Develop Bugs

WP7 -IS- Backwards compatible (well almost)

Applications that were made for Windows Mobile 6 are compatible with Windows Phone 7 Series. The interface of the new mobile operating system has been changed though, so the user interface for these applications will have to be changed as well.
"So there is no reason why programs written for Windows Mobile 6 cannot run on the new version of the OS", said Maarten Sonneveld of Microsoft Netherlands to Tweakers.net. "The interface is complete different though, so the applications will have to be changed somewhat before being ready for Windows Phone 7 Series".
It is still unclear how developers can port their user interfaces to the new version of Windows Mobile. Microsoft will only disclose how applications can be developed and distributed at their developer event Mix2010.
Microsoft announced it’s new OS on Monday afternoon at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. The OS is primarily aimed at synchronisation and integration with Microsft-services like Windows Live, Bing, Zune and Xbox Live. Aside from those Windows Phone 7 Series can also synchronise with Google-accounts and facebook.
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Source
So in summary, while none of the current applications will run on it, the underlying non-UI APIs will be compatible. So if understand correctly, porting would just a case of redeveloping the UI then recompiling, rather than starting completely from scratch. This acts to filter out apps with no more developer support, and promote a consistent UI.
Doesn't sound too bad to me.

That might explain why TomTom was seen on that screenshot of WP7 running on the HD2 (although, it could be a fake!). TomTom takes control of the screen, so uses no WM interface elements. So, it might be able to run full-screen apps/games without changes.
But, who knows...

elyl said:
That might explain why TomTom was seen on that screenshot of WP7 running on the HD2 (although, it could be a fake!). TomTom takes control of the screen, so uses no WM interface elements. So, it might be able to run full-screen apps/games without changes.
But, who knows...
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I was just thinking the same except if you use the included .net controls, there's no reason that the OS couldn't just reskin them automatically to be at least somewhat more in line with the WP7 styling.

This would be excellent if it's true - and I can't see why it wouldn't be. The UI may be new but why throw away a perfectly good underlying core.
What would also be ideal is if the "multi-tasking" involved an app being set to pause in the background by default, but with a "keep me running" API call available for apps that needed it. I'm sure most apps hog resourses not because they need to but because the developer hasn't really thought about how the rest of the device performs when his app has been left running.

Makes sense, WindowsCE core is still the same

Zaim2 said:
Applications that were made for Windows Mobile 6 are compatible with Windows Phone 7 Series
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Absolutely wrong statement due to incorrect translation. Original: "De interface van Windows Phone 7 Series is totaal anders, waardoor er in elk geval iets aan de applicaties moet gebeuren voordat ze geschikt zijn voor Windows Phone 7 Series"
Even google translates it correctly:
"The interface of Windows 7 Phone Series is different, which in any case something should happen to the applications before they are suitable for Windows 7 Phone Series".
We have some "ms confidential" documentation dated January 2010 that proves that none of the existing apps would be compatible with WinPhone7. And the only programming suite that is available to "generic" application-writers is Silverlight+XNA. Native apps are prohibited. Only OEMs and MO are allowed to create them (and even they have a set of limitations).
We would not have even source code compatibility - as all our C++ apps have to be converted to .NET.

mamaich said:
We have some "ms confidential" documentation dated January 2010...
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What the heck? And you say that only now? What else is in there? Any word about how background tasks are handled? Please give us some more information, or maybe, can you upload that documentation?

freyberry said:
maybe, can you upload that documentation?
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Obviously I cannot. As it would reveal the person who provided it.
Just to prove that such info really exists - see attached screenshots.
I really hope that the community would force MS to change such a dumb idea to limit independent software vendors to create only managed apps. Prohibiting C++ as a developing language, and "hiding" Windows API from programmer would force lots of developers to abandon this platform. The main reason of success of old WinMobile OSes was the ability to recompile "desktop" apps to WinMobile with just a minor set of changes (ANSI->Unicode + some interface changes).
P.S. I don't read PMs.

Obviously I cannot. As it would reveal the person who provided it.
Just to prove that such info really exists - see attached screenshots.
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Well, there's certainly a way to remove that information. But anyway, what about background tasks? Are third party applications allowed to run in the background?

mamaich said:
Obviously I cannot. As it would reveal the person who provided it.
Just to prove that such info really exists - see attached screenshots.
I really hope that the community would force MS to change such a dumb idea to limit independent software vendors to create only managed apps. Prohibiting C++ as a developing language, and "hiding" Windows API from programmer would force lots of developers to abandon this platform. The main reason of success of old WinMobile OSes was the ability to recompile "desktop" apps to WinMobile with just a minor set of changes (ANSI->Unicode + some interface changes).
P.S. I don't read PMs.
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Wow, I can't believe noone has picked up on this

freyberry said:
Are third party applications allowed to run in the background?
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OS itself supports multitasking, see attach. But "Windows Phone OS 7.0 Application Platform" that we'll be forced to use to create apps may force our application to be paused in background. I never programmed Silverlight and XNA and can't tell how multitatsking is made in them.
WinPhone 7 == Zune Phone. Both are based on CE kernel, and they should have lots of common in implementation of multitasking, clipboard, etc.

OS itself supports multitasking, see attach. But "Windows Phone OS 7.0 Application Platform" that we'll be forced to use to create apps may force our application to be paused in background.
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The question is, can we write applications that are not automatically suspended when sent to the background? What are the policies on this?
It says multiple processes can run at the same time, but it does not say whether they get suspended automatically.
Is there any info on this? Maybe in the "Scheduling" section?

