Windows phone description. What is Windows Phone

Windows Phone is the operating system of the software giant Microsoft, created specifically for mobile (laptop) computers - tablets and smartphones.
Windows Phone 8.1 is a new improved version of this operating system for portable devices- came out about a year later after the release of the initial version - Windows Phone 8.
What changes await users in the new version, how well has Microsoft taken into account the wishes of ordinary users and corrected the errors? We will try to answer all these questions in this article.

Updates to the Windows Phone 8.1 Start screen interface

The first acquaintance of the owner of a smartphone running Windows Phone 8.1 with this updated OS naturally begins with the desktop on his display (start screen). At first glance, there is nothing radically new here – it’s still the same tiled interface. But once you start using it, you quickly discover a number of convenient innovations.

This operating system provides 4 types of sizes for icons (shortcuts) of built-in programs. The largest icon display size allows you to view detailed information about applications and files. The layout of the start screen is designed to place shortcuts to folders and applications in 3 columns. WITH minimum size There will be 6 icons in one column.

In Windows Phone 8.1, it became possible to select icons in groups so that you can later move them to another area of the screen, delete them, or simultaneously change their size.

The situation with desktop wallpaper is simple. Since the screen is cluttered with icons, and in Nokia smartphones they all also have an internal fill, the wallpaper picture is barely visible. There is, however, an interesting feature - you can set the desktop wallpaper to change according to a schedule. It is also possible to make the fill transparent - then the desktop background will be clearly visible.

Among a number of useful innovations in the work of the start screen, it is worth noting the direct download of files to it by default, which frees you from the need to search later for where the downloaded file was saved.

It has become possible to synchronize desktops on the screens of all your devices running Windows Phone 8.1.

Microsoft programmers have returned the Start button, which was missing from the first eight. True, it has almost nothing in common with the functions of a similar button in Windows for PC. Here, in essence, it is just a shortcut that is assigned the option to go to the list of applications.

Functional changes in the interface

They affected, in particular, the mechanism for controlling fingers and buttons, typing, and accessing applications from the lock screen.

The status bar at the top of the display now shows more detailed information about the battery charge in percentage, an icon for mobile Internet connection (EDGE, 3G, 4G).
If you pull the curtain from top to bottom (by clicking on the status bar and sliding down without releasing your finger), then under the fixed line you will find a widget for controlling auto-rotation, backlight brightness and wireless communications.

Below here, as expected, is the notification center, which displays various notifications from applications - about incoming messages, letters, calendar events, available application updates. We have long been accustomed to all this Android users. It's a pity that Microsoft realized this so late.

Screenshots can now be taken by simultaneously pressing the volume rocker and the power button. Separately for volume control - finally, it can now be configured separately for notifications, calls and multimedia!

The keyboard has been modified and improved quite seriously. Typing text and selecting a suggested option from the dictionary is done by swiping (a single touch on the screen, and then, without lifting your finger from it, move over the letters that make up the word being entered). Entering numbers has become possible without switching from the alphabetic to the numeric layout (by long pressing the corresponding key).

Working with mail and sending SMS

Sending SMS has now become much more advanced. Firstly, thanks to the Cortana voice assistant, which allows you to dictate the text of the message itself and the name of the recipient. The text of several messages can now be combined by dragging and dropping and forwarded to the subscriber.

Windows Phone 8.1 - Inbox button on home screen

For some reason, Microsoft decided to remove the ability to send instant messages over the Internet directly from the contact card. Not a big loss, considering that most people prefer Viber for chatting with people from their contact list.

This new operating system is now fully supported postal services Google and many others. To fully launch and work with them, you need to allow them access in the appropriate settings item.
After update old Windows background before version 8.1 will be prompted to log in again or register new account, if you haven't had it yet. This is most likely an integral part of the policy for collecting information about user activity, which includes some innovations in working with Wi-fi.

Voice assistant Cortana and the ability to search for the information you need

A new voice assistant called Cortana, in addition to the ability to enter text by voice, allows you to ask a search engine a query by voice and receive the results of your query in the browser (or even hear the answer from it out loud!). Yes, yes, you can now talk to the phone!

It is also possible to search for the necessary information on the phone or tablet itself - a contact, an event, or something else. Launch Cortana by pressing and holding the search button, which looks like a mirror, or by pressing the microphone icon.
By the way, the search began to produce more understandable and informative results. Now it displays files and applications found on the device in groups by relevance, so it’s easier for you to figure out which icon means what.
You can start playing audio directly from the list of found files; a link to search results on Wikipedia is also provided upon request.
Cortana can also do phone call the person you need or execute another command to control the smartphone. To do this, you can simply tell her what exactly needs to be done.

In general, everything in Cortana is very, very similar to the already familiar voice assistant in Android 5 Lollipop.

If you don't enable Cortana, your Internet search results will be returned to you by the Microsoft-owned Bing search engine.
By the way, it has already implemented a photo search function, and the corresponding application is already installed on a smartphone running Windows Phone. Photo search allows, for example, to scan a QR code and get the information encrypted in it. Or scan the text, make a request from it to a search engine and then see the results. To launch it, you need to launch the camera, click “Photo Application” (looks like a circle depicting the camera lens) and from there turn on Photo Search.

Calendar and events

The calendar has been slightly improved. It now has day, week and month views.
The day view displays the day's date, scheduled activities and events for that day that you can trigger audio alerts for, and the weather.

Contacts

The Contacts application has also been improved, made more user-friendly, the ability to filter contacts without phone numbers added so that they do not interfere with the search for people to call, and its appearance has been improved.

Wi-Fi and wireless networks

A “Wi-Fi Control” section has appeared in the Wi-Fi connections menu. It has a function for remembering the selection of hot spots (access points). In the future, the smartphone will automatically connect to available connection. By the way, a similar principle is implemented in iOS from Apple.

The Wi-Fi Sense option offers something truly new. It allows you to automatically send saved passwords to Wi-fi points contacts from Skype, Facebook and Outlook. Users will not see the passwords themselves, but will be able to instantly connect to access points from their Windows Phone devices.

Microsoft Camera

In the application of the same name, it became possible to take serial photos - that is, take several frames in a row after a single click on the corresponding button.

Many camera settings have been added and it is now possible to use many professional photography functions.

Multimedia management has been divided into separate applications. Playback of audio files is launched from the Xbox Music application, from which you can search, listen and download new songs from the Internet.

Podcasts (audio recordings of any events, television or radio programs) are now also located and launched in a separate application.

The same has been done for video and FM radio.

A screen reader appears that reads aloud the text displayed on the display.

Games were returned to the general list of applications along with other programs built into the operating system. It can be seen if you swipe your finger across the desktop from right to left.

Problems found in the updated operating system

Software not optimized for Windows shell Phone 8.1 will launch with the appropriate size of operating buttons and elements, which is not always convenient when working on a display with a small diagonal. Alternatively, you can rummage through the Windows Store in search of an analogue.

