Saturday 23 July 2011

Windows Phone 7 Development and Windows Phone Device Manager #7

Latest on this:

WPDM does have access to Marketplace applications and to their data (great news), but only on HTC 'phones (not such great news, especially for me, given that I have a Samsung Omnia 7).

My detailed beta test results are now on the TouchXperience forum, I'm aiming to start writing my review this week.

Sunday 10 July 2011

Windows Phone 7 Development and Windows Phone Device Manager #6

Received a WPDM Registration Key by email - no reference to beta testing, but I logged in to the www.touchxperience.com forum, (eventually) found the 1.4 software, downloaded it, and installed it (guesswork - no instructions provided).

I have got it to work, which is very good news.

There are lots of undocumented things you have to do to make it work and keep it working (e.g. none of the connectivity works unless the automatically installed TouchXperience app is active on the 'phone).

The application clearly has absolutely no knowledge of the existence, let alone the internal storage, of any Marketplace app (which doesn't surprise me at all, but which means it's pretty useless as a backup engine).

More details when I have time (and when I have checked whether I'm allowed to give specifics of the 1.4 version yet, since I am on a private beta).

Windows Phone 7 Development and Windows Phone Device Manager #5

Encouraged by @piaqt, I decided to take option b).

I have made a donation to www.touchxperience.com (which seems to consist of only one person, Julien Schapman) and used the Contact form there to ask to enrol as a beta tester.

More news soon, I hope!

Friday 1 July 2011

Windows Phone 7 Development and Windows Phone Device Manager #4

Not getting on that well ...

I installed WPDM, but it won't run - just starts and almost immediately stops.

It transpires that I need version 1.4 to coexist with the latest WP Developer Tools, but that version 1.4 is still in private beta, with no date given for a public one.

So either
a) I wait an indeterminate time, or
b) I make a donation to the suppliers of WPDM and they consider (but do not guarantee) making me a beta tester and thus giving me access to 1.4, or
c) I waste the morning's effort installing the Developer Tools, take them off my PC, install the penultimate version, and hope that works with 1.3 (which is quite backlevel in terms of functionality anyway - should I be reviewing it at all, on that basis?), or
d) I decide now that the almost non-existent support that seems to be on offer is never going to allow for use of the product in a business context, and drop the idea (my level of curiosity isn't going to allow this).

Some more depressing news picked up during the above researches is that the product gets inside WP7 by, effectively, loading a manufacturer specific 'adopt authority' DLL.I hope that once Microsoft provide supported unlocking they will give developers a better method than that, otherwise here's another reason for lack of acceptance in a business context.