I’m not sure this is a big deal. I can see them saying a lot of native C++ apps may have compatibility issues. I could go either way on it with the limited amount of information I have on this. I’ll have a better opinion at and after MIX
Note that this could be old documentation, and it’s pretty annoying you're leaking confidential documentation. Personally, I hope you get into trouble for breaking your contract - they trust you and you're posting it? Yuck.
To be fair, though, every app we’ve written has been managed, and Microsoft hasn't t said P/Invoking is verboten, so what would be the problem?
There’s probably exceptions for games and the like, and the documents you've scanned even say a waiver is available to use the Native APIs. So I don’t know what you're complaining about…
Microsoft's dev teams have been listening to developers - why not get them to chime in and also give them a chance to hear you. Posting confidential Microsoft documents, assuming those are real, is not the way to get them to listen
Best,
-Auri

freyberry said:
The question is, can we write applications that are not automatically suspended when sent to the background? What are the policies on this?
It says multiple processes can run at the same time, but it does not say whether they get suspended automatically.
Is there any info on this? Maybe in the "Scheduling" section?
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Personally, I like Android's approach to this, where Services can run in the background, but UI apps are allowed to be "put to sleep" while other apps run. But then again, we may see a lot of that come into play come MIX and "Answer Time"
Best,
-Auri

Well, I am now both excited and nervous -I think I will just cool my jets until MIX10 and just enjoy the eye candy for now. At worst - if the interface is nice, but the core is crap I am sure some of the boys here at xda will make us an inteface port for 6.5.x that acts and looks like the new hotness with the old compatibility. - lets see MIX

AuriRahimzadeh said:
Note that this could be old documentation, and it’s pretty annoying you're leaking confidential documentation.
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Docs are dated 2010.
I'm not leaking the documentation. I'm sharing the information that anyway would be opened in some days, maybe weeks.
And screens are posted here just as a confirmation of my words. You may think that these pics come from my mind and are made with photoshop - it is your opinion.
I really think that WinPhone 7 would be a failure similar to desktop Vista. Of cause some people would like it, but most would stay on WM 6.x and wait for the next version.
Regarding P/Invoke. As far as I've seen, "unsafe" operations are prohibited in XNA and Silverlight. Otherwise we would be able to call coredll funcs and run native apps (and do everything else that is allowed in our chamber).

mamaich said:
Docs are dated 2010.
I'm not leaking the documentation. I'm sharing the information that anyway would be opened in some days, maybe weeks.
And screens are posted here just as a confirmation of my words. You may think that these pics come from my mind and are made with photoshop - it is your opinion.
I really think that WinPhone 7 would be a failure similar to desktop Vista. Of cause some people would like it, but most would stay on WM 6.x and wait for the next version.
Regarding P/Invoke. As far as I've seen, "unsafe" operations are prohibited in XNA and Silverlight. Otherwise we would be able to call coredll funcs and run native apps (and do everything else that is allowed in our chamber).
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Mamaich any though of a WP7 ce6.0 bsp for all the current cortex A8 devices running on a ce5.2 bsp, will the new kernel support them natively or will extensive bsp/bootloader hacking be required?

P/invoke surely is a limitation of .NET CF, rather than Silverlight/XNA libraries?
I think it would be a bit stupid to remove P/Invoking, because it's just not realistic to rely on .NETCF alone which has soooo much stuff stripped out to minimize size.
Will we be seeing a whole new .NETCF so soon after 3.5? I highly doubt it...Unless MS have been working overtime the past year

Shame, time to stop mobile development altogether if this is true. When we developers are considered as dumb earning pipes for companies who in their arrogant big ways think they have all the wisdom, and app developers only make annoying software that makes their precious leaky OS'es crash, it's time to move on. i would have been talking about IPhone, Android etc, but sadly we must add Microsoft to the list also.
Then there's the $1195,- and airplane tickets we have to pay to get to the Mix2010 in oder to maybe maybe get to be a "partner" with access to limited native API's (probably only reserved for the big companies) and don't even bother talking about giving away 30% of our earnings to a company that last year made how many billions of profits was it ?
Time to start an XDA OS based on REAL Linux maybe ? NVidia have a nice dev-board available for $400,- with Tegra on it. That's what I call developer friendly.
Cheers !

Regardless of how this will play out, I'm pretty sure of two things:
1. Closing down the OS may be beneficial for the majority of users by bringing stability, ease of use, UI consistency, etc. Even though I don't like it.
2. Because the OS itself is multitasking, any and all restrictions may be hacked around, and a "jailbreak" will be possible.
Depending on how this whole thing will be implemented, jailbreaking and using "illegal" apps may be a major PITA (think iPhone 3GS/tethered jailbreak) or as easy as a few registry tweaks/installing additional certs/whatever. If Apple didn't chase JB with every update it would be a rather good platform for both mainstream "ordinary" users and those who want rather unusual things from their phones.
We'll have to wait and see how it evolves really to make a final judgment.

[Q] Bluestacks or equivalent for RT?

Rumors are flying that bluestacks will bring their newly touch-optimized app to RT, giving us access to Android Apps. Anyone else heard something similar?
Also, is there any equivalent we could get our hands on right now, like an open-source equivalent that could be ported? It seems ridiculous that to run native ARM apps on an ARM platform we need to port an ARM environment from x86 back to ARM again... there should be a simpler way. All pure speculation of course, but it seems like it should be possible. So, outside of a bluestacks port, how could Android apps be run on an RT device?