Windows von 8.1 does not allow connecting Bluetooth keyboards to smartphones and tablets.

Conclusion

So, Windows Phone 8.1 revealed its own rather successful discoveries and improvements. Although some shortcomings that distinguish this OS from Android and iOS 9 for the worse are still clearly indicated. Today this is partly compensated for by the updated store Windows applications Store with more user-friendly interface and an increased range of multimedia programs, including web browsers and development tools.
Overall, it is a fairly fast and inexpensive operating system. And buying a device that runs on it will be quite profitable for you, since their prices are on average price segment(that is, significantly cheaper than Apple products).
In addition, its improvement does not stop for a minute.

This OS is currently being produced and sold Nokia smartphones and Microsoft (prices, characteristics and photos of which are still on the page about Nokia smartphones).

Lock screen

The lock screen in WP8 is a screen in the truest sense of the word. That is, this is a full-screen image that you need to pull up to unlock the display. The picture is selected in the settings, it can be one of standard images, as well as any photo or picture you downloaded to your smartphone. On NTS smartphones you can also set weather animation as a picture.

The lock screen at the top displays the current signal reception level, Internet connection type (HSDPA (H) or EDGE (E)), operating icons wireless interfaces, battery level and time.

Also here, on top of the system information icons, a music control panel appears. To call it, you need to press the volume up or down key. This panel shows the current volume level, music control buttons, track name, playing time, as well as an icon with sound mode, ringer or vibration.

In addition, information about a newly found Wi-Fi network or a piece of a new text message appears at the top of the screen, that is, part of it can be seen without even unlocking the screen.

Just below the center of the screen are displayed current time and an alarm icon next to it if it is on. Even lower are the day of the week, date and month. And at the very bottom there are icons for unread text messages, email and missed calls. The mail icons for different accounts are the same, with the exception of “mailboxes” from MS (hotmail) and MS Exchange Server.

In the settings you can specify the time after which the lock screen will appear, the range of values: 30 seconds, 1, 3, 5 minutes or “never”.

You can also set a password for the lock screen. In this case, when you move the screen up, instead of unlocking, a panel with numeric keypad, where the password is entered. Interestingly, as soon as you finish entering the password, the screen immediately unlocks.

Honestly, I would like to have large quantity settings for the lock screen, for example, the ability to quickly launch a program. I also didn’t like the tiny notifications: if you remember HTC Sense, where the entire message appeared at once, it becomes quite sad.

Desktop

Working space is organized in Windows Phone 8 in two panels, one of which contains tiles already known to us, and the other a detailed list of programs.

In Windows Phone 8, the tile menu has undergone a slight external modification. Firstly, now up to four tiles can be located in one row, and secondly, the useless arrow has finally been removed (or rather, it was not removed, but placed at the very bottom of the tiled menu). Tiles come in three sizes: small (1x1), medium (2x2) and large (2x4). If the program supports “live tiles”, then the information on the tile will be updated. As you move a tile, nearby tiles will move away. It looks the same as in latest versions Android, except that this feature appeared earlier in Windows Phone.

Most tiles support “unread notification counters”, that is, if you have received a new letter, then the tile with mail will have a one, the same with other programs. Moreover, this applies not only to standard programs, but also to third-party ones (for example, IM+). The “Calendar” tile deserves special mention; if you stretch it to a large size, it will display a list of current affairs that you have written down.

Adding a new tile occurs by long pressing on the program from the application menu. Also, some third-party applications can add tiles directly from the settings. Changing the size and position of tiles or removing them from the desktop is done by long pressing on the tile itself. From the list of programs, you can not only quickly add a new tile, but also delete a program.

All personalization of the desktop comes down to changing the background (black or white) and the background color of the tiles themselves (here the range has been seriously diversified). Interestingly, some apps also change their appearance depending on the color of the tiles. This allows you to maintain continuity of appearance between third-party applications and built-in ones.

The solution with tiles is interesting and unusual: on the one hand, these are ordinary shortcuts, on the other, updated tiles, and on the third, unique widgets. The most pleasing thing, of course, is that we finally got rid of the small arrow on the side and increased the size of the line on the desktop (4x1 versus 2x1 in WP7). In my opinion, tiles are inferior in variety to the same widgets in Android, of which there are a great many in the Play Market.

Status bar

Unlike Android, Windows Phone 8 pays virtually no attention to the status bar. First of all, it doesn't even fall out. Secondly, it contains a minimum number of notifications. Thirdly, this line is still automatically hidden, so if you need to check the smartphone’s charge, signal reception or new messages, you need to manually omit it, which, of course, is inconvenient.

The address book does the same thing, only you search for the subscriber's card yourself, rather than immediately opening it. After shortcuts on Android, this solution seems outdated.

The “Phone” tile opens the history of all calls, and you can immediately dial the person who called you recently.

When you call a subscriber, you see his number and the time of the call. There is no contact photo (even if one is assigned!). This is a huge miscalculation, which upsets me very much; it is unclear why it was necessary to do this.

At incoming call you see the photo of the contact, to answer the call you first need to swipe up and then press the answer button. The button itself is narrow and flat, made completely inconveniently, you need to aim to press it.

The address book

The address book is located in the Contacts application. The application itself is divided into four blocks: a list of your contacts, their activity on social networks, the last contacts you contacted, and the “All Together” block, where created rooms and user groups are located. Let's talk about everything in order.

Your contacts list displays your address book synced with Hotmail. If you have enabled synchronization of contacts with Twitter and/or Facebook, then contacts from these networks will also appear in your address book. Contacts from social networks can be “linked” to contacts from Hotmail, then all the contact’s activity from social networks will be displayed in one card. In addition, after “linking”, a high-quality photograph is pulled up, if we talk about Facebook.

If you wish, you can synchronize your smartphone with Gmail, then the contacts will be pulled up from Google account. The disadvantage of this method is that with such synchronization you automatically receive low quality photos contacts.

To create a new contact, just click on the plus sign at the bottom of the screen. There is also a “Search” button for quick navigation through the book.

The second tab displays the news feed from Facebook, Twitter and other connected social networks.

The third contains frequently called contacts.

Last tab contains a list of contact groups and rooms. What is the room like? You invite one or more contacts to create a room, then inside this room you can maintain a shared calendar, correspond, make a shopping list, and much more (for example, share photos). It is clear that the functionality of the room presupposes its use, first of all, by family or simply close people. The second use case is the corporate segment.

Call log (call history)

The call history window is simplified as much as possible. You see a list of recent calls (all), on the left is the same phone icon, on the right is the subscriber’s name, just below is the type of call (incoming, outgoing, missed), day of the week and time at which the call was made. For missed calls, the line under the caller's name is highlighted in a cheerful color (it depends on what color you have chosen for the OS).

