Skype for Windows Phone 7 Isn't Coming

[Darius Wey]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://smarthouse.com.au/Phones/Industry/A7D8T4T8' target='_blank'>http://smarthouse.com.au/Phones/Industry/A7D8T4T8</a><br /><br /></div><p><em>"Speaking an event in Sydney Dan Neary Asia Pacific Vice President for Skype was hesitant to explain why no development was taking place for the new Windows Mobile offering, however he did say that the VOIP communication Company was developing new offerings for the iPhone, iPad and Android based phones."</em></p><p><img src="http://images.thoughtsmedia.com//wpt/auto/1273744342.usr2.png" /></p><p>Back in March, we <a href="http://www.windowsphonethoughts.com/news/show/97149/skype-for-windows-mobile-dead-and-buried.html" target="_blank">reported</a> that Skype had killed the availability of Skype for Windows Mobile as a result of what the company perceived to be fragmentation across the Windows Mobile platform. Considering Microsoft is focused on reducing fragmentation in Windows Phone 7, we were hopeful that Skype would consider bringing its popular VoIP product back to the platform, but that idea now appears dead in the water. What's interesting is that the company is now <a href="http://smarthouse.com.au/Phones/Industry/A7D8T4T8" target="_blank">reluctant</a> to provide a reason. In the meantime, it's planning to roll out new versions of Skype for iPhone, iPad, and Android, and as you know, these are all platforms that consumers are currently going gaga for. With that in mind, we're guessing the real reason why Skype has abandoned Windows Phone 7 development is that it simply doesn't see much potential in it. And only time will tell whether it's spot on about that.</p>

[Ed Hansberry]

This will be the case with all major software apps, and minor apps for that matter. It will be the chicken and the egg. With offerings like Android and iPhone and their massive third party app library, will someone buy a device with effectively zero apps? Will developers put time and resources into building apps for a device with 0% marketshare?

The iPhone was a game changer. Android got some serious open source love that helped kick-start it. WebOS got hammered, partly due to the stupid decision to partner with a 2nd tier carrier and partly due to the app story, or lack of one.

WP7 has a VERY tough road ahead. It has to get out of the driveway first of course.

[j2inet]

Will developers put time and resources into building apps for a device with 0% marketshare?


We most certainly will. However, regardless of available time and resources there is a technical obstacle that prevents any one from being able to make a VoIP application on Windows Phone 7. The only type of communication the device can establish with the outside world is through web service calls. For a VoIP application one needs to be able to open network sockets and stream the audio data over it. Third party applications will not be able to do this at the initial release of Windows Phone 7.

VoIP applications are not the only type of applications that cannot yet be developed. However, unlike Windows Mobile when Windows Phone 7 is released the devices won't be feature locked. Microsoft will be releasing updates with additional functionality over time and all users will be able to get them. So we may see third party socket support in a future release.

[Fritzly]

Microsoft will be releasing updates with additional functionality over time and all users will be able to get them. So we may see third party socket support in a future release.

Thanks for confirming my impression: when WP 7.XXX or WP 8 will become available I will consider coming back to Windows platform; for the time being: HD2 is working fine and down the road there is Android or, depending what will come out of the Steve Jobs hat, iPhone.

[efjay]

Joel, MS needs to hire you to counter all the anti-WM FUD that has been and will be spread in the future, MS themselves, as usual seem to be doing a pretty piss-poor job of it themselves. Thanks for the clarification, now if only this piece of info would be carried along with the headline-grabbing "skype drops wp7, its DOA!!" stories perhaps we would see some balanced stories.

Alas, as will all things these days, its wishful thinking.....

[Ed Hansberry]

The only type of communication the device can establish with the outside world is through web service calls. For a VoIP application one needs to be able to open network sockets and stream the audio data over it. Third party applications will not be able to do this at the initial release of Windows Phone 7.
Thanks for the info. Seems WP7 will be missing more than just copy/paste on initial release.

[Gerard]

No Fennec. No Skype. But hey, at least it'll have Facebook, so it's still 'hip' right? Or maybe the Bing button will be the big selling point...

[Oleander]

Alienating its entire developer base (WM 6 developers) is also always a good starting point....

