What Windows Phone 7 Should Have been.

Well, we don’t have any initial plans to develop any of our Applications on Windows Phone 7. Microsoft just went too far away from where they were in the mobile space and worried too much about asthetics and what iPhone was doing to please a consumer level instead of staying with the flexibility that usually defines them.

What did Microsoft need to do.

Yes, they needed a more refined interface. But really, this is just a skin. I like some of the 3rd party Skins better than the direction that Microsoft went, wish those were still an option… Supposedly this new Zune and Box interface is popular with a lot of consumers, and it has an initial ‘oh how’ factor, but it DEFINITELY isnt for everyone. And If I, who is comfortable with a lot of OS designs, look at it and my first thought is “confusing”, what are regular consumers going to think.

So why isnt this interface design more of the top level, with ways to make an application use them without forcing them too. If I want to build a Zune interfaced app or a box interfaced app give me tools to do so and maybe even encourage me to do so. But guess what, this style will grow tired(which I think is a big problem, which iPhones interface elements don’t suffer nearly as bad from), so let me as the developer not do it if I don’t want too…

Yes, it will be snazzier with Transitions and more ‘smooth’, but that all could have come without re-inventing everything. How cool would it have been if you could turn off ‘Zune Craziness’ and go to Mobile Shell or Sense or even “gasp” the very handy today screen and plugins.

They could have (and started too) create new controls that were more touch friendly and attractive. Finish them off, make them work right, incorporate them everywhere in the main OS’s UI, and give them to developer’s to use…

The OS should simply have been based on the same direction it has always been but completely overhauled. It should have been dropped on a new kernel and taken the time to optimize it and dump some of the legacy support and re-write major communication and other pieces that needed help. It should have been cleaned up and compartmentalized so that OTA updates are possible and easy. Hardware requirements should have been raised and simplified to a more appropriate level and not catered to whoever was offering to buid a device if ‘x and y’ were done. Settings screens should have been simplified and cleaned up, and moved to a better interface. And then if you want to offer new ways for apps to look that don’t follow your long existing standards, well offer those paradigms but don’t strip out the usability of the old ones. And then offer new development tools to compliment the device but allow current development to be re-compiled using the same or similar source code that was the standard before, and not force everything to be re-written from scratch.

They didnt need to take Apple’s closed position that developers need to be babysat on everything for speed and stability wise. Its just not true. The raising of hardware requirements and possibly making the OS actually do what you claimed it always did memory management wise would have been a significant improvement. Or even make up a couple new pieces that most applications should have code wise that do some of the simple things like persisting when application goes to the background, and clearly document it and make it the default so most apps use it… Sadly they even took it a step further than Apple and took away native code development which will actually make some applications slower and defeat the purpose.

Now think of all the Enterprise level solutions and Business oriented users of the old OS that are now out of luck once they slowly phase out the original WM OS… I think they really could have done it so that there was one solution for both sets of users….

They simply went too far. Which is maybe the way they felt they needed to approach it, but then they’ve segmented and lost what they did have on a gamble that consumers will like the trendy interface and snatch this up and the hope that they can then attract new developers away from the other new OSes.

Good Luck.

Razz Poker Basics for iPhone

We would like to introduce the first of several titles teaching you how to play poker. Razz Poker Basics is a new iPhone application that teaches you how to play the popular game of poker known as Razz. It uses an innovative new tutorial system to walk you through the rules, strategy and some example hands of poker. It then also allows you to practice as much as you want in an actual Razz tournament against computer players before hitting the real felt.

We plan on innovating the tutorial system and concept even more so watch for this to evolve into something very neat, and let us know if there is a game you want us to cover in an upcoming title.

Version 3.5 of Extreme Agenda.