The call list appears to reflect calls from the last week. There is no grouping of calls from one subscriber, detailed information You also cannot look at the call, for example, its duration, there is no such functionality. If you call the same person ten or twenty times, then the call list will contain these twenty entries without any grouping under one contact.

When you click on the phone icon, a call starts to the selected subscriber; when you click on his name, a window with a profile opens. By the way, if the number from the call log is not in your address book, then when you click on it you will still be taken to the profile window. That is, you can select an action, call this subscriber or send a text message.

Display of missed calls

When the display is locked, missed call information appears as an icon at the bottom of the lock screen.

On the main screen, the missed call is shown inside the “Phone” block. I already talked about this above, I think. The display of missed calls in the system line did not appear.

Working with USSD requests

The system processes direct USSD requests without problems, and now supports requests in which it is possible to select options.

Messages, mail

Display new (missed) messages

In screen lock mode, new text messages are displayed at the bottom of the display as an icon; new text messages and mail are not shown in the system bar. The number of messages on the main screen is shown within each block, that is, within a block, for example, for Gmail, for mail on MS Exchange and for text messages.

Text messages

Text messages are represented by a list of chats, for each chat the last message in it is indicated. IN general window messages you see for each chat the phone number or name of the subscriber, and below is the last message or a piece of it in two lines. To the right is the time when the message was received, or the day of the week (Monday, Tuesday, etc.) if the message is from previous days. Unread messages can be distinguished from read ones by the color of the text of the piece of message under the subscriber's name. U unread messages this will be the color selected in the theme: red, green, etc. The message list contains not only SMS messages, but also messages from rooms.

When you open a chat, you see all the correspondence with the selected person. The contact's first and last name are shown at the top, and messages appear below. By clicking on the contact's name, you can go to his card. The subscriber's messages are aligned on the left side, and yours are aligned on the right. Under each message the date it was received by you or delivered to the subscriber is indicated. Separate message can be deleted or forwarded, in addition, you can delete all correspondence with a contact.

If messages are old, then not only the time of sending and delivery, but also the day of the week will be indicated for them. If very old, the date of the message will be indicated in the format day/month/year.

When you create a new message, it defaults to text. If you add any content to an SMS, it will be converted into an MMS. Users can send photos, video clips, their locations, voice notes, contact cards and ringtones via MMS.

Another feature of working with messages in WP8 is this. In the system, when entering messages, you initially cannot see anywhere how many characters you have already entered, and this is inconvenient. The thing is that the OS shows the number of characters entered as a number only after you have exceeded the value of 130 characters for the Latin alphabet and 60 characters for the Cyrillic alphabet. This flaw has been known since WP7, it’s sad that it hasn’t been fixed.

When you enter a new message, the recipient is selected. To select it, you can start entering the contact’s first or last name, the system itself will offer options from those found in the address book. In addition, you can simply enter the phone number manually or click on the “plus” button and get into the address book, where you can select the required contact. You can send a text message to one or more people.

In the message settings, you can enable notification of message delivery to the recipient. When you turn on notifications, after each SMS you send, you will receive a response message with a text indicating what time your message was delivered.

WP8 does not have the usual message templates for most other (or all other?) phones like “Happy Birthday”, “I’m busy, I’ll call you later”, etc.

There is no concept of a "draft message" in WP8. You cannot save drafts. Moreover, if you were writing a message and accidentally pressed the “Windows” or “Back” key, that is, you went to the main screen, the text you wrote will not be saved and you will have to enter it again. At least the good thing is that if you answer the call while writing an SMS, you can then continue writing.

And the last point about messages. If you sent a message, but it didn’t go through (you were traveling in the subway, driving through a tunnel, your phone was in “Airplane” mode, etc.), then you will need to resend it manually, yourself. The notification that a message was not sent will only appear in one place, directly below the text of the message itself. That is, situations are quite possible when the message was not sent, and you do not know about it, because you clicked the “Send” button and immediately closed the message window.

Mail

Let's look at the implementation of mail in Windows Phone 8. Unlike what we see in Android, there is no separation by account type, that is, if you set up Gmail and, for example, Hotmail mailboxes, the same application will be used to work with them . Let me remind you that Android has its own separate mail client for Gmail and another for the rest of the mail.

About the fact that each account with mail can be transferred to main screen in the form of a picture block, as I already said. Now let's look into one of these boxes.

Postal messages presented as a list; about 5 letters fit on the screen (HTC Windows Phone 8x). Each line displays the sender in large font, below is the subject of the letter and the first line from it. To the right of this data is the time of receipt or the day of the week (if the letter is yesterday or old). If you swipe the screen to the left, you'll move from the screen with all emails to the screen with unread emails. And the last scroll through – letters marked “important”. A convenient screen, in my opinion, it works correctly for all accounts. That is, if I send an email marked “important” to myself on Exchange and to Gmail boxes, then in both cases the system will place it on the important messages screen.

You can select letters in the list. To do this, you need to move your finger to the left edge of the screen and gently click on the area to the left of the desired letter. As soon as one letter is selected, a square will appear next to each one with the ability to put a checkmark there, that is, select it too. In addition, you can simply press the button at the bottom of the screen to call the email selection mode. You cannot select all messages at once. Selected messages can be marked as read or unread, checked or unchecked for them, and also marked “done” (a check mark will appear to the right of the name and subject of the letter).

Let's open one letter. Above in large-large font the sender's first and last name are written. As a rule, this data does not even fit on the screen, and you will not be able to fully read the name of an unknown person. For example, if Konstantin Konstantinov writes to me, then I will see something like Konstantin Konst in both the general list of messages and in the open message.

Below the first and last name is a line with the subject, and then the date the letter was received. Even lower is the addressee, that is, you and other people, if the letter was sent not only to you or in the form of a newsletter. Next come the attachments, if any, and then the text.

The unprepared reader will receive some unpleasant news here. However, it is unpleasant for everyone. In WP8 you can scale the text of an email, just like in any other system. Make it smaller or larger. However, unlike other systems, in WP8, enlarged text is not re-aligned to the width of the screen. You understood me correctly, if you “enlarged” the text of the letter in the mail, please use horizontal scroll to read it.

You can read letters in both vertical and horizontal screen orientations. Attachments are opened by clicking on the gray “attachments” label. Clicking on the name of the attachment starts downloading it. The download status cannot be tracked, but you will know that the attachment is being downloaded by the presence of a “Cancel” signature under it.

You cannot select a specific location to download attachments; there is no concept of folders or file system to view. Accordingly, to view the downloaded attachment, you need to open the letter with it and click on the attachment there. The system does not provide a tool to view all downloaded attachments or any kind of download log for email accounts.

A downloaded attachment can be distinguished from one that has not yet been downloaded by its icon. For undownloaded ones it is general, in the form of a paperclip, for downloaded ones - by file type. By the way, WP8 does not distinguish between letters in html format, that is, with pictures, and letters with attachments. That is, in the general list of letters you will see a paperclip icon not only for letters with attachments, but also for letters in html format, because there are pictures, and these are like attachments.