Install a Linux kernel and a Dalvik runtime... Seriously, do you realize how silly what you're asking for sounds?
"Why can't we run Linux apps on Windows? It's an x86 processor too..." (Note: Android is not all ARM.)
Stuff like Bluestacks is a huge, complicated project.

GoodDayToDie said:
Install a Linux kernel and a Dalvik runtime... Seriously, do you realize how silly what you're asking for sounds?
"Why can't we run Linux apps on Windows? It's an x86 processor too..." (Note: Android is not all ARM.)
Stuff like Bluestacks is a huge, complicated project.
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Seriously your a bore

rw6497 said:
Seriously your a bore
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He's not a bore, he's realistic. It's not his fault that people make outrageous requests all the time and expect them to be fulfilled. I find it quite irritating too, especially when people PM me and ask me again because it's been posted in a thread that it's not possible without an unreasonable amount of work (that we're not going to do on our spare time) and they don't like that answer.
You guys have to remember, we're doing this for free. We're not obligated to port every single program you guys throw at us. If you don't like that, learn how to port them yourselves.

I don't want to spawn an argument...
I'm not asking anything from anyone, I'm just curious about some rumors and inquisitive about possibilities. I'm not all "OMG! netham45! Can u plz make this run android!? And then iOS! And PlayStation games!" I respect netham45 a ton and think his work is amazing.
I'm just opening discussion here.

For comparison, consider the Wine project: well over a decade of development (much longer than Android has even existed) to have an open-source tool that can run many x86 Windows apps on x86 Linux. Or consider Cygwin, which can't even run x86 Linux apps on x86 Windows; they must be recompiled for Cygwin first. Expecting that some equivalent program to run ARM Dalvik/Linux apps on ARM Windows would have just popped out of the woodwork in a usable state - even as usable as Wine, which is nowhere near 100% app compatibility yet - is quite unrealistic.

jtg007 said:
It seems ridiculous that to run native ARM apps on an ARM platform we need to port an ARM environment from x86 back to ARM again...
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Bluestacks involves ZERO emulation of ARM. Android apps are run inside the dalvik virtual machine (itself a register based version of the java virtual machine). To run an android app just needs a DVM and its class library: bluestacks pretty much does this. Android native code apps do then get complicated yes but then the android NDK has a rather convenient feature that bluestacks can exploit.
NDK compiles native binaries for both x86 and ARMv7 by default (note default, you can over-ride which platforms it compiles for, I believe ARMv6, ARMv6hf, ARMv7, MIPS and x86_32 are available options although I am not 100% sure on the exact arm versions so might be wrong). Bluestacks is only running on x86 and x86_64 machines. x86_64 machines can safely run x86_32 code. So really bluestacks when it encounters a native app "just" has to run the x86 binary the NDK produces on windows/mac with a compatibility layer. Still a complex job of course.
Bluestacks on windows RT could actually take the same shortcut bluestacks on windows and OSX takes in regards to native code, just with the ARM binaries running in a compatibility layer instead of the x86 binaries.
Bluestacks still has to mess about a bit exposing hardware to "android" correctly and handling a few extra bits and pieces but generally it works rather well and in theory could work on windows RT. However in practise it might have some speed sacrifices which will become much more apparent seeming as the guts of most windows RT devices are also the guts of android devices, now you've introduced slowdowns and the RT device will be slower than if it just ran android in the first place, might not be an issue on some less intensive apps but something like shadowgun would probably have noticeable slowdowns. Also I doubt a company like that behind bluestacks wants to develop for jailbroken devices, microsoft certainly wouldnt give permission for something along the same lines to be included on the windows store. The other major issue is OpenGL ES. Non existant on windows RT, bluestacks I believe converts OpenGL ES calls to full OpenGL. We dont have that either. We have directX or software. In theory you could convert the OpenGL ES calls to directX, certainly not impossible, but would certainly be alot of work.
TL;DR. Its theoretically possible to have android apps running on windows RT. There are too many issues to make it viable at this moment in time.
Future updates to what microsoft does and doesn't allow on RT (OpenGLES I'm looking at you) and knowledge/hacks (GLES>DX?) gained as more people take a poke at it might help nudge a dalvik VM on RT in the right direction in future though.

I wonder how relevant this is
http://www.pcworld.com/article/2018...tility-to-run-android-apps-on-windows-rt.html

Interesting, but too early to call "relevant", I think. That article is over two months old; has anybody heard anything since? It's possible that the project is being worked on internally already and will be available soon, but don't count on it.
That said, we now have three ways to get software onto RT:
1. The Windows Store. Official, easy, and can be monetized, but requires Microsoft approval, must run in Metro, and restricts available APIs.
2. Sideloaded Metro app. Semi-official (no hacks needed) but requires going through the (fairly simple and free) process of equipping your device with a developer license. Still runs in Metro and the AppContainer sandbox, but you can somewhat ignore Microsoft's approval process and use any API that is reachable.
3. ARM-compiled desktop app. Requires a jailbroken device, which MS could later try to block, but for now it's easy. No API or sandbox restrictions, aside from the lack of certain features (like OpenGL) on RT.
I wonder which one Bluestacks would choose? #1 is the most beneficial to them, if they can do it, and if MS rejects it they could always go with #2 as a fallback. #3 is the easiest for them, most likely, but carries the most risk. There's also, of course, item #4: forget RT, and keep going with x86 Windows and OS X, where all the customers are.

