Mobile phones & tablets thread

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Originally Posted by Mark

So they are just big icons which can update themselves?

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Well yes, but icons updating themselves isn't simply the work of 5 minutes.

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Originally Posted by Mark

Now if I could have an iPad, that is the same weight and thickness etc but have a full (not mobile) version of Windows on it, that would be fantastic!

From what I've seen iPad is excellent but there are still a few issues with it which mean it can't yet replace a proper PC.

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I don't get why you'd want to replace a PC though? Phones are excellent portable computing devices which in terms of brute force aren't that far behind tablets in terms of performance. A tablet has all the disadvantages of a phone with the advantage of a larger display and the disadvantage of having to find somewhere to put it when you want to take it somewhere.

I really think this is almost an electric car type device. Fantastic for its purpose, BUT due to limitations it can't really replace the device it's meant to replace, so you end up with 3 devices (a phone, tablet and computer) rather than just 2.

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Originally Posted by henners88

I hope not. Its the most least appealing characteristic of WP7 for me and I hope others don't go that way. A screen full of tiles that update is just a different way of doing what the other interfaces already do and its purely an aesthetical difference IMO. I don't see it as massively innovative and something that will be copied as the others are already ahead in the market at this stage.

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I personally think you're wrong and whilst you're right that it's purely aesthetical, isn't that the whole reason Apple have succeeded with the iPhone? The whole point of live tiles is that you can get certain information without having to actually open an application. If I just want a temperature why should I have to launch the bloody app? If you're wanting to see if there are any new tweets waiting for you, the live tile can tell you.

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Originally Posted by Daniel

If I just want a temperature why should I have to launch the bloody app? If you're wanting to see if there are any new tweets waiting for you, the live tile can tell you.

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You've just described widgets which Android already has - and which are far more customisable than Mango / Metro - and which iOS5 looks like it's going to copy.

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Originally Posted by Dave B

You've just described widgets which Android already has - and which are far more customizable than Mango - and which iOS5 looks like it's going to copy.

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Fair enough. I have seen other people using widgets like that. I think it's a 6 of one half a dozen of the other type thing.

From what I remember the WP7 implementation is a little bit more minimalistic. For me at least, I'd rather just have a notification of something new if all of the data can't fit into the field. Swings and roundabouts though I suppose.

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Originally Posted by Daniel

Fair enough. I have seen other people using widgets like that. I think it's a 6 of one half a dozen of the other type thing.

From what I remember the WP7 implementation is a little bit more minimalistic. For me at least, I'd rather just have a notification of something new if all of the data can't fit into the field. Swings and roundabouts though I suppose.

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I don't know if you've played much with Android handsets, but one of the things I like about it is the way I can have widgets mixed in with shortcuts, in various sizes.

For example I use Plume as my Twitter client and I can have any or all of a simple icon which takes me to the full app, a 2x1 tile with basic notifications, a 4x1 tile which displays the latest tweet... right up to a 4x4 tile which is pretty much fullscreen. I can drag this to wherever I like (so long as there's space), duplicate it, mix it with icons and shortcuts, use 2 or 3 different widgets from the same app, whatever.

Windows' tiles are a similar concept but I'd only be interested if I could customise them in a similar way. I don't want Microsoft or a developer telling me that my Facebook tile must be blue and a certain size, for example.

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Originally Posted by Dave B

I don't know if you've played much with Android handsets, but one of the things I like about it is the way I can have widgets mixed in with shortcuts, in various sizes.

For example I use Plume as my Twitter client and I can have any or all of a simple icon which takes me to the full app, a 2x1 tile with basic notifications, a 4x1 tile which displays the latest tweet... right up to a 4x4 tile which is pretty much fullscreen. I can drag this to wherever I like (so long as there's space), duplicate it, mix it with icons and shortcuts, use 2 or 3 different widgets from the same app, whatever.

Windows' tiles are a similar concept but I'd only be interested if I could customise them in a similar way. I don't want Microsoft or a developer telling me that my Facebook tile must be blue and a certain size, for example.

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I think I'd have to see what you're talking about to really understand it tbh. Maybe I'll have a play on the Android tablet that's staring at me.

I wouldn't imagine MIcrosoft would be too silly with restrictions.

In terms of playing with android handsets. It's always been someone elses phone and of course you don't go moving other people's stuff around so my experience of moving stuff around and configuring Android is virtually nil :)

m.guardian.co.uk

Some interesting but nerdy details for developers.

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Originally Posted by Dave B

m.guardian.co.uk

Some interesting but nerdy details for developers.

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Good piece. If as they say, the Metro UI is a success in the desktop field then it'll give a massive boost for Windows Phone and if people are buying windows phones then why are they going to go for Mac's and so on and so forth. As some sites are saying, it's an attempt at "One OS to rule them all"

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Originally Posted by henners88

In the link I posted earlier on the Windows 8 tablet, am I right in thinking 'Socialite' and 'Tweeter' are microsofts apps for running Facebook and Twitter? Or are these applications microsoft has developed to rival the two?

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I would imagine they're the apps Microsoft has Twitter and Facebook. I would imagine Socialite works with myspace, bebo and facebook etc etc whereas tweeter is probably just solely for twitter.