If the system “does not understand” the extension or format of an attachment, no action can be taken with it; when you click on such an attachment, you will see a notification that it cannot be opened. For some OS investments, you are prompted to download an application that supports them. For example, this applies to .pdf files.

In the case of a Gmail account, the system recognizes the “there” labels as folders. Accordingly, you can see what kind of shortcuts you have. In G8, the email client has finally learned to work with labels; you can open letters marked with these labels and download attachments.

The search in the list of letters is carried out by first name, last name, subject of the letter, as well as by the body of the letter (throughout the entire text, and not just the line visible in the general list).

Mail display

Mail client displays both standard text messages and those compiled with using html. In the case of html, to download images, you must first click on any picture inside the letter, after which they are loaded.

Working with text inside a letter

Windows Phone 8 supports copy-paste functionality. That is, text from a letter (and not only) can be copied and then pasted into another place, for example, into a document or into the address bar of a browser. It looks like this: when you click on a word, an icon for copying the selected text to the clipboard appears, to the left and right of the word there are arrows, by dragging which you can select other words or entire pieces of text and copy them.

On-screen keyboard, text input

The keyboard in Windows Phone 8 has remained virtually unchanged since the days of the 7. Four lines of characters, no additional markings on the buttons: one click - one character. There is a key to enter numbers and additional symbols. There is a button for entering smiles (emoticons), there is a space bar, a “Backspace” and “Enter” key. Personally, I was counting on the possibility of installing a third-party keyboard, but, unfortunately, Microsoft did not please us with such a luxury. In my opinion, this keyboard is too simple. If the company doesn’t allow you to install other keyboards, then at least make yours the best and most convenient. But Microsoft did neither the first nor the second.

In landscape mode, the keyboard becomes a little wider, but not the full width of the screen. That is, in WP8 there is no particular difference between landscape and portrait keyboards; they do not differ in the ease of entering text on them.

When you enter a letter on the keyboard, it is displayed in a pop-up field above the key itself, so even if you close the button with your finger, you always see which letter you are currently entering.

Pressing a key is accompanied by sound, there is no vibration. The keyboards are slightly different for different input fields. For example, for text messages to the left of the space there is a button for entering smiles, and when working in a browser there is also a key for rapid administration".com". In this case, if you hold your finger on the “.com” button for about a second, a pop-up menu will appear where you can select the domain zone: .org, .edu, net.

If you hold your finger in the input field on one of the words, a cursor appears, with its help you can correct errors in words or simply move between words or phrases in already written text to add or correct something.

The keyboard has predictive input and supports the Russian language. When misspelled, words are automatically corrected.

Calendar

The calendar can be represented as a picture block on the main screen; it will occupy the entire line, that is, two standard blocks. The current day of the week and date are displayed here, as well as the nearest event, if any.

In the calendar you see a list of events for the current day, sorted by time, or a list of events for the next day for which they exist. The general list of events displays their names and location, as well as time. To the right of each event is a colored label that indicates whether the event belongs to one of the calendars you are synchronizing. Native synchronization with the Facebook calendar is supported, joint events from the common room are also displayed.

When adding a new event, you can select a topic, location, account affiliation, start time, duration, reminder and status. In addition, you can enter a note and add users from your address book, who will be sent an invitation to take part in this event (by mail).

Multimedia

Music+video

It’s unclear why Microsoft decided to combine music and video in one program. What does this mean? While watching all the content, you get a mix of movies and songs. The meaning of this decision is unclear.

The music player itself supports playback by artist, album, or genre. You can also play all tracks. Unfortunately, there is no support for playing folders. It's important to note here that you can't install a third-party audio player on WP8, so the fact that Microsoft installed such a simple application is very disappointing.

As for video playback, there are practically no settings here: no subtitles, no changing the audio track, or anything else. Linear playback only. And again, you cannot install a third-party video player.

It’s important to note that in Windows Phone 8 there is no such thing as “ringer volume” or “media volume,” so if you take out your headphones after listening to music and put your smartphone in your pocket, it’s quite possible that you might miss an incoming call.

Photos

The application is divided into four tabs. In the first, you can view your photos, having previously selected sorting by date, albums or contacts. The photo disk contains direct images from the camera. You can add the picture you like to “Favorites”.

In the "What's new?" tab are displayed last news from social networks containing photographs.

Applications contain programs for working with images.

Marketplace

home page The application store is divided into four tabs. From the first you can quickly go to proprietary smartphone applications, third-party programs and games. The second contains the “program of the day” - any good application according to Microsoft. The third and fourth tabs are dedicated to the list of applications and games, respectively. They display three titles and offer to familiarize themselves with all the programs.

In addition to the usual sorting by paid/free and the best programs, there is a "Collections" tile here. The collections contain the best applications for various tasks. I really liked this section, it’s clear that they really chose good apps for each of the subsections.

When you open application information, several tabs appear in front of you. The first contains a brief description of the application, its weight, the name of the developer and the average rating. The second tab is dedicated to reviews, the third tab shows screenshots of the program, and the fourth tab shows similar applications.

The app store has one inconvenient drawback - if you have already purchased an application, when you open information about it, its purchase is not displayed in any way, that is, you still see the “Buy” button. Of course, you don’t need to buy it a second time, and when you click the button they will tell you that you have already bought it and offer you to download it. Many applications have demo versions so you can try the program before purchasing.

As for search, in my opinion, it is better organized in Marketplace than in Google Play. Here, at least, all the applications displayed after searching are at least relevant to the word you enter. In Google Play, you can enter “FBReader” and get the Opera Mini program as the fifth or sixth link.

Marketplace Programs

At the moment, in the Marketplace you can find about seven good Twitter clients, two or three quality e-book readers, a couple of third-party browsers, about 9-10 social network clients, and several really good instant messengers. There are completely no third-party video players as a class, as well as music players. Of course, there are no third-party launchers or keyboards either.

In principle, there are many applications on the market, but in my opinion, there are about a hundred of really high-quality ones. They are easy to find in the top paid and free programs, as well as in collections.

Xbox Live

This section contains all the games available on the Marketplace. If you want to see a list of available games in the Marketplace, you will still be transferred to Xbox Live. Conventionally, all games can be divided into two types: “Xbox games” and “Others”. What is the advantage of the former? They support the achievement system from Xbox. That is, if you, say, completed the next level in Sonic, you will receive the appropriate reward. In fact, Xbox Live is the equivalent of Game Center on iOS.

If we talk about the number of games, then there are very few really good, cool toys, probably not even two dozen. At the Windows Phone 8 presentation, several interesting toys from Gameloft and others were announced, but so far only Cut The Rope has appeared.