I dont think they would actually have to go as far as option 3. ModernUI would probably be more than enough for bluestacks.
I wonder if microsoft would try and prevent bluestacks from the marketplace. I guess as far as they are concerned it might improve the image of their devices if they can run android apps too (minimizing costs of migration to RT from android for enterprise customers too, although it seems ipad's took off mostly in enterprise).

How "limited" is Windows RT compared to regular Windows 8?

I've been thinking of getting a tablet and I've been eyeing the Windows 8 tablets. Honestly, I like Android, but all of their tablets disappoint (I don't want a Nexus tablet or an iPad for that matter).
I keep hearing that RT marketplace is very small, that there are only "a few apps", etc. Is this true? I am not a heavy app user, plus I'll always have my phone (LG G2 btw, and it's amazing).
I use W8 on my desktop and I like it - but that's obviously the "full" version. I would also like to ask for a tablet recommendation (Nokia 2520 looks FANTASTIC by the way). I don't want to give more than $500 for a tablet, so then generally RT tablets come to mind. My only other requirement is at least a full HD screen. What would you suggest?

Deusdies said:
I've been thinking of getting a tablet and I've been eyeing the Windows 8 tablets. Honestly, I like Android, but all of their tablets disappoint (I don't want a Nexus tablet or an iPad for that matter).
I keep hearing that RT marketplace is very small, that there are only "a few apps", etc. Is this true? I am not a heavy app user, plus I'll always have my phone (LG G2 btw, and it's amazing).
I use W8 on my desktop and I like it - but that's obviously the "full" version. I would also like to ask for a tablet recommendation (Nokia 2520 looks FANTASTIC by the way). I don't want to give more than $500 for a tablet, so then generally RT tablets come to mind. My only other requirement is at least a full HD screen. What would you suggest?
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Well if its for your criteria of a full Desktop you are right - you can't do this with Windows RT, thus with no RT tablet. But as im using my Surface as a thin client, remoting my home pc or my server for all the stuff i can't do on my tablet it's quite wonderful. And the Windows Store has been incresing ever since, last week i reset me tablet and did some serious store browsing to get up to date with available apps and i probably couldn't find anthing that's not there - development environment and compilers excluded of course. But as far as i can see - not knowing your area of expertise - there is everything you would need to get a basic start, though some apps will cost a dollar/euro or two. Whatsmore, there is the 8.0 jailbreak, if you are willing not to go to 8.1 yet (don't know if the surface 2 gets delivered with 8.1 and you would need to downgrade) - in this case there are already a lot of ported desktop apps available.
Jailbreak and ported apps can be found here:
Jailbreak
Ported Desktop Apps
As for the Nokia 2520, it definitely looks good! Haven't actually seen this one come up, looks promising.
To sum it up: if what you like is the new Modern UI interface you can definitely go with an RT tablet for there are plenty of apps available. For the desktop that's a whole other story, as I've described (jailbreak/ported apps) - if you are willing to compromise, you will get another added benefit from this cool piece of hard- and software.
The decision which RT tablet to use should be yours i guess, there are quite a few out there, but in a matter of usability I deem them all to work the same.
Greetings,
Fasin

The app market you can check out on your full windows 8 machine no problem. I do personally think its a bit limited.
Windows RT is for all intents and purposes windows 8 running on ARM instead of x86 processors. This does bring a few limitations, and then microsoft impose 2 more.
ARM and x86 processors are rather obviously not compatible. x86 programs cannot run on ARM and vice versa normally (you could emulate an ARM CPU on x86 and vice versa but thats slow).
Most "metro" apps are compiled in both ARM and x86 versions. There are a few which are not for whatever reason. But most should be available in both stores. The vast majority of metro apps use C# or VB.net anyway which dont output native ARM or x86 machine code and instead use .NET bytecode (the .NET runtime is present on both windows 8 and windows RT). VLC is the only major exception I can think of right now, although that hasn't been publicly released yet and ARM is planned (right now its x86 only).
Just about all desktop software for windows is x86. It won't run on ARM. If its open source it may be portable however the only compiler capable of targetting Windows RT is MSVC whereas alot of software can only be built in alternative compilers. There is a list (already linked in the post above) of software which people have managed to recompile for Windows RT.
Then 2 microsoft imposed restrictions.
Drivers. Although windows tablets all have full USB host abilities, you do of course require drivers for all USB devices you want to use. Windows are not allowing 3rd party drivers on ARM, so if your USB device isn't listed on their compatibility chart it won't work. Mice, keyboards, USB storage, some printers and even the xbox 360 controller work.
Desktop requiring signed binaries. This is a major restriction which serves no purpose. All software run on windows RT must have a digital signature attached which will be checked before execution. If the signature is missing it won't run it. For store apps this isn't a problem as signing the app is part of the release process. However microsoft don't want us to use the desktop on windows RT devices, they havent released any way to add the signature to software running on the traditional desktop. MS Office, internet explorer and all the other software that runs in desktop mode and is preinstalled on RT has been signed because microsoft wrote it and have the tools to do so. We don't. There is a jailbreak which can remove this restriction and enable people to run desktop applications (either written in .NET or compiled for ARM) but it doesn't work on windows RT 8.1 which the lumia tablet and surface 2 have (they cannot be downgraded to 8.0). An 8.1 jailbreak is coming soon.
Whether the RT is suitable or not depends on your needs. If all your going to do is surf the web, well its full blown internet explorer 11 not some sucky mobile browser, it even has flash (but not java, which you should not confuse for javascript. However iOS and android dont have java either).
You get full RDP support in windows RT. So you can view the screen of and interact with your real windows 8 desktop remotely on the tablet. In the ported apps section for jailbroken devices there is also VNC which does the same thing but is cross platform unlike RDP which is supposed to just be windows (however there is an RDP server for linux too so if you have a linux machine, install the RDP server, remote access it on non jailbroken RT device no problem).
You get microsoft office. Its missing plugins and macros. But otherwise, its a full office suite. Its more than android or iOS have.
Being close enough to normal windows, you get a full file browser which supports network mapped drives and USB etc as you do on your desktop. Android can have file browsers, but they usually arent as good as a desktop file browser. iOS doesnt have a file browser at all.
With the file browser you have support for USB storage. Got some photos on a memory stick, plug it in, you can view them. iOS cannot do this. Some android phones can, some can't (your LG should be able to).
True there are not as many apps as iOS or android. But both iOS and android had low apps counts when they first released and according to what little public data there is, windows after 1 year is about on par with both android and iOS app counts after 1 year. It takes time (but will it take too long is a better question)

