More Windows Phone Update Problems 103
angry tapir writes "Yet another problem has cropped up preventing some Windows Phone 7 users from getting two software updates, adding a new chapter to the update saga that started in February."
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More Windows Phone Update Problems
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No spitting on the Bus! Thank you, The Mgt.
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>I get the M$ hate, but just check it - it's great thing. So much better than Android.
And Mussolini made the trains run on time.
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How did you type all that in less than a minute?
Re:Windows Phone 7 (Score:5, Insightful)
It's quite obvious that Microsoft is astro-turfing heavily. They like to get a couple of these in early on every story. They're getting a little bit better, but phrases like "What is great about WP7 is its support for developers." are easily identifiable as marketing drone speech.
Most likely they have a bunch of evangelists and/or subcontractors whose only job is to monitor and comment on tech sites; the debacle when Vista marketing got run over by the realitytrain made it quite obvious how expensive it could be to lose control over the narrative.
And with windows phone being a warmed over windows mobile they certainly have their job cut out for them...
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A very interesting move is the integration between Silverlight and XNA: this will allow (I am developing such a game right now!) web-based 3D accelerated games that are also playable on wp7, the XBox and as a desktop Windows application. The framework, at least from the pov of an indie game dev, is truly exceptional and very little out there compares favorably. Unity, maybe, but then it's an engine rather than a framework and so it
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Is it really a web-based game, or is it merely a web-delivered game? Because I see Flash and Silverlight developers confuse these all the time. Is the game based on the fundamental technologies of the web - e.g. are you delivering human-readable code, or are objects in the game discrete resources served via HTTP, or are levels addressable via U
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While I agree with this.
The gp's point that the Microsoft stack is really well integrated where code written for the desktop and the web and the Xbox and WP7 and Silverlight can all be shared quite easily is also spot on.
Re:Windows Phone 7 (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, I get the point, but in my experience this is one of the worst things about the Microsoft stack, by far. I've got no problem sharing infrastructure at the CLR level, but once you go beyond that to try to make applications written for one paradigm fit anywhere the CLR is, you end up with an unholy mess. The "integration" doesn't make things easier, it just forces you into one colossal fuckup instead of a more sensible approach of platform-specific front-ends over a portable base.
Microsoft's approach to web frameworks is an ideal example of this. They tried to make developing a website like developing a desktop application; and web forms, postbacks, and all of that gigantic mountain of failure was the result. ASP.NET development is about as far away from the architectural principles of the web as you can get without dumping the technology altogether and using plugins instead. They tried to abstract away HTTP when it's one of the most fundamental parts of the web, they did a shitty, incomplete job because the architecture of the web and traditional desktop applications are entirely different, and they ended up with a failure that they are now attempting to replace altogether.
So when somebody comes along and says that they are making a game that can be "web-based" because Silverlight's integration lets them do that easily, my immediate reaction is that it's not "an interesting move", it's a continuation of the same terrible fucked up attitude that Microsoft don't show any real signs of shaking. Hence the question - is this actually a web-based game - i.e. does Silverlight's "integration" really deliver, or is it the same old fuckup they always come out with?
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Ironically, on WP7 it wouldn't be web-based in any sense, because, while WP7 apps are written in Silverlight (or XNA), WP7 browser does not support Silverlight as a plugin.
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Nice way to leave out the real competition. Programming for android is nice as well by the way.
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Yeah, because Symbian was what you were complaining about in your origina-- oh, that's right, you were talking about Android, which is also 1000x better than "it was."
By the by, lying by omission is still lying, and pretending innocence is morally corrupt. What does that say about the company that employs you to write this stuff?
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So you just happen to work for a marketing company?
No one mentioned open or closed, more MS has changed marketing BS in your post though.
May just be fanboys (Score:1)
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You know the guys I'm talking about - the ones that installed Vista from a torrent and then other people had to try to get it to work for them.
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I pick the third option, fix the OS for that phone. I am running 2.3.3 on a Droid. WP7 won't be like that, it will be as locked down as apple without any of the upside.
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I pick the third option, fix the OS for that phone. I am running 2.3.3 on a Droid. WP7 won't be like that, it will be as locked down as apple without any of the upside.
