windows marketplace Fix

Chief among them is the new ability to install programs to storage cards, and the ability for the user to switch regions. Also quite significant is those willing to submit free apps will no longer have to pay $10 to submit to additional markets.

World View: previously known as “geo selector”, the World View feature will allow Marketplace users to browse and purchase applications from different geographic catalogs. For example, a user in France could choose to browse the English US catalog, or a user in Canada could browse the catalog from Japan. All application prices will show up in the user’s local currency and Microsoft will be in touch with registered independent software vendors (ISVs) in the weeks ahead to provide step-by-step instructions on how to re-price their apps for all markets.

Installation onto storage cards: a highly requested feature by end users, it will allow users to install applications downloaded from Marketplace onto storage card memory. This will solve a common pain point today where the main memory of the phone runs out after installing a few apps from Marketplace.

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Screenshot

The initial report is here : http://www.1800pocketpc.com/2010/01/22/unacceptable-behaviour-by-developer-in-windows-mobile-marketplace.html

We covered the story with screenshots from Snow Rally City Stage and Speed City 3D which looks quite nice on the marketplace while the ingame screenshots were not that appealing. The developers have got back to us with this statement

The screenshots we submitted are rendered by OpenGL ® or OpenGL ES ®. The screenshots are shared for all platforms including devices powered by Open GL ES. We have added a note for the screenshots at our website: “Screenshots and movie on this page are rendered by OpenGL ® or OpenGL ES ®.” Since most Windows Mobile devices do not provide Open GL ES support, we decided to submit new screenshots.

The email was caught up in the SPAM folder which is the reason when the devs could not reply sooner. We would like to thanks them for taking the time to get back to us and for replacing the screenshots. ( i am guessing it will go online once marketplace approves the submission ). Special thanks goes to Frank Prengel and the guys from the Marketplace Team who looked in to the issue. I am sure all marketplace users will be happy to learn about this.

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Marketplace Price

via venturebeat.com

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windows marketplace Broken

The previous Copy Protection was cracked in less than 2 hrs. Lets hope this one lasts longer. We are not sure how the developers feel about the new Advanced Anti-Piracy Protection. We would love to hear your thoughts on the same.

Full Story : Windowsteamblog.com

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Marketplace

Predrag Tomasevic from codeproject.com takes us through the software store on the 3 major smartphone WM, iPhone and Android. He goes through some of the experience had had to face while developing for each platform and runs through the submission process on each of them ( with sales data and time taken for approval, etc ).

Conclusion :

Windows Mobile Marketplace is just horrible. The only positive thing I can think of is that it’s not crowded and that really nice applications which are up there now will have better chance to eventually earn good profit when (and if) Marketplace lives up to the expectations. Everything else, from support to infrastructure and exposure is, as I said, just horrible (really felt need to repeat that). At this point of time you are currently better off trying to make money out of your WM app over at Samsung Apps or similar stores that are opened for number of years. Which is really a shame, because I expect Microsoft will eventually get it right.

iPhone AppStore : if you never developed using C/Objective-C – don’t bother to follow the buzz, there is almost no real chance that you’ll be able to repeat existing rags-to-riches story (which are undeniably true). It is way too much crowd, you’ll need way too much time to get your skill to certain level and most good ideas are already tried out – including “pretend-you-are-cute-looking-chick-developer-who-likes-balls”. If you are really good in C/Objective-C and haven’t already followed Steve’s call to arms – you’ll need knack for design, awesome idea and sleek implementation to develop something worthy of pushing and making it stand out, especially now that the big guys are bracing themselves to overtake whole market.

Android Market : You can’t imagine my surprise when after Windows Marketplace and Apple AppStore experience I clicked on Submit button and saw “Published” next to my application. For 10 minutes I couldn’t believe that application was available so I checked from two different phones to be sure. Simply because of that Android Market has my sympathy and I believe that the move they made will hugely influence battle of markets we are currently witnessing.

Our Take : Predrag seems to be impressed with Android Market , it seems that he was quite happy to see his app approved and available quite quickly ( and with much less effort ) . From a developers point of view that is certainly very good. But with the news of a phishing App that was approved and available via the Android Market, as a user I would be concerned.

We have been rambling about the issues with WM Marketplace for a while now and some of the developers we have interviewed have raised concerns of their own [ Ageye, slimCODE, Manbolo ] and iPhone developers have their share of issues and problems with the AppStore ( policy concerning rejection criteria ) .

head over to codeproject.com for the full story ( its quite an interesting read )

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manbolo

Meon is one of the most successful game from any indie developers in the Marketplace. We recently reviewed this windows mobile game. Today we chat to the guys behind this amazing game and find out their thoughts about marketplace and learn what is in store for us in the future from Manbolo.