Thank you both very much. Very well thought out responses. I was debating between getting the Dell Venue 11 Pro (full Windows 8) or the Nokia 2520 being as that they're the same price, but I have honestly been convinced to get the RT version.
Fasin said:
Whatsmore, there is the 8.0 jailbreak, if you are willing not to go to 8.1 yet (don't know if the surface 2 gets delivered with 8.1 and you would need to downgrade) - in this case there are already a lot of ported desktop apps available.
Jailbreak and ported apps can be found here:
Jailbreak
Ported Desktop Apps
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Oh. My. Gott.
I had no idea that this even existed. I think this is pretty much what settles it - I'm definitely getting an RT. Notepad++? Python? 7-zip? Amazing! Vielen dank!
SixSixSevenSeven said:
Then 2 microsoft imposed restrictions.
Drivers. Although windows tablets all have full USB host abilities, you do of course require drivers for all USB devices you want to use. Windows are not allowing 3rd party drivers on ARM, so if your USB device isn't listed on their compatibility chart it won't work. Mice, keyboards, USB storage, some printers and even the xbox 360 controller work.
Desktop requiring signed binaries. This is a major restriction which serves no purpose. All software run on windows RT must have a digital signature attached which will be checked before execution. If the signature is missing it won't run it. For store apps this isn't a problem as signing the app is part of the release process. However microsoft don't want us to use the desktop on windows RT devices, they havent released any way to add the signature to software running on the traditional desktop. MS Office, internet explorer and all the other software that runs in desktop mode and is preinstalled on RT has been signed because microsoft wrote it and have the tools to do so. We don't. There is a jailbreak which can remove this restriction and enable people to run desktop applications (either written in .NET or compiled for ARM) but it doesn't work on windows RT 8.1 which the lumia tablet and surface 2 have (they cannot be downgraded to 8.0). An 8.1 jailbreak is coming soon.
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You're right, that truly is an odd restriction. Perhaps they just want people to use Windows Store more and more? But from this thread it seems that Jailbreak "fixes" a lot of issues - and I didn't even know this existed until now (admittedly I wasn't into the Windows 8 on mobile devices a whole lot until now).
Yep, I think my only pseudo-concern is now gone. Thank you again both, and Nokia 2520 - here I come!

Well, the jailbreak isnt out for 8.1 and is still more limited than the bay trail in the venue 11. But its one of those things that can only go uphill from here.
My personal choice would be the venue. But thats me, not you. I do a fair bit of programming and use alot of software that just plain isnt available on RT. And I think thats the point, different devices suit different people in different ways.

BestBuy will have Surface RT for $200 in Black Friday. I'd like to buy one since it is such cheap and I can play with some ARM Win32 programs.

SixSixSevenSeven said:
Well, the jailbreak isnt out for 8.1 and is still more limited than the bay trail in the venue 11. But its one of those things that can only go uphill from here.
My personal choice would be the venue. But thats me, not you. I do a fair bit of programming and use alot of software that just plain isnt available on RT. And I think thats the point, different devices suit different people in different ways.
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I do quite a bit of programming myself (both personally and for my work), but I can never picture myself programming on a tablet (or even a tablet/keyboard combo). That's just not what I'm getting the tablet for.
I've just read Engadget's review of Nokia 2520, which is overall positive. But I thought it would be much better than the Surface 2, and apparently (according to their review), it isn't. In fact, I thought it will have a better battery life, while in fact it has worse.
As a student I also get a 10% discount on Surface only, and I have a $25 Microsoft Store gift card that I got eons ago, so that brings the total cost for a Surface 2 down to ~$370, which is phenomenal.
It's still in between Nokia 2520 and Surface 2...

Deusdies said:
I do quite a bit of programming myself (both personally and for my work), but I can never picture myself programming on a tablet (or even a tablet/keyboard combo). That's just not what I'm getting the tablet for.
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To be honest even a laptop is less than ideal - if you're used to working on a multi-monitor desktop setup then a laptop will feel restrictive.

ThorburnJ said:
To be honest even a laptop is less than ideal - if you're used to working on a multi-monitor desktop setup then a laptop will feel restrictive.
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I do program on a laptop with a 14" 1366*768 display. I have used much higher resolution displays though and it is certainly alot better.

ThorburnJ said:
To be honest even a laptop is less than ideal - if you're used to working on a multi-monitor desktop setup then a laptop will feel restrictive.
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Yep... I do all of my programming on a desktop. At work 3 monitors, at home 1, but 27". So, yes, tablet is just for movies, some games, etc.

