Microsoft announces Lumia Denim, the next version of Windows Phone OS and firmware updates to go along with the OS update.

Lumia Denim: Windows Phone 8.1.1 + Firmware Updates

The official roll out of Windows Phone 8.1 begins, coupled with Nokia’s firmware update named Cyan.

Official Rollout of Windows Phone 8.1 Begins. Lumia Cyan Also Released

T-Mobile (and MetroPCS, which it acquired) announce the availability of the powerful and inexpensive Lumia 635 for the US market.

Powerful and Inexpensive Lumia 635 Available on T-Mobile and MetroPCS in July

I have been wanting to test drive Android for some time now. I had briefly thought of buying a Nexus 7 to experience Android as an OS and the Android as an ecosystem in general. For whatever reason, the actual purchase did not happen. Earlier this week, an opportunity presented itself, where a friend was able to loan me his brand new Samsung Galaxy S4 Active device on Thursday and I could put the device through its paces over the weekend.

And I did. The experience wasn’t exactly smooth and the “getting acquainted” period ended up being longer than I expected. After much frustration, I realized Android as I experienced (via the Galaxy device and Samsung’s flavor of Android) is most definitely not for me. Some things that I liked and would love to see implemented in iOS and Windows Phone, but many things that are baffling and plain annoying in Android for me to seriously consider it as a daily driver.

What is there to like

Actionable notifications

Widgets

Screen size

Choice

So much not to like

OOBE

Crapware

User experience

• You can create shortcuts to apps on home screens. That makes sense, but you can create multiple shortcuts of the same app on the same home screen, and even in the same folder on that home screen. There is no difference between an app icon and a shortcut, which means when there are multiple shortcuts to the same app on the same screen, you have no idea why.
• For the longest time I had no idea how to disable icons that show up in the system bar at the top of the device. I did not want my email notification in the system bar but despite going into the email app (GMail app, in this case), I wasn't able to find the setting to turn that off, nor was there anything under the main settings. Later, by accident, I realized that the first physical button triggers a menu and when I went into GMail app and triggered the menu, I was able to get to settings and uncheck the notification setting.
• Why the heck do apps have a settings screen in-app and also trigger another set of settings via the button? The afore-mentioned GMail app is one big example of this nonsensical user experience, so we can't even blame "Android developers" as a collective. This is Google's own developers creating confusion within their prime app by having some settings exposed via app and some via the button.
• I noticed that the lock screen showed a few app icons on the bottom that I could launch directly from the lock screen, but I simply couldn't find where to change that list. Help from the web seemed to suggest it was under Lock Screen settings but I just couldn't find it. Later, I realized I had to change the first setting (lock screen swipe) before I could edit that setting. If I had a PIN to unlock, I couldn't even see how to edit it but it was there by default. This one took a long time to figure out and involved removing my work Exchange account because that mandated a PIN to unlock. This item really frustrated me, more because it was so hard to figure out rather than the actual utility of being able to edit the list of apps.
• Speaking of work Exchange account, when I set it up, I was asked to enable encryption. I understand what that means and why they need it, so I went ahead and agreed to that step. I was asked to set up a password which confused me because I already have a PIN enabled for the device. Regardless, I went ahead with it because I did not have a choice. After the process completed, I realized I ended up having to enter that password upon boot, and then enter my PIN to unlock the device. Both iOS and Windows Phone encrypt the whole device by default and keep the user out of this messy issue. I understand technically what they are doing in Android (encrypting only part of the device that needs to be encrypted for Exchange use), but for a common user, this is a hot mess.