I finally got an update to Extreme Agenda out there. Version 3.5 is a really cool release that enhances the XA experience on VGA Windows Mobile devices greatly. I went through and completly cleaned it up to work better on smaller VGA screens including bigger list items and controls for easier more finger friendly use, and put in a whole slew of new and bigger icons mostly from Professional Icon sets, so everything just looks and works great on your VGA device. And to top it off, we’ve dropped the price down to just $9.95!!! That is a crazy low price for what you get, so try it out, tell your friends and enjoy Extreme Agenda even more on your awesome VGA WM devices…

Here come’s OpenFeint…

Ok, so Ive wanted to try OpenFeint for a while now and finally out of the blue really researched it. And to my surprise it was WAY easier than I had imagined. And the newest interface in it is something I really really like.

So I took a couple days and some late nights and did a little project that I had wanted to do in order to make my first OF game something I’d really push. I took the TriPeaks engine (already ported to iPhone in Metal TriPeaks), a game that I am truly addicted too, and re-used a lot of the Jezster Assets and some new All-In cards and created a more “Happy World” version of TriPeaks. I then revamped the engine so that I could make any board layout I want that fit the rules and then did a few boards. Then just a little ‘achievement check’ coding and I added in the OpenFeint API…

…………And WOW!!

I have a TriPeaks game that is in my opinion way more fun (and cute) than any of the other Solitaire games out there. TriPeaks just ends up feeling so much more like a a puzzle/action game than a solitaire game, and this is no exception. Initial Beta testing is over, and yet I still find myself playing this game… And I can’t wait until I can be competing against all of you on the OF global leaderboards.

Thank you OpenFeint for making a product that has helped take this game to the next level.

The process was so easy, that Im happy to say Ive also already added it into Jezster. With the existing goals and high score system already in there, it was less than a couple hour project. And Ive spent a bunch more time optimizing the application to get rid of the slowdown issues on 3.x devices. So It now works on 3.1 like it originally worked on the 2.x devices…. Why oh why did the performance get hit that hard while they “improved” the OS…. So, JEZSTER is in the Approval process and is coming back swinging with OpenFeint too… Lets have some online Domination.

See you on the leaderboards…

Get TriPeaks Explosion now

XA iPhone call to Arms

Ok, just looking for a few brave souls that would like to help steer the development of Extreme Agenda for iPhone in a fun way.

I had a really great group of Beta Testers in private forums on this site that helped steer the initial XA for WM to make it such a great product. (and if any of you have since picked up an iPod Touch or iPhone and want to participate just let me know, that goes for all XA for WM converts to iPhone).

Well I want to take that to the next level. So I have created a Facebook Group that will allow complete interaction along with Sneak Peaks, design input(and more), and eventually will be Ad Hoc Beta Testers if they want to be. All I ask is for feedback on what you are thinking on what we are doing or should do, and how you would use it…

Just drop an email and if Im still wanting more and I can find you on FB Ill throw you an invite….

Thanks

A little iPhone Submission Process Rant.

Ok, so obviously everyone under the sun that develops for iPhone has pointed out why the submission process stinks for the iPhone AppStore. Yes it takes too long. Yes it is hit or miss with no set guidelines. Yes, they will let utter GARBAGE through, and lots of it, but will reject good applications for the stupidest things….

My recent example. I have a nice little PokerTimer program that I wanted to upload for FREE on the AppStore. Thing is it got rejected not once, but Twice. Why? Well the first time is because they have changed their policy and are now rejecting for a ‘private API’ that really isnt dangerous and in fact should be public. Original iPhone 2.0 OS builds actually EVEN needed it to work correctly. And Ive used it in at least 5 applications!! It basically tells the device, ‘hey you are in Landscape.’ But now using it got my App rejected. Ok. So I take it out and re-submit.

After another week and a half, rejection #2. Why, because I used a Standard “compose” icon (still visible in the screenshot of PokerTimer) as a button to enter when you EDIT the blinds. Yes, it seems that it might confuse some users because its for EDITING MESSAGES not EDITING BLINDS. You’ll see the trivial change to the icon that I did in order to fix this. C’mon APPLE, this icon has been used for EDITING of all types for YEARS!!!