It is possible to emulate some x86 programs on RT's ARM processor, however often it will be slow. Most desired programs won't run through emulation (including utorrent, VLC, Steam, etc)
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2095934

Doesn't Microsoft forbid metro apps from having native binaries?
If so, how would you ever write something like a wii emulator on today's hardware? It would be way too slow. Perhaps two decades from now?

Rakeesh_j said:
Doesn't Microsoft forbid metro apps from having native binaries?
If so, how would you ever write something like a wii emulator on today's hardware? It would be way too slow. Perhaps two decades from now?
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No...
Many "metro" apps are normal C/C++ compiled natively for the processor itself.

SixSixSevenSeven said:
No...
Many "metro" apps are normal C/C++ compiled natively for the processor itself.
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Oh. Then what was with MS's comments that they deliberately wanted to make metro apps limited? They can't just mean in terms of being sandboxed? You can still sandbox without sacrificing utility; Android does that quite well.

Rakeesh_j said:
Oh. Then what was with MS's comments that they deliberately wanted to make metro apps limited? They can't just mean in terms of being sandboxed? You can still sandbox without sacrificing utility; Android does that quite well.
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trying to start flamewars again...

SixSixSevenSeven said:
trying to start flamewars again...
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No, it's very much on topic. If the goal was to start a flame war, then the OP beat me to it a long time ago.

Kindly point out something an android app can do which a windows app cannot (there are some, I personally wanted to use a certain feature but until 8.1 could not, yeah 8.1 added loads more features)
Apps requiring root do not count as root is a device modification much the same way modified RT devices can do more.

SixSixSevenSeven said:
Kindly point out something an android app can do which a windows app cannot (there are some, I personally wanted to use a certain feature but until 8.1 could not, yeah 8.1 added loads more features)
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Honestly I don't know as I've never published any apps and I've only done very small scale development for my own uses. I'm just going by MS's commentary on where they think they went wrong with their 8 strategy, in which they indicate that they believe making apps limited in scope wasn't a mistake (effectively they believe that their marketing was the reason for RT's failure, and that it will be easier to market 2 OSes instead of 3.)
I do know however that you see some pretty complex applications on Android whereas I haven't seen anything on RT hasn't already been done better in a web browser. In fact, I've seen web browsers do things that RT will not, take for example that version of battlefield which runs in Firefox and Chrome (RT could technically do that, granted.) The most complicated emulator available for RT is for snes, which also can be done in FF and Chrome: http://www.b81.org/~tjw/smw/
SixSixSevenSeven said:
Apps requiring root do not count as root is a device modification much the same way modified RT devices can do more.
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I don't really see it that way. Just issue an 'oem unlock' command to the device and you're golden. RT devices however by design forbid doing anything like that.
That said, the ultimate limitation in RT comes from this: RT won't run any app unless MS explicitly greenlights it. A lot of the more interesting apps (to me anyways) are ones that companies like MS and in some circumstances even Google wish didn't exist at all, like ad blockers, being able to tether without carrier permission, etc. Even so, not all of these require root and there's nothing stopping you from using them on Android.

Rakeesh_j said:
Honestly I don't know as I've never published any apps and I've only done very small scale development for my own uses. I'm just going by MS's commentary on where they think they went wrong with their 8 strategy, in which they indicate that they believe making apps limited in scope wasn't a mistake (effectively they believe that their marketing was the reason for RT's failure, and that it will be easier to market 2 OSes instead of 3.)
I do know however that you see some pretty complex applications on Android whereas I haven't seen anything on RT hasn't already been done better in a web browser. In fact, I've seen web browsers do things that RT will not, take for example that version of battlefield which runs in Firefox and Chrome (RT could technically do that, granted.) The most complicated emulator available for RT is for snes, which also can be done in FF and Chrome: http://www.b81.org/~tjw/smw/
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Then if you don't know, then why are you claiming it to be so poor in comparison to android? What apps *are available* doesnt dictate what apps the system is capable of.
In 8.0 the biggest issues were lack of low level interfaces to peripherals and instead being limited to high level wrappers provided by WinRT. In 8.1 there are now WinRT wrapper classes to raw USB and bluetooth, both of which were absent in 8.0. Besides that, there isn't any OpenGL, but there is DirectX which android doesnt have and serves the same purpose.
WIndows 8 apps are perfectly capable of hosting a first person shooter such as battlefield, there is a massive difference between it being incapable and simply not been done (actually there are FPS games, but they are more inline with the crap you see on android).
Your battlefield example is entirely bull**** either way as you seemed to be arguing for android whereas android doesnt have battlefield either.
Even if microsoft ditched windows RT, the store is part of windows 8. It would still be present. Windows RT is just an ARM port of windows 8. WinRT is the so called "sandbox" store apps run in and is present on both operating systems.