We’re three friends living in France (that explain our poor English…), we’re developing and making games since we’re 14 years old! Three years ago, we started Manbolo to develop some games for us just for fun, on Windows Mobile. We would like to make casual games, cheap but which were well programmed (small size, work on every device), kind of game that you like to play when you’re on the way to work (or during some meetings…) and not reserved to hard-core gamers. We’ve chosen Windows Mobile (sorry Windows Phone) because three years ago, it was easy to develop and sell your product on your own website or on web-vendors website, and also because Windows Mobile was among the most innovative smartphone platform. Today, a lot of things have changed, but we keep confident in the platform. We’re currently developing games under our brand Manbolo and also developing more ‘serious’ app as contractors for thirds parties.

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I am not the biggest fan of Marketplace but I still have hope for it and expects Microsoft will fix the issues plaguing the app store. With more and more apps being featured on the Marketplace we often find that we are linking to apps on the Marketplace. We got bored of the text link linking to Marketplace so I sought out the help of some designers from xda-developers and with their help got a banner made ala the iPhone App store Banner.

Special Thanks goes to [ElCondor] and Emrulez for participating.

Banner by Livven

Marketplace Banner

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Today we chat to Martin from slimCODE, with some great apps in the Marketplace under his belt. We look at his apps and how he got motivated to develop for Windows Mobile. His thoughts about Marketplace and what slimCODE has in store for us in the near future. :)

SlimCode

Tell us a bit about yourself and slimCODE.

It all started on a Vic-20, when I was 14. A few months later, I was already making programs too large for the wobbling 3.8 kb of RAM available for programs. After a brief Apple II+ era, I moved to a PC running MSDOS. It’s all been Microsoft since then, an attachment strongly linked with the quality of development environments available for their platforms.

After graduating in Computer Science at university, not before some wandering in Chemistry, I became a software consultant for Hydro-Quebec, then moved to work with friends who had started their own company three years before: Xceed Software. They were making a Zip compression library, selling to other developers. I worked there for 9 years, having the chance to learn and work with many development languages. Xceed was part of the .NET early adopters, so I had the chance to visit Redmond regularly to participate in the beta programs and ask questions to the same people who conceived the .NET Framework. Clearly, my years of C++ and COM programming were getting to an end. I’d become mostly a C# and .NET developer from now on.

Three years ago, I left Xceed and founded slimCODE. My goal was to develop Windows applications for the general market, and complete my revenues with consultancy projects here and there. But the reality struck me hard. My main software, slimKEYS, wasn’t popular enough to pay for the hosting alone. Web development for customers kept me alive, but that’s not what I wanted to do for a living. Then, my presence became more and more required at home (personal reasons) so you could say I’m now a part-time software developer and full-time dad/husband at home.

I was developing some hobby software for an old HP Jornada for some time now, but the purchase of a new Windows Mobile cell phone (an HTC P4000, or “Mogul”) convinced me there could be some potential on that platform. That, and the crazy idea the popularity that some iPhone apps had on the AppStore could be translated to the Windows Mobile platform. That’s why I moved almost all my development time to the Windows Mobile platform.

Read The Full Interview

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windows marketplace Broken

Here are a few of the issues expressed there

• I don’t agree. , Boycotting Marketplace or MS is not extreme, but just a normal reaction. This MarketPlace is a real mess, and apparently MS staff refuses to listen to its customers and adapt itself. So we turn our back to MS. I am fed up too.
• Dear Microsoft – What are you thinking? With out he ability to install to SD card the Marketplace is completely unusable. It is mind boggling that a 3rd party hack was required to make this work in the first place. It just plain asinine that your new update disables the hack. The biggest reason I don’t have an iPhone is their stupid app store policies. Congratulations on proving to be even worse. This is unacceptable.
• If XDA can come up with a hack in a matter of days then their is no excuse for a company with an army of programmers. The amount of code to write in this feature is minimal. Get with it!!!!!
• Maybe for you it’s easy, but not for the majority. Why should I install a program on the main memory and then copy it to the sd-card?? We have a Marketplace to install programs “easily” and “central”….
• My concern is that the marketplace is going to fail. People aren’t purchasing apps because they’re waiting for a fix or are concerned about storage space. If people aren’t buying apps, then companies are not going to be encouraged to develop new apps. If windows can’t stay competitive with apps like the iPhone, then people are going to start to consider switching. That is a big deal.
• The absolute worst thing a business can do is ignore the legitimate complaints of its customers. Does anyone there really think we’re going to forget about this issue and it will just go away?

Read the Full Story

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BiJ

A few weeks back we did an interview with Jörg ( from Ageye Apps ). He explained the frustrations he faced as a developer in getting his apps in to the marketplace. We were contacted by another developer who has released some great apps through xda-developers and some great commercial apps who found that the security offered in place to safeguard apps in the marketplace was a joke. ( a few changes were made to fix this after that )

ShopSavvy is one a much loved app on the Android platform and as per the developer they had to ” put EVERYTHING on hold ” to get the WM 6.5 app rolled out for a Windows Marketplace launch as a featured app. And when the app was almost ready to be released , Microsoft pressed the need for SQL Server CE to be included in ShopSavvy ( which according to the developer was a requirement that was never documented or explained to them )

Read the rest

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