I agree with you 100% except for the upside.
Re:Windows Phone 7 (Score:5, Insightful)
Is obvious shill obvious? Comment below!
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developers, developers, developers, developers, developers....
consumers? fuck 'em.
developers, developers, developers, developers, developers, developers, developers.
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sigh, ok, positive comment to beat /. filters: its no good giving developers everything they could possibly want if no-one wants to buy the stuff they make. Its no good saying how great a phone is if those poor fools who bought one end up with a brick at the first update. Android or iPhone - they work, are very popular, have won the battle. I
Re:Windows Phone 7 (Score:4, Interesting)
Well obviously one of them will be along presently to point out that "nobody knows" how well WP7 is doing since release because Microsoft won't tell us. Since I know, I may as well nip that one in the bud: Abysmal [j.mp] is not an exaggeration. Panglozz has been scraping the Facebook user statistics weekly since November for all the major phone platforms, and has assembled that delightful analytical spreadsheet that tells us week-by-week how it's doing relative to other platforms.
Facebook user stats may not be perfect, but it's a huge sample and lines up perfectly with other reports, which seem to be bending over backwards to avoid stating the obvious truth. The phone is not selling. After six months WP7 total facebook users don't add up to two days worth of increase in iPhone and Android platforms. The user base is not there, and ultimately that's what developers care about. They don't care if it's fun to write apps for the phone. They care if there are users to use the apps - and there aren't enough to speak of. The trend is clearly in decline, so not only are the users not there, they're not ever going to be there. Writing Windows Phone apps is not going to be profitable for nearly any developer, and it's not going to make them famous either. Nokia can't save this.
Some of the numbers we've seen for WP7 are totally bogus. Obviously if nearly three times as many people downloaded the software development kit for WP7 [knowyourmobile.com] as use WP7 for Facebook [allfacebook.com], something is amiss. Phone software development is not a 3x more common activity than Facebook posting. Somebody is trying to make it look like the thing is more popular than it actually is - perhaps by including the WP7 SDK with some other tools.
Which makes me glad that Panglozz is keeping track of this for us. It may be a little bit OCD, but it's helpful.
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The trend is clearly in decline, so not only are the users not there, they're not ever going to be there.
Not sure how you got this from the data, which clearly shows monotonic growth in WP7, either looking at the native app or the facebook app.
Just in raw numbers (Score:1)
3,368 new users per day for period ending 1/24 is not equal to 1,711 new users per day for week ending 4/26 - and seasonal adjustments aren't going to let you rationalize the decline. That's not monotonic growth - it's declining growth. Given the expansion of the market overall it's also rapidly declining share. On the third tab, "Chart of Delta MAU/Day" there are graphs that will help you visualize the rate of declining growth versus the longer term average.
With Android and iOS each adding over 140,00
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Obviously if nearly three times as many people downloaded the software development kit for WP7 [knowyourmobile.com] as use WP7 for Facebook [allfacebook.com], something is amiss. Phone software development is not a 3x more common activity than Facebook posting.
Not necessarily. Many developers on MS stack have downloaded the toolset simply because it's free, and they wanted to see what's it all about - maybe write a hello world app. Most of those likely didn't have a WP7 phone when they downloaded (heck, the toolkit was available for download long before the first phones shipped!), and many probably never got one. So that number obviously doesn't correspond directly to the number of active developers publishing apps to the Marketplace.
You should know better (Score:1)
Shutdown, what are you doing? You know better than to argue with me. You've been around here long enough to know that I don't make definitive statements unless I have the high ground. Your team must be growing desperate.
Out of respect for our friendship I'm going to let this one go unless you try to spell that as some concession of your point.
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I don't work on WP7 in any way, shape or form. As far as it goes, I'm just an annoyed customer (both as a user and as a dev) same as everyone else.
I'm not arguing with your numbers, either, nor the overall problematic uptake of WP7 in general.
I'm merely pointing out that your assessment of SDK download numbers as "bogus" is not necessarily valid, and the supporting arguments are weak. Namely, you assume that phone development is a rarer activity than Facebook use - which is certainly true in general, but do
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So much better than Android.