SixSixSevenSeven said:
Then if you don't know, then why are you claiming it to be so poor in comparison to android? What apps *are available* doesnt dictate what apps the system is capable of.
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Two things:
Comments I've heard from developers
And most importantly, Microsoft's own comments
SixSixSevenSeven said:
In 8.0 the biggest issues were lack of low level interfaces to peripherals and instead being limited to high level wrappers provided by WinRT. In 8.1 there are now WinRT wrapper classes to raw USB and bluetooth, both of which were absent in 8.0. Besides that, there isn't any OpenGL, but there is DirectX which android doesnt have and serves the same purpose.
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That later bit is more of a reason to not want RT. Virtually every platform out there uses OpenGL. The number of devices that use directx exclusively make up such a small percentage of the marketplace that it almost may as well not even exist. Android wouldn't gain anything at all by having it (really, no developer out there has ever said "I'd port to Android if only it supported directx,") and it really hurts that RT/WP don't have it. For this reason, any developer who says that they'll only use DirectX is shooting themselves in the foot. Microsoft is doing exactly that - too many games developers said they probably wouldn't ever bother porting anything to RT/WP because they don't want to spend all of the money on porting because the revenue gained is almost guaranteed to not be worth it. Sure, some game engines now support it, but that doesn't solve the problem of backporting their own customizations and additions to the base engine.
SixSixSevenSeven said:
WIndows 8 apps are perfectly capable of hosting a first person shooter such as battlefield, there is a massive difference between it being incapable and simply not been done (actually there are FPS games, but they are more inline with the crap you see on android).
Your battlefield example is entirely bull**** either way as you seemed to be arguing for android whereas android doesnt have battlefield either.
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That's probably because you missed the point entirely. It has nothing to do with whether or not battlefield is an FPS. The point is that I've seen web browsers do more impressive things than RT apps. Battlefield is merely an example of why even Chrome is more valuable to me than RT.
SixSixSevenSeven said:
Even if microsoft ditched windows RT, the store is part of windows 8. It would still be present. Windows RT is just an ARM port of windows 8. WinRT is the so called "sandbox" store apps run in and is present on both operating systems.
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You aren't telling me anything new here. Microsoft has done something similar more than once and we've already seen the results: It'll just go derelict and then eventually deprecated but still kept around.
I actually wouldn't be surprised if MS created an app store for win32 apps similar to what apple is doing with OSX. Their current store model is just a flat out knockoff of the ios app model (contrast to the play store model where each publisher is at their own discretion, and some people still wonder why android/play is by far more popular than the rest) so they may as well go all the way with it.

[Q] Windows surface RT.

How's everyone doing?
I bought a Surface RT during last Black Friday and i have been using it mainly for school. I just found out there was a jailbreak and i guess this whole world of mods. Just wondering what kind of things can a normal computer gamer and medical student gain by jailbreaking? What additional features do you get?

Windows RT cannot run desktop applications normally for 2 reasons.
Firstly it uses an ARM architecture processor commonly used in phones and tablets whereas your normal laptop or desktop uses an x86 architecture processor. The 2 are not compatible, same way my A+ blood is not suitable for a B- recipient (as far as my limited medical knowledge is concerned anyway).
Secondly, unlike windows 8, windows RT features digital signature enforcement. In order to confirm whether a piece of software is legitimate or malware it requires microsoft to add a digital signature to the executable. If the signature is missing or invalid then it won't run it. Apps you download from the windows store will come with this signature so its not a problem there. Unfortunately there is no way to obtain a certificate for desktop applications available to us at this time so only microsoft office, internet explorer and the other built in desktop programs that came preinstalled have the required certificate.
The jailbreak removes the signature checking on windows RT 8.0 only, it does not function on RT 8.1. Black friday is not a thing here so I have no idea when you got the tablet, it could have come with 8.1 rather than 8.0 in which case you can get an 8.0 recovery image and "downgrade" the device again. That solves the second issue and allows us to run software not authorised by microsoft.
The first issue. I don't know how much you know about software development but normally you take a human readable file(s), run it through a compiler and that spits out the executable binary. Of course existing software that you can just hop online and download or pull from a CD will have a binary for x86 processors not ARM. Microsofts C/C++ compiler with support for windows RT is available though so we can at least get binaries which will run on the Surface RT (and other RT devices). Downside, in order for us to port this software to RT it has to have the human readable source code available and that source code needs to work in microsofts compiler, if either of those requirements is not met then there is nothing we can do for a port.
If you are running the 8.0 version of RT rather than RT 8.1 then you can obtain the jailbreak tool from here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2092158
A list of applications which have been ported to RT can be found here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2092348
So what do you gain as a medical student/gamer by jailbreaking? The ability to run the software in the list above, that is it (and if I was to pick up an RT device that would be highly important to me, but thats me, not everyone)

SixSixSevenSeven said:
A list of applications which have been ported to RT can be found here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2092348
So what do you gain as a medical student/gamer by jailbreaking? The ability to run the software in the list above, that is it (and if I was to pick up an RT device that would be highly important to me, but thats me, not everyone)
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I wouldn't consider myself a serious gamer, but the jailbreak gives me three game-related things that I use occasionally. First is Quake. I never actually played through the whole game back in the day, so I'm finally doing that on my Surface, which I think is really cool. Mouse not required so I can pretty much play it wherever (unlike Quake 3, which I've also played on it occasionally). Second is DOSbox, as I occasionally pull out some old games like Duke Nukem when I'm bored. Last is the super Nintendo emulator snes9x. Yes I know there is also a store app version, but it got pulled for while, so I like the knowledge that the desktop version is mine to keep.
Past that there are some very helpful desktop utilities that I use, KeepPass2 (password safe) I use for both personal and work passwords, so to have it on my Surface is awesome, and since there is also a subversion client, I can even check out the work safe directly using my Surface. And of course Putty.
Basically I would not have bought my Surface RT if it weren't for the jailbreak. And I will also not upgrade to 8.1 if a jailbreak isn't available. There are too many things I would rather do on the desktop, even on RT.