PC connection

One of the innovations of the G8 was the ability to directly connect to a computer without intermediary programs like Zune. On the one hand, this is an absolute plus, but on the other, you still cannot upload any files to your smartphone. Or rather, you can download them to your phone, but third-party programs will not be able to see them. Simple example: popular app Bookviser cannot open books downloaded via a PC; you need to use workarounds. Moreover, I will not be able to see the uploaded books in the folders on the PC, they (these folders) are simply hidden and not displayed.

Multitasking

Windows 8 introduces full multitasking. I can easily minimize the game, send an SMS, read Twitter, and then open it again and continue exactly where I left off. You can view all open programs by long pressing the “Back” button. However, not all applications currently support this multitasking. Developers must update their programs to be compatible with this mode. At the moment, at least Facebook has done this.

Browser

I think many of you associate the phrase “Internet Explorer” with a kind of installer for third party browser. However, the mobile version of this browser pleasantly surprised me; it has a simple, I would even say, ascetic design; it looks similar to the desktop version of IE in Windows 8.

The address bar has moved to the bottom of the screen, and the analogy with desktop IE is also visible here.

The browser supports multiple tabs, Flash banners and animations are visible and playable. There are no problems with watching videos on VKontakte.

Position indicators on the page are two thin stripes, on the right frame and at the bottom of the screen. They can help you understand which area of the site you are in. This is convenient when you have greatly enlarged the page compared to its original resolution and want to move to another area of this page without changing the scale.

The maximum zoom of the browser is redundant; you can enlarge the page so that one or two words per line are displayed on the screen. When changing the scale, the size of the pictures does not change.

When you enter an address, auto-selection works; the browser “suggests” options from the list of pages you have visited.

Unfortunately, there is no auto-fitting of text to screen size.

If you wish, you can place your favorite tabs on your desktop.

When editing an existing document or creating a new one, you can select the font size, font type (italics, underline, strikethrough) and color. You also select a highlighter color for the word or phrase to make it stand out. There is a button to roll back one or more actions.

The application supports work with Microsoft Sharepoint Server 2010; you can take part in editing and viewing documents on the server without downloading them to the device. There's also a OneNote screen in the Office hub. Here you can create various notes. You can also view PowerPoint presentations using the Office Hub.

Ringtones and sounds. Here you can configure the notification sound and ringtone (your own ringtones are now supported; to do this, you need to upload them to the Ringtones folder), enable/disable vibration alerts, and select actions for which sounds will be enabled.

Themes. Select the color of the tiles and the background on which they will be placed.

Shared Internet. Giveaway mobile internet With using Wi-Fi. Open and secure networks are supported.

Touch and send. Windows Phone 8 now supports NFC. You can use it as follows. A number of applications support the “touch and send” function; this could be a contact, an open page in the browser, a document, an image, in general, all applications where, when calling context menu there is a line “Send” and then a field “Touch and send”. I can click “Send > Touch and Send” in the IE browser on the Lumia 920, then lean it back against the back of another WP8 device, and a notification will appear on it, if I accept it, the same page will load on my smartphone, opened on “ lumii." The same goes for pictures and other content.

Wi-Fi (8.x)

The operating system is a successor to, although not compatible with, Windows Mobile, with a completely new interface and - for the first time - integration of Microsoft services: Xbox Live gaming and Zune media player. Unlike its predecessor, Windows Phone is aimed more at the consumer market than the enterprise sector.

Story

Development

Work on major update Windows Mobile may have started back in 2004 under the working title "Photon", but progress was slow and the project was eventually abandoned. In 2008, Microsoft reorganized Windows command Mobile and began developing a new mobile operating system. A product called Windows Phone was announced for 2009, but due to several delays, Microsoft decided to develop Windows Mobile 6.5 as an interim version. The reason for this was the incompatibility of the new operating system with Windows Mobile applications. Windows Mobile senior product manager Larry Lieberman also explained this as Microsoft's desire to take a fresh look at the market mobile phones, taking into account both the interests of end users and corporate networks.

Windows Phone 7

Windows Phone 7.5

In February 2011 at Mobile World Congress 2011 Microsoft first announced the next update to Windows Phone, and already in April at the MIX’2011 conference in Las Vegas it spoke about the details of this update, which was called Mango. Later, the company officially announced that this operating system update will receive the serial number 7.5. The new version, which was released in September 2011, contains more than 500 improvements and additions, including those that significantly increased the speed of the operating system. The system has updated the Internet Explorer Mobile browser to version 9, which supports hardware acceleration, HTML5 and Canvas. It is now possible to use the front camera. One of the most important changes for Russian-speaking users is localization into Russian (interface, keyboard, compatibility with Cyrillic). IN total the platform supports 24 languages.

In February 2012, at Mobile World Congress 2012, the Nokia Lumia 610 smartphone was demonstrated with the next operating system update, which is part of Mango, which added support for processors with a frequency of 800 MHz and 256 MB of RAM. Peculiarity this update lies in the possibility of launching budget segment smartphones on the market. In March, this update was officially named Windows Phone 7.5 Refresh.

Windows Phone 7.8

At the end of 2012, on the official Windows Phone blog, developers announced the planned release of update number 7.8 in early 2013, which will include some innovations of the Windows Phone 8 platform: a start screen with customizable size of “live tiles”, new screen locks, creating ringtones, data transfer via Bluetooth. On January 30, 2013, Nokia officially announced the start of updating its Lumia line devices to version 7.8, which contains the announced changes.

There will be no full update of smartphones running Windows Phone 7.x to version 8, which has been officially confirmed by Microsoft. Official support for the Windows Phone 7 platform will end a year and a half after the release of update number 7.8, that is, approximately in mid-2014. Version 7.8 will not only update current devices running Windows Phone 7/7.5, but will also be installed on budget devices.

Windows Phone 8

On June 20, 2012, at a conference organized by Microsoft called Windows Phone Summit, Windows Phone 8 was announced. The main advantage of Windows Phone 8 is the ability to combine tablets, smartphones and personal computers into a single “ecosystem”, that is, the ability to create conditions for developers that make it easier to port software security between these devices. The new generation of the platform will be based on the core and maximum resolution The device screen will be 1280x768 or 1280x720, unlike Windows Phone 7.x, which is based on the CE core with a screen resolution of 800x480.

On October 29, 2012, Microsoft officially unveiled the next generation of the platform. Innovations in Windows Phone 8 - Internet Explorer Mobile version 10 with the function of detecting malicious sites, support for multi-core processors, NFC data exchange technology, a slot for memory cards and others. Users have the opportunity to change the size of the “live tiles” of the start screen - now there are three types (small, medium and large).

Windows 10 Mobile

On January 21, 2015, Microsoft officially unveiled the next generation of Windows 10 Mobile for devices with screen sizes up to nine inches. The operating system is a special edition of Windows 10 and provides a unified ecosystem for various types of devices using the Universal Windows Platform. At the moment (February 2019), the future of the platform is unknown, as there was an official statement about the termination of the development of the platform due to competition.