Yah. Right
This is beside the fact that its not really common to expect any updates at all from your mobile phone manufacturer.
Sure. That's because Samsung has a habit of abandoning their OS releases and their customers. That's not the case for, well, pretty much everyone else. And so far as I'm concerned, I run a third-party Android ROM and get better support from an open-source group than any of the big boys including Microsoft.
Update saga? (Score:2)
A software has compatibility issues on some specific hardware. Amazing and never seen before. So what?
Re:Update saga? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Update saga? (Score:5, Insightful)
it means that all those WP7 developers might have the latest, coolest, Silverlight based .NET development tools, but once something doesn't work the way the pointy-clicky development environment says it will, they're pretty much clueless.
It means that they can't get an update to work on a handful of phone models running 1 version of the software. (think what would have happened if they had the hundreds of models that Android has been released on).
It means that dumbing down development only leads to very poor engineering practices. Most of the time you don't notice, but when you need that old-style expertise, you really miss it.
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I do not wish to offend, but you may not know much about Silverlight. Up until a couple of versions ago it did not even have a visual plugin for Visu
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Silverlight is not "pointy clicky development". It is a clean Reactive Programming model that [blah blah blah, heh, funny buzzword soup, LMAO]
I do not wish to offend, but you may not know much about Silverlight. Up until a couple of versions ago it did not even have a visual plugin for Visual Studio...
Oh, shiiii--! You weren't making a joke? That wasn't supposed to be funny?!
I'm sorry... it's just that I'm an ASM/C/C++/Java/Perl/Ruby/OCAML/Haskel/JavaScript programmer... and I've tried Silverlight...
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Btw, I know the difference between a library and a language and so I know that it's quite irrelevant how many languages you know to judge a software library.
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Well then, you must certainly recognize that all the features that you mentioned about Silverlight were specifically designed so that it would be simpler to make Silverlight a back-end for a "pointy-clicky" front end language "studio" (IDE).
Come on... being familiar with other languages you must be able to see this -- right? I mean... "XAML, templates, styles, and data-bindings." All designed from the ground up to be easily representable in an IDE that already uses those concepts to perform refactoring
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Mostly I do the following: I write reusable meta-libraries in F# that generate the same code-behind that others would repeatedly build by hand in Visual Studio with C#. So I clearly hear what you are saying, but rather than conclude negatively that an easy-peasy avenue makes a library "dumb", I appreciate the fact that the underlying model is clean enough to allow both library makers and "regular coders" to be productive. More often tha
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Come on... being familiar with other languages you must be able to see this -- right? I mean... "XAML, templates, styles, and data-bindings." All designed from the ground up to be easily representable in an IDE that already uses those concepts to perform refactoring....
XAML was designed from the ground up to be a declarative way to express object heirarchy and relationships. Nothing to do with an IDE.
Templates were designed as a way to customize declared UI at a visual level. Nothing to do with an IDE.
Styles were designed as a simple way to set properties on objects and react to property changes. Nothing to do with an IDE.
Data Binding was designed as a way to declaratively ensure that properties and UI can reflect data declaratively. Nothing to do with an IDE.
In fact, if
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The three layers are put together, respectively, by XAML, templates and styles, and the very powerful mechanism for data-bindings.
Oh joy.
That sounds like the kind of projects I've had to try to support in the past where everything was configured with a bazillion XML files and the original developers were long gone so you could never figure out which objects were calling which other objects without spending two hours deciphering the linked list of XML lookups.
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Basically, the XAML defines the UI, while the codebehind defines the logic. In the XAML, you can write binding expressions that declaratively bind values from objects to the UI or between objects in UI (if, for instance, you wanted two panes of a window to have the same size). XAML includes a style system that allows you to control rendering, and you can control that through binding expressions.
It's hardly different than other development frameworks that separate the codebehind from the visual definition, a
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or to put it another way, its Microsoft's version of the internet!
HTML is used to define the UI while codebehind (javascript) defines the logic. HTML includes a style system that allows you to control rendering. etc etc. There's not much difference in concept between them.
