web experience with hardware accelerated IE9, amazing Search features like Local Scout and of course a smarter approach to apps make Windows Phone 7.5 the only phone that truly puts people at the center to keep them connected.

But don’t just take my word for it…

“Windows Phone remains a breath of fresh air in an otherwise-entrenched mobile landscape. It’s fun to use in a way that iOS and Android are — to put it bluntly — not,” notes Chris Ziegler of This is My Next. “Put simply, I love Live Tiles, and Mango finally takes them to where they need to be,” he adds.

“With Mango, WP7 has caught up with Android and iOS in nearly every way, and in some areas it's even surpassed the other two in functionality,” Brad Molen, Engadget.

“If you don't want an iPhone, this is basically the only real option,” concludes Matt Buchanan, Gizmodo

“Apps are getting the bulk of Microsoft’s love, though. The upgraded OS is designed to make Windows Phone’s 30,000+ apps more discoverable, useful and accessible” reports Ben Parr of Mashable.

This OS builds on our commitment to create MORE opportunities for you by reaching 19 more markets, enabling MORE app functionality and providing MORE ways for your apps to be discovered such as App Connect and deep linking, so that even apps that a customer has never heard of show up during a Bing search. How important is App Connect? A recent study* we commissioned found that 60% of people using competing Smartphones wish there were an easier way to discover relevant apps. More than half of people believe that app suggestions should show up among Web search results*, which is exactly what we are delivering with App Connect. The Windows Phone SDK makes it easy for you to do MORE with your app.

The most visible new opportunity to arrive today is a Web version of Marketplace. Check it out here. This is a powerful new way for MORE customers around the world to browse, acquire and recommend your apps and games right from their browser. Customers can now purchase an app from the Web and that app can be automatically downloaded over-the-air to their Windows Phone 7.5 devices. Marketplace on the Web will also be able to maintain a customer’s download history to make it easier to reinstall apps (when changing phones, for example). This new Marketplace creates MORE app marketing and promotion scenarios for you as well since you can link directly to your app within this comprehensive Web shopping experience.

International expansion of onboarding and payouts for the Microsoft Advertising solution for Windows Phone has been one of your top requests. Today our international footprint reaches well beyond the United States to support developers in eleven MORE countries: Australia, Belgium, Canada, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Spain, and the United Kingdom.

So what does this mean? It means MORE Windows Phone app developers can make MORE money from in-app advertising and get paid locally in their country. The Microsoft Advertising solution for Windows Phone has been shown to make MORE money for developers than other solutions in the market… up to 71% MORE in a recent study! Click here to read more on international expansion of Microsoft Advertising solution for Windows Phone app developers.

We also continue working to bring Marketplace and App Hub to MORE markets. Developers in countries other than the 38 we currently support can also publish their applications to Marketplace via local intermediaries enrolled in the Global Publisher Program. These global publishers accept your app submissions and then publish them to the markets you choose. Publishers are now available for all major regions the world including:

• Asia Pacific: App Port;
• China: Device7 & MTel;
• Central and Eastern Europe: APPA Market;
• Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS): Softkey;
• Middle East, Africa, and Latin America: Yalla Apps

Our registration and certification processes are part of the reason that customers have come to count on Marketplace to deliver malware free apps and games, whereas nearly 70% of Android users recently expressed concern about malicious software*. Still, as we reach MORE developers in MORE countries with Windows Phone, we continue to look for ways to improve App Hub and the registration process for developers. One issue we’ve heard loud and clear from you is the time and energy required to provide tax information such as ITIN. I’m happy to share today that we’ve simplified payout and taxes by eliminating the need to provide an ITIN on your W-8 to take advantage of a reduced withholding rate. That’s MORE money, with less paperwork.

We’re also always improving the Windows Phone Developer Tools to make it faster and easier for developers around the world to create MORE amazing apps and games. Watch for another blog post tomorrow from Cliff Simpkins with an update on the SDK and developer builds of Windows Phone 7.5.

Finally, I want to thank you. As Windows Phone 7.5 begins reaching customers, we’re reminded how far we’ve come together. In less than a year we’ve built a thriving Marketplace with MORE than 30,000 apps and already offer 90% of the most popular apps available on both leading competing platforms*. Your apps are increasingly a factor in people choosing Windows Phone, and our smarter approach to (your) apps is even MORE evident with Windows Phone 7.5. These capabilities, combined with the new market and merchandising opportunities make this an exciting and we hope lucrative time to be a Windows Phone developer. Please keep those great new and updated apps coming!

Todd Brix,
Senior Director, Windows Phone Marketplace

(*source: iPhone and Android App Usage Research. Aug-2011. Research by TNS, Commissioned by Microsoft. TNS is part of Kantar, the world’s largest research, insight and consultancy network. Please visit http://www.tns-us.com for more information.)