Characteristics

User Interface

The user interface is based on a Windows Phone design system called Metro, the principles of which were previously used in the interface design of Windows Media Center, Zune, and Xbox. The initial screen consists of so-called “live tiles” (eng. Live Tiles), which display information in real time without user intervention. Tiles are also links to applications, various features, and individual objects (contacts, web pages, etc.). The user can add, move or delete tiles. Starting with Windows Phone 8, the size of tiles can be adjusted by choosing between three display sizes.

One of the interface innovations is “hubs” or, as described on the official website, “sections” that combine local and online content thanks to Windows integration Phone with popular social networks such as Facebook and Twitter. For example, the Pictures hub shows photos taken with the device's camera and the user's photo albums from Facebook, while the People hub shows contacts from a variety of sources, including Windows Live, Facebook, and Gmail. From the hubs, users can comment directly, like content they like, and share it on social media. Other built-in hubs also include Xbox Music and Video, Xbox Live Games, Windows Phone Store and Microsoft Office.

Windows Phone uses multi-touch technology to control it. User interface Windows Phone has a dark theme to save battery on an organic light-emitting diode (OLED) display, since completely black pixels do not emit light. But users can change the background to white from the phone's settings menu.

Entering text

Users enter text using an on-screen keyboard with a dedicated key for adding emoticons, spell checking, and predictive text. With the release of Windows Phone 8.1, it became possible to enter text using using Swype Keyboard. Once entered, the word can be edited by touching the screen, which will bring up a list of similar options. Can also be connected to phones external keyboard to enter text.

Message exchange

Windows Phone allows users to exchange messages across multiple platforms (such as Windows Live Messenger, Facebook messages, or SMS) in a single thread.

Web browser

Internet Explorer on Windows Phone gives the user the ability to manage a list of favorite web pages and tiles that link web pages to home screen. Browser supports unlimited amount open tabs, which can be loaded in parallel. Other features include smooth zooming in/out animation, the ability to save images from web pages and share pages via email.

Contacts

Contacts can be managed through the People hub by manually adding or importing from Facebook, Windows Live Contacts, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google, Outlook and VKontakte (When the application is downloaded). The “What’s New” section displays a person’s news feed on Facebook or VKontakte, and the “Pictures” section shows images from the listed social networks. The “Me” section in the People hub provides information about the user’s status and wall on the social network, allows you to edit the status and mark stays in museums and restaurants.

If Contact Information contained on multiple networks, users can link contacts from multiple accounts, allowing them to view information on one page.

Email

Windows Phone supports Outlook.com, Exchange, Yahoo! Mail and Gmail and other services via POP and IMAP protocols. Contacts and calendars are also synchronized using these services. Users can search by subject, text of letters, senders and recipients. In this case, several mail accounts can be combined in one mailbox.

Multimedia

Xbox Music and Xbox Video are built-in hubs that provide entertainment and sync between PC, Windows Phone and more Microsoft products. The hubs give users access to music, videos and podcasts stored on the device and link directly to the Xbox Music Store for purchasing music and the Xbox Video Store for purchasing movies and TV shows. When searching for music by artist, the user can view their biographies and photos. The Xbox Music Hub also integrates with other apps, including iHeartRadio, YouTube, and Vevo.

The Pictures Hub displays the user's Facebook and OneDrive albums, as well as photos taken with the device's camera. Users can upload photos to social media. network and comment on others' photos. It is possible to zoom in and out of images using multi-touch technology.

Media format support

Supported image formats include JPG/JPEG, PNG, TIF and Bitmap (BMP).

Users can add ringtones no larger than 1 MB in size and no longer than 1 minute.

Games

The Games Hub gives you access to games on your phone along with Xbox Live functionality, including the ability to interact with your avatar, view and edit your profile, see your achievements and leaderboards, and send messages to friends on Xbox Live.

Search

The user can also set song titles using Bing Audio, and using Bing Vision, scan barcodes, QR codes and other marks.

Microsoft Office Mobile on Windows Phone 8

For everyone Windows devices Phone is installed with Microsoft Office Mobile, which provides Windows compatibility Phone and desktop versions of Microsoft Office. Mobile applications Word Mobile, Excel Mobile, PowerPoint Mobile and SharePoint Workspace are available through the common Office hub and allow you to view and edit most formats Microsoft files Office. The Office hub has access to files on OneDrive and Office 365, as well as materials stored on the device itself. Although they are not built-in, OneNote Mobile, Lync Mobile, and OneDrive for Business can be downloaded separately from the Windows Phone Store.

Device development

In particular, HTC, Samsung, Dell, Fujitsu, Toshiba, Acer, Nokia, ZTE, Highscreen, and Microsoft have begun developing mobile solutions for the new platform. “First generation” mobile devices based on the Windows Phone 7 operating system entered the market at the end of 2010, and “second generation” smartphones (with the Mango update) at the end of 2011. Among the presented smartphones were smartphones from Nokia, with which Microsoft announced cooperation on February 11, 2011, and on April 21, 2011, the companies entered into a partnership agreement. In October 2011, at the Nokia World conference, the Finnish company presented the first smartphones on Windows based Phone - the “older” model Nokia Lumia 800 and the “younger” Nokia Lumia 710.

First-generation devices were not officially on sale in Russia, as Microsoft decided that for launch it was necessary to integrate the system with local online services and implement full support for the Russian language. On September 16, 2011, almost a year after the presentation of the first Windows Phone phones, the first smartphone on the Windows Phone platform, the HTC 7 Mozart, went on sale in Russia. HTC 7 Mozart is a first-generation device, but in Russia it was presented with an updated version of the operating system, which included support for the Russian language - Windows Phone 7.5 Mango. At the end of November 2011, thanks to the cooperation of Microsoft and Yandex, smartphones sold in Russia replaced the search engine Bing systems Yandex became the default search.

The following were announced system requirements for Windows Phone 7.5 Refresh: single-core processor from 800 MHz, RAM from 256 MB, flash memory from 4 GB, capacitive 4-point touch screen, display with WVGA resolution (800×480), DirectX video processor, 3.5- mm headphone jack, microUSB 2.0, WiFi 802.11 b/g, FM radio, Bluetooth, hardware control buttons, including “Start”, “Search”, “Back”.

App Store

For Windows Phone devices, there is an online store for programs and games, the Windows Phone Store (formerly Windows Phone Marketplace), available in 60 countries. You can purchase or install these applications through the Marketplace section of your phone or through your browser. At the end of June 2012, Microsoft officially announced that the number of applications in the store exceeded 100 thousand. As of today (June 2015), the number of applications in the Windows Phone Store is 380 thousand.

Installing applications and games on Windows Phone is only possible from the official Windows Phone Marketplace online store. For enthusiasts, it is possible to unlock your phone using the Microsoft-approved ChevronWP Labs service, which allows you to install homebrew applications on your smartphone or use it for testing, bypassing the Marketplace and officially unlocking your phone as a developer.

