New Windows Phone features – IE9, Twitter, Multi-tasking, Kinect integration. Demo video #MWC11
By Staska on 14 Feb 11When Nokia Microsoft deal was first announced, one of the biggest die hard Nokia Symbian and Meego fan complaints was the incompleteness of Windows Phone OS.
“WP7 does not even have multi-tasking, they can’t do copy/paste, the browser is so bad, it is so immature… And Nokia killed off Symbian for this?!“ An indignant cries flooded the net over the weekend.
And it’s all I could do to not shout back at the top of my lungs “C’mon, guys, get a clue! It’s been less then 4 months since the first phones with WP7 shipped. Microsoft made the current version of WP7 from scratch in less then 2 years. They already been working on upgrades the last 4 months, and they’ve got at least another 7-9 before the first Nokia Windows Phone ships. Don’t you think that Microsoft developers will be able to add multi-tasking, copy&paste, new browser and a bunch of other cool features before that?”
If you think about it, an answer is a no brainer. And today Microsoft showed a pretty nice demo of some of the new features coming in a major Windows Phone update sometime later this year.
The new update includes:
- New Internet Explorer 9 browser with hardware acceleration support. It’ll have the same browser engine the desktop version of IE9 has.
- Full multi-tasking for third party apps
- Twitter hub/native integration similar to current Facebook/WP7 integration
- X-Box Live enhancements with WP7/Kinect integration
- Copy&Paste support
- Enhanced Office Hub/Skydrive integration
And, probably, a whole lot more things, that weren’t demoed today. Here’s a video of the new Windows Phone features presented by Microsoft’s Joe Belfiore:
Overall, when Nokia Microsoft deal was first announced on Friday I was shocked and dismayed. And couldn’t see anything positive at all in it. But after yesterday’s Nokia press briefing and today’s Microsoft presentation, the more I hear about this partnership, the more I start to like it.
Yes, it’s a huge risk for Nokia. Of all the possible paths Nokia could have chosen for it’s renewed strategy, this total bet on Microsoft is the riskiest by far. With huge amount of things that can go wrong completely out of Nokia’s control. But if both Nokia and Microsoft will deliver on what they are promising today, late this or early next year year things may look very different for both of them.
If you liked the post, you might find these interesting too:
- Windows Phone 7 may get IE9 earlier than expected
- Windows Phone 7: copy and paste will come early next year
- Here’s What Copy and Paste Will Be Like on Windows Phone 7
- Windows Phone 7 Series to lack copy and paste functionality at launch
- Leaked Nokia document shows the differences between Windows Phone 8 and WP 7.8
« HTC Desire 2 Gets Press Shot Prior to MWC Announcement#MWC11: LG Optimus Chat and Optimus Me P350 hands-on »