Large screen

Choice

Wrapping up

Of course I cannot deny the millions of devices that Samsung has sold and even more so, the billion devices that have apparently been activated with Android, but I can say one thing: Android does not seem like it is something I would enjoy using as a direct consumer of the system. If my next music player has Android built in, and that gets exposed with their iOS app, I don’t care, but I don’t think I have the tolerance or the patience to “work with” Android as it stands today. Now I can at least say this definitively, having experienced the same on (one of) the most popular Android devices.

ps: I realized after the experiment that I did not even care which version of the operating system was installed on the device

If you haven’t read why, here’s an explanation why I recently bought a new iPhone. Having spent about a week with it, here are my quick updates on the whole package:

• For a company that prides itself in top-notch quality, I have seen quite a few spontaneous reboots on my phone. This will most likely be fixed soon, and for that I will be thankful as compared to Windows Phone updates, but the fact that there are some pretty severe crashes tells me something's not right somewhere.
• I am still getting used to the Notification Center. I like it a lot but I am trying to optimize the use of it. Together with some apps that can provide their own notification sounds (like WhatsApp does), I feel one of my bigger complaints with Windows Phone is addressed nicely. Toasts ("banners" in iOS) could be captured in Notification Center so I can always go back and look at what I may have missed. One issue though, some notifications from Facebook app do not get registered in the Notification Center but some others do. I suspect it is a Facebook bug, but it doesn't do away with the problem I have.
• I am glad I am finally able to connect to my work WiFi :-)
• I am loving TouchID to unlock my phone and to make new purchases. However, it seems like restoring apps previously bought using iTunes password don't work with TouchID so that is annoying.
• I am taking a lot of slo-mo videos although that could be only because it is a novelty. However, the huge downside there is that when I share the video via WhatsApp or upload it to SkyDrive, it does not maintain the slo-mo. That's a bummer. I wonder what is the reason, but in the end, I am left wondering how I can easily share with non-iPhone friends and family.

• People Hub: Yes, absolutely miss it. My current workaround? Create a private twitter list with all those who I had pinned to my Start Screen, and separately, mark as "Close Friends" in Facebook all whom I had pinned to Start Screen. With Close Friends, I get notification for every post they make, which is somewhat of a compromise to achieve what I could so easily achieve with People Hub.
• Haven't missed secondary tiles or camera yet, but have sorely missed the auto-upload of photos AND videos as well as wireless sync/download of photos and videos off the phone to PC. I cannot believe there is no elegant (read: native) solution to offload photos and videos from phone to PC. I know there is PhotoStream that sends photos to the cloud, but it doesn't send videos. Also, there is iTunes Wi-Fi syncing, but it is only one-way from the PC to the phone. I tried Dropbox, Loom and Amazon Cloud Photos but none are as hands-free/worry-free as Windows Phone's native auto-upload and wireless sync features. I really, really hope PhotoStream gets video support soon, even if it needs to detect Wi-Fi so it does not take away valuable cellular broadband bandwidth. More importantly, I cannot wait for wireless sync to PC so I don't have to remember to connect my phone to the PC every now and then.

If you know me or follow me, you will know I am a big, big fan of Windows Phone. I bought a Windows Phone 7 device as soon as I was able to (2-year contract was not up until Thanksgiving that year) and have made the move from that Samsung Focus to a Nokia Lumia 800, to my current Nokia Lumia 920.

I love Windows Phone 8 and had written not so long ago about how I do not intend to be swayed by iOS despite some holes I saw in Windows Phone operating system.

Yet, I ordered the iPhone 5s. (I went with Space Grey, 32GB in case you care.) There are several reasons for doing so, and in no particular order, these are:

• Notification Center: Windows Phone 8, and especially hardware like Lumia 920 have come a long way from the initial Windows Phone 7. Notably, they have really improved the reliability of push notifications and I have many apps that send me toast notifications. Invariably, I find myself hearing a notification from the phone and not realizing what it was for by the time I pick it up from across the room. Could it have been an ESPN score alert, or a News360 breaking news alert? If it is a WhatsApp message, I know the live tile gets updated, but what if the tile already had a non-zero number? Was it a Twitter mention or a WhatsApp message then? See the issue? With Notification Center, I know those toast notifications get stored and I can always go back and see what happened while I was away. I really miss it now that I have so many apps sending me toasts and since all notifications except text message, email and voice mail have the same sound.
• Enterprise features: My new office has wifi everywhere on campus, but they use Microsoft Protect EAP (PEAP) for network authentication, which I couldn't get to work on my Lumia. As I understand, it is not supported by Windows Phone 8 and is not available in GDR2 either. Similarly, our company uses VPN and I do need it occasionally and even though it is not a deal-breaker, I know that with iOS, I at least have the capability to use it.
• Updates (lack thereof): Speaking of GDR2, I haven't received the update on my AT&T Lumia 920 yet. I know there are some features I really want to have on my phone that are included in GDR2 and Amber, the associated Nokia firmware. It is an extreme pain to have to keep checking for updates daily and realizing that it is outside of Nokia, Microsoft or your control. AT&T really has no incentive to push the update out. I was really hoping Microsoft changes this with Windows Phone 8 and the "Windows 8 underneath". Sadly, it hasn't happened, and I don't expect that to change.
• iPhone hardware: I like the idea of TouchID, especially for buying apps. I also like that they have the motion co-processor M7 which will enable a new category of apps and look forward to being on the leading edge rather than patiently waiting for those apps to make it to Windows Phone a year or two later. Even though I dislike the fact that the iPhone is tall and narrow, I like that it actually has flat edges and not rounded edges like my Lumia. I find that the flat edges help me hold the phone much better than the rounded edges do. Finally, I really dislike the capacitive buttons which create mistaken taps all the time, especially when handing the phone to someone else for taking a picture. The simplicity of a physical, single home button is sorely missed.
• Family/Friends: Most of my immediate family (dad, brother, his wife, his two kids), friends and cousins are iPhone users. Needless to say, it would be great if I could iMessage with them and FaceTime with them for free. I know there is WhatsApp and we use that a lot, and I know there is Skype and it is quite pain-free to setup and use, but I have to admit, they end up using "SMS" without knowing it is iMessage and FaceTime because it is in the contact card. I think it is about time I gave up convincing them to be platform-agnostic and just join them.
• Windows Phone direction towards low-end: A disturbing (to me, as an enthusiast) trend I am noticing is that Windows Phone is being adopted in large volumes by first-time smartphone users and/or users very sensitive to price. Hence, the popularity of Lumua 520/521. I am afraid Windows Phone engineering team may switch priorities and assume that the current feature set is ok for that user base and the need to focus on the high-end is not as severe. Well, I wouldn't blame them. They need market share at the moment, and the way forward for them in that regard is via the low-end. Unfortunately, that doesn't work for me. If that were the case, I would have been happily using my Samsung Focus or even iPhone 3GS that preceded it. Let's hope that is not true and we see some high-end innovation come to the OS quickly. I am not talking about the one hardware device that is truly innovative, the Lumia 1020, where Windows Phone OS had to be modified. I am talking Notification Center, and Google Now-like features that leapfrog the competition.
• Waiting game: I absolutely love Windows Phone. I have waited patiently since Windows Phone 7 first launched, for the "next" release that would fix many things/everything. Even though Windows Phone 8 broke away from Windows Phone 7 in a way that my purchases of WP7 devices became sunk costs, I stuck around. I even bought a Lumia 920 off-contract, with a premium no less, importing it from the UK when it wasn't available in India (where I was living when it launched). Yet, the "Early adopter and enthusiast program" which was publicly announced on stage at the time of Windows Phone 8 platform event in June 2012 is nowhere to be found. As a loyal customer and supporter of the platform, I feel cheated in multiple ways.

• People Hub: I have a few groups of folks pinned to my start screen and I cannot express how useful I find that feature to be. I am able to see my closest family's, friends' and cousins' updates across Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn all in one place. I would ordinarily not see those updates, most likely, and I do need a plan to handle that in iOS. Maybe create some specific lists and somehow see if I can get notified? I don't know.
• Live tiles/Secondary tiles: Many don't like the flipping live tiles, but I happen to *love* them. In some cases like the People Hub, the flipping may be excessive and in others like the Music+Videos tile, it should have been there while it is not, but in general, I like apps that have live tiles for a quick overview of whatever that app does. Weather, stocks, news, People, calendar, etc. are prime examples. In addition to just the live tiles, I like the concept of secondary tiles where I can actually pin sections of apps to the start screen to get even more granular info. For example, in the Bing Finance app I have some specific companies pinned. In Pandora, I have a few of my stations pinned.
• Camera, especially low light: I have seen some of the 5s vs 92x vs 1020 photo shootouts and while the 1020 is a clear winner, 92x is very close to the 5s. Except in low-light, where even though the 5s does a good job and especially over the 5, the 92x produces better images. I will miss that.

