An early peek at Windows Mobile 7: “built from scratch”

By Kip Kniskern on January 17, 2010 5:41 AM

6 comments

WMPowerUser has been following a very interesting Twitter conversation with Eldar Murtazin from Mobile-Review.com, who has apparently scored an early look at an as-yet unreleased phone running an early build of Windows Mobile 7, if you can believe him (as WMPowerUser apparently does). In the conversation Murtazin (and we agree) expects the new phone OS to be shown, one way or another, at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona next month.

Murtazin provided a few details on what he saw, including that the OS appeared to be built from scratch. When asked what had changed in the UI, Eldar replied (this tweet was after WMPowerUser’s post):

Murtazin complained that the OS would not run any previous Windows Mobile apps, and that the build he saw, anyway, was a long way from being ready:

We’re not so sure, but we should find out quite a bit more about Windows Mobile 7 as early as next month’s Mobile World Congress, and at Mix10 in March.

Posted in Mobile | Tags: Windows Phone 7

Comments

Thomas Atkinson

It was inevitable that Windows Mobile 7 be totally new, and break compatibility with previous versions. This was the right, and only, way for Microsoft to go.

The only trouble is that phone resellers are going to have difficulty selling Windows Mobile 6.6 phones, as these phones have reached a dead end.
majg

Yeah, I don’t mind if they break compatibility. But there seems to be a possibility that there will be some emulation or virtualization built in. I’m really shocked that more educated guesses about what MS is up in the E & D division aren’t being written about. There some good stuff in the job descriptions. http://www.microsoft-entertainment-jobs.com/

Anyways, here’s one job description that might alleviate backward compatiblity. maybe, of course. lol

Windows® phone Core Product Planning

“The specific areas of responsibility will include planning for: OS shell and core experiences, next generation of networking, multi-core computing and virtualization, and software update services.”

http://www.microsoft-entertainment-jobs.com/job/REDMOND-Product-Planner%2C-Senior%2C-E&D-Mobile-Device-Strategy-&-Commercialization-Job-WA-98052/707281/
http://www.techinch.com/ Matthew

Hopefully he’s got an earlier build than what’s currently in the labs at Microsoft! At any rate, if it has a solid backend then they may have more UI stuff in the works.

They need to make sure that the UI is so good, OEMs don’t want to replace it like many currently do.
Kel

Microsoft already said it will bring the Zune interface to a phone. So people shouldn’t be shocked that there’s a new interface. The Zune-style horizontal interface alone will require a new interface build for every application.

The stylus pen has gone, everybody. No more styluses!

Isn’t it obvious Microsoft was going to dump the stylus? Therefore that brings a new interface. Legacy WinMo apps were written for the stylus, so they will need to be written for the new interface. An emulator won’t help that task at all.

So, with some educated guesses, and from what Microsoft has already said publicly, we get a reasonable picture of what they’re going to come out with. Regardless of the latest Twitter leak.
http://twitter.com/simonster Simon May

I actually don’t think it’s a great idea to “do away” with the stylus all together, there are times when it’s handy…OneNote for example. That said the stylus needs to go for all but input functions.
http://www.bowlesonline.com/ Joey

Sleam. I’ve always wanted a sleam phone!

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