[Craig Horlacher]

I found this on the WebIS blog when looking into future possible releases of Pocket Informant:

"So I'd like to make it official. Based on the current beta Windows Phone 7 SDK, we will not be making a Pocket Informant for Windows Phone 7. This is a huge disappointment to us but comes about because while the OS itself is capable, the APIs available to us developers I believe to not give us what we need to make a Pocket Informant for Windows Phone 7."
from here:
http://www.pocketinformant.com/Forums/index.php?app=blog&module=display&section=blog&blogid=1&tag=windows%20phone&

So now we've got...
- no copy and paste
- no card slots
- no multitasking
- no truly native apps
- no apps that need direct socket access
- no api's to even make a good PIM!!!
- no apps right now and I've heard of more developers dropping WinPhone support (2) than being excited about it (is there 1 out there somewhere?!?!?).
I'm really trying to figure out how Microsoft is going to sell these or get developers to make anything for them. Most people who could be interested already bought an iPhone over the last 3 years. For anyone else, a dumbphone cost less and Android sure seems like a good options for power users.

I don't like to be so negative but I'm hoping someone at Microsoft is reading these posts. Like many others I've spent thousands of dollars over the last 11+ years on WinMo hardware and software starting with a Philips Nino. If I would have wanted the limited and locked down functionality of Windows Phone 7 11+ years ago I would have bought a palm pilot. Microsoft really doesn't seem to care.

It would at least be nice if Microsoft would thank the WinMo community for their support over the years, apologize for WinPhone 7, and just tell us all to go buy Android based devices. Maybe they could give us $100 Amazon gift cards or something to help ease the pain.

[epdm2be]

I found this on the WebIS blog when looking into future possible releases of Pocket Informant:

"So I'd like to make it official. Based on the current beta Windows Phone 7 SDK, we will not be making a Pocket Informant for Windows Phone 7. This is a huge disappointment to us but comes about because while the OS itself is capable, the APIs available to us developers I believe to not give us what we need to make a Pocket Informant for Windows Phone 7."
from here:
http://www.pocketinformant.com/Forums/index.php?app=blog&module=display&section=blog&blogid=1&tag=windows%20phone&

So now we've got...
- no copy and paste
- no card slots
- no multitasking
- no truly native apps
- no apps that need direct socket access
- no api's to even make a good PIM!!!
- no apps right now and I've heard of more developers dropping WinPhone support (2) than being excited about it (is there 1 out there somewhere?!?!?).
I'm really trying to figure out how Microsoft is going to sell these or get developers to make anything for them. Most people who could be interested already bought an iPhone over the last 3 years. For anyone else, a dumbphone cost less and Android sure seems like a good options for power users.

I don't like to be so negative but I'm hoping someone at Microsoft is reading these posts. Like many others I've spent thousands of dollars over the last 11+ years on WinMo hardware and software starting with a Philips Nino. If I would have wanted the limited and locked down functionality of Windows Phone 7 11+ years ago I would have bought a palm pilot. Microsoft really doesn't seem to care.

It would at least be nice if Microsoft would thank the WinMo community for their support over the years, apologize for WinPhone 7, and just tell us all to go buy Android based devices. Maybe they could give us $100 Amazon gift cards or something to help ease the pain.

No. Current developpers unhappy with the WP7 situation should keep continuing develop for WM6.5. There's still plenty of technically great WM6.x machines. The HTC HD2 is STILL the biggest and fastest WM-machine. It has a the same fast Snapdragon that all many new suposedly great Android phones has. So what's stopping them?

The biggest problem is that hardcore users like me, won't go for Android or iPhone. Those devices and OS's are much to restrictive. You can't even store your applications on SD-card while WM6.x nicely asks where you want it. Not to mention that lots of functionality is simply not in there. Although the technical capabilities are more or less equal, it seems the OS's of these new devices severly lack in functionality. Granted, this partly due to manufacturors ****ing up hardware from previous models but some is due to bad OS functionality or lack of proper SDK/functional information.

Anyway. If the new OS sucks then just keep developing for the old one. Sure you'l miss the airplay that the new models have but who cares?

[doogald]

The biggest problem is that hardcore users like me, won't go for Android or iPhone. Those devices and OS's are much to restrictive. You can't even store your applications on SD-card while WM6.x nicely asks where you want it.

As far as Android is concerned, that is coming. As I understand it (and I may be understanding it incorrectly, but here goes), the issue is that SD Cards are formatted with FAT, which does not support Unix style permissions for items that are stored on the card. Android relies on these permissions to protect signed apps. I believe that the fix for this is creating an encrypted file that will open as a virtual partition from the SD Card, which would allow these permissions, but the other issue is that there must be a way to prevent an SD Card removed from one phone to allow the apps to run from another that is signed in with a different market account. (Again, I think an answer would be to encrypt that container with a key derived from a hash of the market account email address, but that's just me guessing.)

Of course, the HTC Incredible shipping with about 8 GB of storage space for apps may make this point unnecessary.

However, it is something that I believe Google is working on for a future update of the OS.