Finally, to those whom I recommended Windows Phone, please note that I still stand by the recommendation. I don’t recommend WP blindly to all, so if I told you WP is best for you, I do mean it is.

My impressions soon after using the iPhone 5s.

Some of the upcoming features of Windows Phone 8 GDR2 were revealed by Microsoft, in addition to Nokia’s Amber firmware update.

Windows Phone 8 “GDR2″ Features Revealed

Nokia launched an app to get Instagram’s attention to build a Windows Phone app. Clever or annoying?

#2InstaWithLove: a Clever Ploy or a Mighty Annoyance?

Disqus releases a mobile app for Windows Phone and not for iOS or Android. Outside Microsoft/Nokia, it may be the first such company.

Disqus: A Windows Phone Exclusive App Not Built by Microsoft or Nokia? You Heard It Right!

Several updates from Microsoft related to Windows Phone development, including partnerships to benefit developers.

Microsoft Announces Some More Windows Phone Developer Momentum Numbers, New Partnerships

Nokia announced the entry-level Lumia 520 and the midrange Lumia 720 at Mobile World Congress. They are priced to attract first timers.

Nokia Announces Lumia 520 and Lumia 720: Priced to Gain Market Share

Some Cinemagraphs I created in the past week or so, and shared at Nokia Memories website.

[caption id=“attachment_3041” align=“aligncenter” width=“800”] Cinemagraph - Spinning top[/caption]

See this on Nokia Cinemagraph sharing site.

[caption id=“attachment_3037” align=“alignnone” width=“448”] Cinemagraph - India Republic Day[/caption]

See this on Nokia’s Cinemagraph sharing site.

[caption id=“attachment_3039” align=“aligncenter” width=“800”] Cinemagraph - Swimming pool[/caption]

See this on Nokia’s Cinemagraph sharing site.

Some pics from last night. I took screenshot of the viewfinder to show what the naked eye can see. See the actual image that the phone camera took.

Magical.

Some interesting tidbits about Windows Phone in the news recently. Things may be turning for the platform. Maybe.

Windows Phone: Going from “Very Small” to Just “Small”?

Windows Phone 8 is nowhere to be found, making device launches meaningless and developers angry.

Where Art Thou, Windows Phone 8?

Wow, time has flown. It feels like only yesterday that I was rocking my Blackberry Curve 8300 (no WiFi) and actually proud of it. I did not buy into the iPhone hype when it was released and stayed out, mostly because my Curve had video recording capability which the iPhone didn’t. Believe me, I took some videos on that thing that I still cherish, bad quality and all.

Instead of doing a normal retrospective I thought I’d pick up random articles written around the time the iPhone launched, and laugh at the ones that mocked the iPhone and predicted its doom, some even before it was released. Hindsight is so beautiful, innit?

Ad Age: Why the iPhone Will Fail

Prediction No. 1: The iPhone will be a major disappointment. The hype has been enormous. Apple says its iPhone is "literally five years ahead of any other mobile phone." A stock-market analyst says, "The iPhone has the potential to be even bigger than the iPod."

Prediction No. 2: The media will blame the execution, not the concept.

Instead, the iPhone is going to fail because its design is fundamentally flawed.

First, the iPhone ignores the main reasons that the iPod succeeded: simplicity and ease of use.

Second, the iPhone crams too many functions into a single box.

Third, users will detest the touch screen interface due to its lack of tactile feedback.