However, the binding between UI and objects is horrible and I expect MS will come up with 'XAML binding v2' in the next release of .net and everyone will say how crap the old way was - it reminds me of nasty XML elements being used instea
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You're confusing XAML with XML configs. XAML is not a config, it's a markup language (XML-based, yes) for GUI. It's actually very similar in concept to OS X / Cocoa .xib files, or QtQuick QML (except that this last one isn't XML) - all ultimately represent trees of objects. There are no XML configs in Silverlight, unless you add them yourself.
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Silverlight is not "pointy clicky development". It is a clean Reactive Programming model that strongly emphasizes the distinction between general layout, data templates (how you represent your app objects) and application logic. The three layers are put together, respectively, by XAML, templates and styles, and the very powerful mechanism for data-bindings.
And will only run well on mobile devices when we have quad core mobile devices with 4GB of RAM in two or three years...
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Wow, clueless much? This update fiasco is ridiculous, but that's no reason to spread such complete bullshit. It has nothing whatsoever to do with
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Carriers are still able to block/delay updates in some cases. (and have done so)
Even Apple still has to listen to carriers when it comes to updates in some instances (especially more so with the Verizon iPhone I suspect)
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Sorry, the Jesus Phone has no such issues when it comes to updating.
Neither does my T-Mobile G2 running Cyanogenmod.
I just saw this in a fortune cookie... (Score:5, Insightful)
"If you have time to rigorously test only one component of your software platform, make sure it's the update functionality."
Words to live by.
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Re:I just saw this in a fortune cookie... (Score:4, Insightful)
It'd be solved /really/ easily if MS simply mandated a "unbrickable" device, something like how the Nokia N900 does it: A special bootloader that, when booting with the USB cable plugged in, can boot from code transferred over USB, and chainload that into a proper flash.
Then when you brick your device, just flash it back to the last version and go on with your life.
But that'd be too easy. Especially as it might let someone run *gasp* custom firmware! Abd we can't have that!
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You mean something like a BIOS / HDD combo PC hardware has been using since the 80's ? So crazy it just might work!
Something like an Android device with a recovery partition, like the venerable G1 from HTC had?
Windows Phone = Update problems. (Score:1)
The words "Windows Phone" and "Update problems" are interchangeable, and mean the same thing. Windows Phone is nothing but problems and should be avoided at all cost.
The platform will soon be discontinued, as it is not selling. This happened before with Microsoft's Kin phones. Users got burned.
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*sigh*
Every time the Kin comes up, I feel compulsed to write up the three sentence summary of the problem that was obviously overlooked by anyone using the Kin as a means of bashing MS...
The Kin cost $199, required a $30 data plan, and was a feature phone with facebook and twitter clients.
The Blackberry Curve cost $199, though almost invariably had some sort of gimmick involving rebates, buy-one-get-one-free, or similar. It required a $30 data plan too, but had an actual web browser (didn't say a GOOD web b
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The Kin was a flop, but if it had a music player and only cost $5 for the data plan, the story might have been a bit different.
I would disagree with this. The Kin didn't fit into any real category. It cost as much as a smartphone, but you couldn't get 3rd party smartphone applications like other phones. It had built-in applications, but the ones that existed were not very good. It even lacked basic functionality like a calendar and contact lists which I had on my dumb phone ten years ago. The whole concept of the phone was a flawed as it was between a smartphone and a dumbphone but appealed to virtually no one. Teens (whom the
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It cost as much as a smartphone, but you couldn't get 3rd party smartphone applications like other phones.
Which is why he says if it cost $5 it might be a different story. You disagreed with him and then re-stated his point.
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Wait... what?
The Kin had a web browser, arguably better than the blackberry, and a fully functional music and video player equivalent to the Zune HD.
Phone features were not what killed the Kin, marketing missteps (aiming a phone at people not normally willing to pay $30 a month for data), not including texting in the base cost, for a texting based phone, and reviewers comparing it to the iPhone, which it was not intended to compete with, killed it.
Update works fine on my Focus (Score:2, Insightful)
I have a Focus with AT&T. Update came through fine for me last week, and overall I am quite pleased with it.