In September 2012, Microsoft officially renamed the Windows Phone Marketplace to the Windows Phone Store, updating and improving app search. From November 30, after the next update Windows Store Phone, for devices on the Windows Phone 8 platform it is now possible to install applications and games from the card manually.

Silverlight or XNA is used to develop applications and games. Microsoft has released the Windows Phone SDK, which requires Visual Studio 2010 Express for Windows Phone, Expression Blend 4 for Windows Phone, XNA Game Studio 4.0. The installation file format has changed from .cab, used in Windows Mobile, to a new one - .xap.

At the end of 2012, Microsoft officially announced the availability of more than 150 thousand applications in the Windows Phone Store and the operation of the store in 191 countries. In the summer of 2013, the number of applications in the store reached 165 thousand. In August of the same year, the number of downloads on the Windows Phone Store reached two billion.

At the end of June 2015, there were more than 380 thousand applications in the store.

Reaction

Metro UI reviews

The Metro UI style (later renamed Modern UI) and the overall interface of the operating system received positive reviews, including praise for the interface design by ZDNet. Engadget and ZDNet have been well received by Facebook's integration with the People hub, as well as other built-in features.

Among the system's shortcomings, Mobile Review experts cite the lack of intuitiveness of the interface and the fact that device manufacturers cannot install their own dialers, browsers, keyboards and other applications.

Reviews of Windows Phone devices

Positive features also included the ability to get 7 GB of cloud storage on OneDrive and the ability to read and edit Word, Excel, PowerPoint files and OneNote notes directly on the phone.

In a review of the Mobile Review resource, Windows Phone devices received positive feedback for the uniform style of all applications, completeness backup(SMS and last calls automatically pull up from cloud storage), as well as close integration with social Facebook networks and Twitter.

Market share

The crisis helped WP. Sales of smartphones based on Windows Phone in Russia grew sharply at the beginning of 2015 amid the crisis. Smartphones with Microsoft's operating system have replaced the iPhone. In unit terms, Windows smartphones actually outperformed the iPhone in the first five months of 2015, confirm Euroset representative Ulyana Smolskaya and MTS representative Dmitry Solodovnikov. The latter notes that the share of devices on Windows started grow back in December last year.

According to a report by the analytical company International Data Corporation, in 2013, Windows Phone was among the top three in the release of operating systems for smartphones and was named the platform with the fastest growth in market share (at the time of publication, the growth was 91% per year). Windows Phone is the third most widely used operating system in 9 markets.

In 2015, according to information from Svyaznoy, Windows sales Phone in Russia grew by 107%. The share of smartphones running Windows OS reached record levels for the first time in all sales history. Compared to 2014, the figure has doubled.

However, according to the analytical company IDC, the market share of Windows Phone-based devices, having passed its peak in 2013 with a value of 3.4%, fell to 2.5% in the second quarter of 2014. Subsequently, the share of Windows Phone only decreased, reaching 1.6% by the end of 2015. By mid-2016, the share of Windows Phone dropped to a historical low of 0.7% of the market.

Notes

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How to update phone software on WP7 (undefined) Archived from the original on December 27, 2012.
How to update phone software on WP8 (undefined) . Microsoft. Retrieved December 26, 2012. Archived December 27, 2012.
(undefined) . Expert. Retrieved June 24, 2012. Archived August 8, 2012.
Windows Phone 7: in search of individuality / Software / 3DNews - Daily Digital Digest
Review of Microsoft Windows Phone 7.5 Mango: the new OS is already in Russia / Hi-Tech.Mail.Ru
Windows 10 Mobile End of Support: FAQ
Microsoft recommends switching to iPhone or Android as it prepares to kill off Windows phones
アーカイブされたコピー (undefined) . Retrieved June 29, 2012. Archived August 5, 2012.
Microsoft talks Windows Phone 7 Series development ahead of GDC: Silverlight, XNA, and no backward compatibility
Microsoft Press Center
Windows 10 will be the same for all devices
Steve Ballmer wishes Windows Mobile 7 had already launched, but they screwed up | MobileTechWorld
Microsoft Explains Windows Phone 7 Lack of Compatibility
Windows Phone 7’s multitasking uses zoomed-out cards to check on your apps
Multitasking, IE9 coming to Windows Phone - CNET (undefined) (unavailable link). Retrieved June 3, 2014. Archived April 25, 2012.
“We took the best from Apple and Android”
Microsoft MIX’2011, day two: the future of Windows Phone 7 smartphones / Hi-Tech.Mail.Ru
Official: Mango Market Name - Windows Phone 7.5 / Hardware News / 3DNews - Daily Digital Digest
Windows Phone - Using cameras in Windows Phone 7.5
Nokia Lumia 610 hands-on (video)
Windows Phone hardware requirements have changed - a camera is now optional / Hardware News / 3DNews - Daily Digital Digest
Windows Phone 7.5 Refresh / Hi-Tech.Mail.Ru
Inside Windows Phone #33 | Windows Phone 7.5 Refresh & 60% more Opportunity! | Inside Windows Phone | Channel 9
Ferra.ru - Windows Phone 7.8 update will be released in early 2013
Presentation of Windows Phone 8: live broadcast of the announcement in Russian - Hi-Tech Mail.Ru
Windows Phone 7 devices will not be updated to Windows Phone 8 / Hi-Tech.Mail.Ru
Windows Phone 7 will receive updates for another year and a half | Windows Phone 7 | News | Windows Phone Live!
Windows Phone 7.8 will be launched in China in the coming weeks / Software News / 3DNews - Daily Digital Digest
Terry Myerson: Windows Phone 7.8 and Windows Phone 8 "will be around for quite a long time" / Software News / 3DNews - Daily Digital Digest
Lenta.ru: Science and technology: Microsoft introduced Windows Phone 8
Windows Phone 8 officially unveiled / Hardware News / 3DNews - Daily Digital Digest
Microsoft's new weapon in mobile games: DirectX on Windows Phone 8 / software news / 3DNews - Daily Digital Digest
Ferra.ru - Existing WP7 smartphones will only be updated to Windows Phone 7.8
Microsoft officially introduced Windows Phone 8 with new features | IT | Digit. Online technology magazine Archived January 27, 2013.
2 billion downloads from the Windows Phone Store / Hi-Tech.Mail.Ru
Archived copy (undefined) (unavailable link). Retrieved June 30, 2012. Archived June 24, 2012.

When choosing a smartphone, we look at different factors, and one of the main ones is the operating system, which we will have to deal with. Google Android, Apple iPhone or Microsoft Windows Phone? Many buyers believe that the main competition is between the first two, and Windows Phone is not serious. But we will try to debunk this myth.