An iPod with just a cell keypad on the back would have been, may still be, a smash hit product for someone. But the iPhone as currently consituted? Forget it. Because its designers forgot Platt’s First, Last, and Only Law of User Experience Design (“Know Thy User, for He Is Not Thee”), that product is going to crash in flames. Sell your Apple stock now, while the hype’s still hot. You heard it here first.

This one is a great read because all the reasons mentioned in the article are exactly what Apple destroyed with the iPhone. Incredibly, a lot of the same type of chatter is heard now for the TV business, except the bad guys in control are the Hollywood mafia and not the carriers. We shall see how that story unfolds later in 2012.

Commsday: THE LONG VIEW: Why the iPhone will fail

But then – and here’s my prediction part – something strange will happen. In a week or two the fuss will fade and people will start to realise an important point: it’s just a phone, and not a particularly “smart” one at that. And then people will start to find flaws in it, because let’s face it, version 1.0 of anything is going to have flaws, particularly something loaded with sensitive radios and electronics like a mobile phone.

And finally, there’s the competition. The likes of Nokia, Motorola, Samsung, Sony Ericsson and LG won’t be idle bystanders as Apple tries to do to the mobile phone market what it did to MP3 players with the iPod. Building a mobile phone isn’t rocket science – it’s much more complex than that. And the traditional guys have been doing it for the best part of 20 years.

It’s hardware, it’s proprietary, so I really planned on keeping my mouth shut about it. But there is one point I have decided to make, one related directly to this beat, which is the real reason I believe the iPhone will, at best, disappoint in the market.

Open spectrum. We don’t have much, and we are nowhere near getting more.

The iPhone is nothing more than a luxury bauble that will appeal to a few gadget freaks. In terms of its impact on the industry, the iPhone is less relevant.

First, Apple is late to this party.

Next, the mobile-phone industry depends on cooperation with the big networks.

Lastly, the iPhone is a defensive product. It is mainly designed to protect the iPod, which is coming under attack from mobile manufacturers adding music players to their handsets.

There is no likelihood that Apple can be successful in a business this competitive. Even in the business where it is a clear pioneer, the personal computer, it had to compete with Microsoft and can only sustain a 5% market share.

What Apple risks here is its reputation as a hot company that can do no wrong. If it’s smart it will call the iPhone a “reference design” and pass it to some suckers to build with someone else’s marketing budget. Then it can wash its hands of any marketplace failures.

It should do that immediately before it’s too late. Samsung Electronics Ltd. might be a candidate. Otherwise I’d advise you to cover your eyes. You’re not going to like what you’ll see.

Finally, a couple of point-by-point mythbuster pieces by Tom Reestman, which in fact were inspiration for this blog post: Red Ferret’s list of “serious problems” with the iPhone touchscreen, and What a shock. Another BS (Baltimore Sun?) list of reasons to avoid the iPhone.

Oh, how the world has changed. “Late to the party” is now Motorola and Nokia. “Carriers control the whole thing” is now flipped over to carriers like TMobile begging to get the iPhone. “Too complex” is now flipped over to the iPhone being the simplest and the most intuitive user interface.

Let’s all use this 5th anniversary of the iPhone to thank Steve Jobs and everyone at Apple who opened this new world up for us, where it’s not just smartphones but mobile, highly-connected devices that help to get work done more efficiently and in more places than ever before.

Hat tip, iPhone.

Microsoft has a “major” announcement to make at an unspecified location in Los Angeles. My hope list for what may be announced.

What I Wish Today’s Microsoft Announcement Will Be

Nokia announces partnerships with major brands to bring their apps to Lumia and other Windows Phones. Is Nokia really the “real” Windows Phone maker?

Nokia Provides More Evidence of Being the “real” Windows Phone Maker

In my series comparing iPhone 4S to Windows Phone (Nokia Lumia 800), I look at the amazing Retina display.

iPhone 4S Used by a Windows Phone User: Screen

In my series comparing iPhone 4S to Windows Phone (Nokia Lumia 800), I compare setup and out of the box experience.

iPhone 4S Used by a Windows Phone User: Out Of the Box Experience, Setup

I start using iPhone 4S as my primary phone to compare the experience to my Nokia Lumia 800 Windows Phone. I document what I like and what I don’t like.