domboy said:
I wouldn't consider myself a serious gamer, but the jailbreak gives me three game-related things that I use occasionally. First is Quake. I never actually played through the whole game back in the day, so I'm finally doing that on my Surface, which I think is really cool. Mouse not required so I can pretty much play it wherever (unlike Quake 3, which I've also played on it occasionally). Second is DOSbox, as I occasionally pull out some old games like Duke Nukem when I'm bored. Last is the super Nintendo emulator snes9x. Yes I know there is also a store app version, but it got pulled for while, so I like the knowledge that the desktop version is mine to keep.
Past that there are some very helpful desktop utilities that I use, KeepPass2 (password safe) I use for both personal and work passwords, so to have it on my Surface is awesome, and since there is also a subversion client, I can even check out the work safe directly using my Surface. And of course Putty.
Basically I would not have bought my Surface RT if it weren't for the jailbreak. And I will also not upgrade to 8.1 if a jailbreak isn't available. There are too many things I would rather do on the desktop, even on RT.
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Thank you that sounds amazing. Yea I use it mainly doing work at a clinic, but there is always downtime throughout the day. Playing some Old school quake/snes would be tight. for SNEs are the roms all on there or can you just download everysingle one you want? also do you need a controller?

Redistributing ROMs is generally considered at least technically illegal, and thus against XDA rules. That said, I'm guessing you have them or can find them. No idea if it works with a controller (in general, Windows RT supports controllers, but no guarantee on app compatibility through something like DOSbox or an emulator).
There's one other advantage of Jailbreak that 6677 didn't mention: you can run an x86 emulation layer that (very slowly) allows running (a small number of) normal x86 programs. A few old games, like Heroes of Might and Magic 3, are known to work with it. It won't run anything very new or fancy - for example, even really old versions of Firefox don't work, although their installer will run - but sometimes something that hasn't been tested before is tried, and works out.
Something to consider about DOSBox: a lot of the games on GOG.com are 16-bit games that run in DOSBox. If you extract the DOSBox disk image and configuration and bring them over to the tablet, you can run them using the RT port of DOSBox as well.

egyptionsr2buff said:
Thank you that sounds amazing. Yea I use it mainly doing work at a clinic, but there is always downtime throughout the day. Playing some Old school quake/snes would be tight. for SNEs are the roms all on there or can you just download everysingle one you want? also do you need a controller?
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Everything I mentioned I do with the Surface keyboard, and I've got the type keyboard. The Surface itself can make use of an Xbox360 controller, but I've never tried to configure it in snes9x. A quick search on Google looks like people have used the X360 controller with snes9x on regular Windows, so it may work. I know the store version (snes8x) can use, as I tried it briefly once. I just don't usually have my controller with me, so using the keyboard is much more convenient. The store version has touch controls, but that is really tricky to use when you need precise movement in a game.
ROMs are not bundled with the snes emulator, but that's typical in the emulation world. I don't want to go into too much detail since it's against forum policy, but again, Google it a bit as it's pretty easy to find info on the subject.

Windows 9 On RT

Hi,
Like you know, windows will release a beta of w9 in somes days, and they said that they'll do an hybrid system for all platform. Did you think there'll be an emulator or anything different to run somes x86 app like a "computer" ?
We have awaiting fo a while a jailbreak for 8.1, but if w9 give us the opportunity to run x86 programs it'll be better, hope they'll release this soons to take a look.
What do you think about this?
Regards

No, only metro apps will be universal, not x86 ones

mod edit
On topic. I can't see why Microsoft would give us the ability to run apps outside of the Metro sandbox. Although I am surprised that they don't try and entice the open source community into contributing to the store. We all know that they'd love to see more quality apps on there.

Hello my friends @andTab Even if "somebody" would give you the jailbreak for RT 8.1, I bet you won't be really happy with that:
Ofc it would give some great possibilities, but its not like you can run many x86-programs on JB RT, because you can only emulate it and the performance is,....
[how to say it nice],..... not optimal xD
you can hardly play games like "Heroes of Might and Magic 3" but that is the maximum. As I understand you that wouldn't be enough (plz correct me if im wrong)
But for users loving to play around and start i.e. JDownloader with a loadingtime of ~5min; or those, using a lot of pure .NET 4 programs it would be really cool.
[But most of them are happy enough with a jailbroken RT].
Why am I writing this?
I just wanted to ask you politely, if you could edit your post, because it sounds really offensive.
BUT I also wanted to be cooperative, and give you some informations...
Ontopic:
I think the hope, that ms would be nice to us, is gone...
I strongly suggest you, to dual-boot WinRT8.0-JB & WinRT8.1 !!!
joke:[until somebody tell us how to "open the bootloader" and boot for example a linux-distro. (perhaps via soldering a hardware-flasher and reflash that damn thing )]
Cheers
Blade

I removed the majority of the unnecessary and negative comments. Lets try to keep the rest of this thread on track now please.

It will be Windows 10
1 windows will work on all the devices, laptop, phone, and TAB!!!!

9 or 10, I don't have a lot of hope right now for Windows on ARM... I keep hearing rumors that unlike x86 Windows 10, the ARM version (Windows RT) is going to be "combined with windows phone" whatever that means, and loose the desktop. Sounds like a dumb-ed down phone OS to me... and nothing like what I'd want on my Surface RT, and definitely not what I'd hoped for which was basically an ARM version of the full-blown Windows 10 OS, with and unlocked dekstop, windowed store apps, etc.
But, since Microsoft hasn't actually demoed the ARM version of Threshold I guess we don't know anything for sure.

@mark manning Can you move this to General please. It should not be in DEV/Hacking

wcomhelp said:
@mark manning Can you move this to General please. It should not be in DEV/Hacking
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Moved