One of the little publicized problems related to the Focus was its issues with music playback. You could start a playlist, turn the phone "off" (sleep mode), and some random number of songs into the list, there would be stuttering and sometimes crashing on a track change. This was a very annoying problem for someone who had come from a Zune HD and was hoping to migrate all my music over to my n
Re:Update works fine on my Focus (Score:5, Insightful)
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I think the take away from this story is th at the Samsung Focus is broken, not that WP7 is broken. Considering HTC has managed to release a couple products free of problems and that received timely updates the 'problem' updates always seem to be focused on the samsung focus and the omnia.
(Disclosure: I have a Dell Venue Pro and its camera and wifi firmware is garbage and in serious need of updating--it did however update WP7 fine.)
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That was a focus-specific issue, so far as I've seen. (I live in Seattle, and know several people with different WP7 devices. Only Focus owners complained about the stuttering.) Agreed that it's pretty awful to have on a new OS, but that's more a "v1 OS with specific hardware" issue than a "MS can't code a mobile music player" issues, since the Zune line of hardware and HTC-based WP7 phones didn't seem to experience that issue.
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I don't work for Microsoft in any way shape or form. I work for an IT company in the medical industry, which has had its fair share of problems with MS in the past.
I'm seriously just trying to report an objective truth.
Thanks for trying though. Please carry on with your regularly scheduled Slashdot anti-MS FUD.
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Samsung Again? (Score:1)
http://gizmodo.com/#!5737002/the-problem-with-android-updates-part-seventeen-or-why-samsung-galaxy-phones-are-stuck-in-the-past [gizmodo.com]
http://androidcommunity.com/samsung-fascinate-users-report-froyo-update-problems-and-solutions-20110422/ [androidcommunity.com]
http://www.bgr.com/2011/02/24/sprint-pulls-epic-4g-android-2-2-froyo-update-data-connectivity-sd-card-issues-reported/ [bgr.com]
http://www.digitalhome.ca/2010/12/samsung-users-complain-android-2- [digitalhome.ca]
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So am I the that is seeing this MOTD at the bottom of /.?
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Unlike Android where they just drop support (Score:1)
for older phone platforms, and have myriad issues that never go reported here.
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Gingerbread was released on December 6, 2010, yet the Nexus One didn't receive an update until almost 3 months later on Feb 23, 2011. The Windows Phone update in question was released On March 22nd. Here we are only a Month later where one manufacturer seems to have trouble with this.
How exactly is this situation worse than Android's?
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LoB
Works for me (Score:1)
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Two people I know use them and it's for the same reason I use an iPhone: email, web, apps. The Windows Phone 7 is going through the same birthing process as iOS. But I have to admit that while not as functional yet as either iOS or Android, its interface is as polished as Apple's and the Apps are very intuitive. It could become a the BB replacement for the younger IT and business set.
Hmmmm (Score:2)
Microsoft releases actual cow turd as phone (Score:3, Funny)
Desperate to stay competitive against iPhone and Android mobile devices, Microsoft has released a two-pound lump of actual cow faeces [newstechnica.com] that they claim constitutes a phone.
Windows Phone 7, in development for several years, strips the mobile telephone down to its fundamental essence: futility, annoyance, malfunction, inconvenience and a socially unacceptable odour. Confounding analyst expectations, the turd is in fact shined.
US mobile carriers hailed the turd as the perfect physical complement to their world-famous customer service. "This powerful product will promote our growth!" said John Harrobin of Verizon Wireless. "We're marketing them as edible."
"We think we can really work the brand equity," said Steve Ballmer, modelling the optional shoulder-length rubber gloves. "Everyone works with our stuff all day every day. They know who Microsoft is and what we do."
"How about making our customers actually swallow our bullshit physically?" said John Harrobin. "Windows Phone 7 was my idea."
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I remember reading this before. Talk about Deja Vu.
Oh, now I remember: http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2096508&cid=35905686 [slashdot.org]
I guess recycling posts is the green thing to do these days.
to be fair though (Score:1)
Meanwhile in Redmond (Score:1)
Ballmer was overheard screaming, "Mail the damn users an update CD or something!"
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