New Series: iPhone 4S Used by a Windows Phone User

If you are not aware of the “Blown Away by Lumia” contest, it is the Nokia’s version of “Smoked By Windows Phone” contest started by Ben Rudolph of Microsoft, at the 2012 Consumer Electornics Show (CES) in Las Vegas. Nokia took that contest global, and here are some videos of former Miss World Priyanka Chopra competing with challengers with various smartphones and beating them. Quite cool, although she comes off as a bit too chirpy.

www.youtube.com/watch

www.youtube.com/watch

www.youtube.com/watch

Nokia’s had a roller coaster fortnight. What matters though, is the Lumia 900 seems to be selling well. Is it enough to mark Nokia’s comeback? Time will tell.

Nokia’s Roller Coaster Fortnight

Nokia Lumia 900 reviews are out. A look at why Nokia and Microsoft have a problem with the device and the platform when it comes to reviews and reviewers. Perception is reality, right? The Problem with Reviewing the Nokia Lumia 900

Plex, the “media center” software application built for a multitude of devices, has a Windows Phone app now. They wrote up a blog post about it and while I am excited that there is a WP7 app now, it was heartening to see the praise they had for WP7 both from a user’s perspective as well as from a developer’s perspective.

There are so many gems in that post, I felt compelled to not only write this blog post, but highlight a bunch of the gems from the post:

Android phones never managed to capture my interest. They just looked and felt like bad photocopies of the iPhone, and didn’t offer anything new I was interested in, like the ability to install a custom theme that looked even uglier than the default, or download torrents on my phone, or play a Matrix animation in the background, or remove my battery, or spend time killing random processes, or over-clock my CPU, or any other beardy sort of thing.

Fast-forward to this January, I ordered a second hand Samsung device to help with development, and promptly fell in love with it.

As much as Android felt like (poorly) recycled ideas and bad new ones, Windows Phone felt original, well designed, and fun to use.

The performance was great, really smooth in a way iOS is and Android isn’t even in ICS.

The “pivot” and “panorama” UI concepts were fresh and a great way of making good use of a small screen in portrait mode. The typography was clean and brazen.

The integration of Facebook and Twitter made them feel like first class citizens, not an afterthought.

The live tiles on the home screen were a great way to make the phone feel alive.

But the iPhone felt staid, for lack of a better word. I wanted to be able to pin a few email folders to my home screen and watch them update live. I wanted to see all my social updates in a more integrated way. I missed being able to go to a contact (which I could also pin to my home screen), and easily see the conversations (Facebook, or SMS) I was having with them, and recent photos they’d uploaded.

The iOS development environment is quite good, with the weakest link being Objective-C, which has a steep learning curve and feels like it stepped out of the 80s with a cocaine hangover.

Android, oh, Android, I don’t mean to pick on you once again, but your edit-build-deploy cycle is long enough to make a grown man cry, and then stab himself in the eyeballs, and then cry some more. Java is fine, but the surrounding environment and piss-poor emulator makes it much harder to develop for than it should be.

So how is the Windows Phone development environment? It’s scary good. C# is a great language, .NET is a solid framework, XAML is a really nice way to design user interfaces, and the edit-build-deploy cycle is fast.

We were able to write the [WP7] app from start to finish in two months, between two engineers working part time, which is almost an order of magnitude faster than it took for the iOS and Android app.

58 minutes later an a new wp7 Instagram client is born. I think that's a record for me (but #nuget helped me along the way)

— Bil Simser (@bsimser) January 13, 2012

My last thought on Windows Phone is that it’s got all the ingredients it needs to be successful: It’s a fun, useful, well-designed platform, with sexy (Nokia) hardware, and it’s as good for developers as it is for users. It deserves much more marketshare than it has, and Microsoft seems to be making most of the right moves (about time).

Hope to see many others release their WP7 apps. Are you listening, Instagram?