AND Apple, how about if its going to take 1-2 weeks to even complete the Approval Process, that you actually complete the first review and tell me on the first rejection that there is more than one infraction. How hard would it have been for the reviewer to do a complete review and say, “Hey, change this icon and remove this API call”, both of which are ridiculious to be rejected for in the first place, but at least it would have knocked the approval of a nice little application down to a couple weeks from a month.

[End Rant]

December 2009 – Wha?

Well, Birdsoft has been extremely busy. We have just released a huge release to our biggest product of all time. We are finishing up some really cool consulting projects. And Im excited for a couple of FREE projects that are in the submission process with Apple.

All-In 3.0 has been doing very well, and I encourage Windows Mobile users to check it out. Of course Microsoft is going the way of Apple with their submission process and has rejected it once due to some weird “hopper” test that they use to try and crash your application over 2 hours of random input. The thousands of people that have played the game dont run in to too many real world crashes or I would have heard about them. But I will be attempting to get that resolved and re-submit soon…

PokerTimer iPhone has not yet ‘cleared customs’ as now Apple do to their ridiculious submission testing has rejected it twice. The first time was from a private API that doesnt even make sense to be private and I have used in at least 4 other applications. The 2nd time I used a ‘compose’ icon (they maybe could have mentioned it the first time) that is a piece of paper and pencil to access where you ‘Edit’ the Levels. Well its not for composing or editing Levels but rather messages and may confuse the users to use that icon, so I have since re-submitted again for the 3rd time with a slightly altered icon.

All-In Poker Lite is also in the submission pipeline, which will offer a FREE and rather unobtrusive game of All-In with only Limit Hold Em and Omaha included.

We have some other projects in early stages for the iPhone including Poker Timer Pro, The update to All-In, another poker related title, and initial work has been started on another possibly recognizable title….

Extreme Agenda iPhone

Extreme Agenda iPhone

Yes, plans are in the works to bring Extreme Agenda over to the iPhone in stages. The plan is to first bring a lot of the calendar functionality over as the iPhone calendar is rather weak. Then Task/Todo’s and Sync/Contacts/Projects and as much feature parity as we can possibly hit while creating this new interface. We’d LOVE to hear feeback on what you really want to see.

So Yes, we are rather busy…. Hope you are having a great Holiday Season.

All-In Poker 3.0 for Windows Phones

All-In 3.0

We are pleased to announce that we have finally released Version 3.0 of All-In Poker. It has a bunch of great new features including the game of Omaha, Multiple Careers, and a slick new interface. We have also put a lot of effort into making it better on the new classes of devices with VGA and WVGA screens and even 320×320 screens for the Treo users out there. Bigger Fonts and making it more finger friendly are just some of the things we tried to do for you. We hope to agree that we have taken the best Poker game for Windows Phones and made it even better.

And we hope that our current users will be willing to pay the small upgrade fee to start enjoying the game with the great new features. We know our competitor’s charge that same price for just a limit version of their game or just an Omaha Version. Why not continue to have it all in one place. Previous users can install the trial version, and if they want to revert back to a 2.x version they can download that off our product page to re-install right over the new trial.

Thanks and we hope you enjoy All-In 3.0 for Windows Mobile.

PokerTimer

We have completed and submitted our next very quick project and we really like how it has turned out. An absolutely FREE PokerTimer for iPhone. We went for beauty and function on this one. We created it to have all the functionality that we use in our monthly poker league, so it should be a great choice if you don’t want all that other “tournament” stuff getting in the way. Its just a nice clean easy to use Poker Clock.

We do plan to possibly advance it to add a ton of extra features in a PRO version that might cost a buck or two. We obviously have a big list of what we can add to make it worth while, but we would love to hear feedback on this as well, so if you are interested please drop us an email….

Sorry Folks, it will not have any compatibility with the Desktop or Windows Mobile Version at this time. It does have some of the same neat time saving features though… 🙂