10 Windows benefits Phone

Plus one: this is not an iPhone

From the point of view of Yabloko, this looks like a definite drawback, but non-fans of Cupertino products will clearly look at this fact with interest.

In fact, in many ways the ideology of the iOS and WP8 operating systems is similar: both are closed from “external influences,” a strict selection of applications, and a rather narrow selection of gadgets. But if Apple only needs to deal with gadgets from Apple itself, then Microsoft is doing much better in this regard: Windows Phone smartphones are produced by many respected manufacturers, from Microsoft itself to HTC and Samsung (the latter - even despite the promotion of its competitor WP - OC Tizen).

If we add up and discard technical details, then Windows Phone can be called “iOS without Apple.” The latter, as you know, likes to set completely ridiculous prices for its components, while there is no such problem with gadgets on Windows Phone; the components here are the most “ordinary” ones. In general, if you like the ideology of Apple devices, but don’t like the pricing (or any other) policy of the Apple company, take a closer look at WP smartphones and Windows tablets.

Plus the second: yes, it's Windows

In view of the upcoming unification of operating rooms Microsoft systems For all mobile and desktop devices, this advantage looks especially attractive. Now a smartphone running Windows Phone 8.1 also synchronizes with Windows 8.1 without problems, but when Windows 10 comes out, it will be Windows 10 for everyone, without the Phone prefix. By the way, a release for developers has already been released, which seems to be a hint.

Such unification means, at a minimum, the absence of problems with synchronizing gadgets (and now they are small, but they do occur), and the ease of use on all devices should, in theory, be similar.

In principle, approximately the same can be said about different versions of Apple iOS, but not about Google Android. Yes, there are Chromebooks, but this is where the variety of types of Android devices ends.

Plus three: there is no problem of lack of RAM

This is the scourge of Android devices: once 512 MB of RAM was enough, but now 2 GB is considered the minimum acceptable for comfortable work. While the Lumia 720 on Windows Phone 8 easily copes with the same 512 megabytes of RAM, and even allows you to comfortably work with the navigation system (which the author personally tested a couple of years ago), not to mention the 2010 HTC Mozart with its 576 megabytes of memory: despite the obsolescence of the Windows Phone 7.8 OS and the actual cessation of support for this version of Microsoft, you can still work comfortably on this device (unless, of course, you install “heavy” games). Moreover, you don’t have to disable various “beauties” such as menu transition animations. Of course, there are already top-end WP devices with 2 gigabytes of RAM.

But a three-year-old Android smartphone with one gigabyte of memory on the fourth version of the operating system today is ungodly slow, and devices with three gigabytes of RAM actually cause more sadness than joy, since the trends of “more, more, more!” This is quite appropriate.

By the way, the Apple iPhone also does not have a similar problem, which is proven by the presence of “old” iPhones of the third dash of the fifth generation in advertisements and at well-attended auctions, where they sell like hot cakes. And that's not only because iOS is a smart and simple operating system in its own right, but also because iOS doesn't have the same RAM issues as Windows Phone.

Unlike Android. Increasing RAM in Android phones only proves this.

Plus four: default applications

Since only the lazy don’t buy Android smartphones in the basement (just look in any Chinese online store at their number, amounting to tens of thousands), they usually do not have a rich set of equipment by default. Of course, various major vendors like Samsung or HTC will cram into their version Android set all the do's and don'ts, but the vast majority of Android smartphones on the market have nothing but stock firmware. Someone generous can, perhaps, give free shell and a couple of free applications. But the common denominator we have is that a small amount of(4% of the market, plus or minus, according to analysts) Windows Phone smartphones give their users quite a lot of useful branded applications, and the mega-diversity of Android leads to the fact that you have to finish everything yourself. Even with the excellent HTC Sense shell.

By the way, a pleasant bonus is the swipe keyboard in bundled Windows Phone 8.1: while in Google Android such an innovation appeared regularly only some time ago (somewhere around versions 4.2-4.3), and before that it was necessary to use paid application Swype or its analogues, the free versions of which were not nearly as good, having, among other things, extremely poor default dictionaries.

True, Windows Phone does not have Google Chrome (as well as Hangouts), but it does have everything else. And even Google account synchronization is the same as the default Hotmail account. There is also a cloud application Microsoft OneDrive- similar functionality in Android is Google name Drive provides the same space in both clouds: 15 GB each.

Plus fifth: there is little that can be configured (and broken accordingly)

Probably, many will at first decide to put this plus as a minus, but if you look from the point of view of the average user, what does he want? Only one thing: that everything you need is there, and that it all works as it should. Without “finishing”, “rooting”, “customization” and other scary words. Buy it and use it.

With Windows Phone, everything is exactly like this: I took it out of the box and everything works. You can change the color of the “tiles”, make a ringtone, organize the desktop at your discretion, but you don’t need to unlock your smartphone to get superuser rights, install tricky applications to clean and reorganize memory, both RAM and ROM... Because everything works great without it .

By the way, this plus can also be attributed to Apple - once again.

Plus six: simplicity

But since we already mentioned the iPhone, Microsoft’s operating system can give the user the same simplicity. Yes, there are not very many applications (yet), but their number is increasing. Yes, customization is very limited (see above) - but you don’t need to shamanize with a tambourine for something to work.

Simplicity is the guiding principle not only of the iPhone, but also of smartphones based on Windows Phone. They simply won’t let you mess up anything in the system (including applications), the ways to get something you need are also easy, and even a child can figure everything out (especially since there is a very simple and effective children’s mode called “Children’s corner" (Kid's Corner). "Usability", in general, is excellent.

Plus seventh: OS update regardless of manufacturer and device class

Everyone is familiar with the Android distribution model: it comes out a new version The OS appears on the newest Nexuses, then smartphone manufacturers begin to slowly shake things up and very slowly integrate the new OS into their firmware. Sometimes months pass, and in some cases, the new Android does not reach seemingly current devices at all.

With Windows Phone 8, everything is simpler: updates appear for all devices at approximately the same time, and for both the weak Lumia 520 and the powerful HTC 8x, all functions are available equally, except that games on weak WP smartphones will slow down. There is no “finishing” of your own shells: the firmware of different manufacturers differs, perhaps, in the amount of proprietary software, which is also not very much.

Plus eight: safety

In fact, the roots of this grow not from the fact that in principle there are no viruses in Microsoft’s mobile OS (as in the joke about Elusive Joe), unlike its desktop relative, but from the fact that, due to their low prevalence, they simply have not yet begun to be written.

The second reason is secrecy source code, which makes the OS virtually unhackable, at least for now. And antivirus for Android today is almost a must-have application for all “droid drivers”.

Plus Nine: Xbox Live

This is more of a plus for gamers, but it's still worth mentioning: the Xbox Live system is integrated into Windows Phone, so you can use your profile on this system for all games, collecting points and “pumping up” your character, and there are common features for everything rating tables where you can compete with other players not in just one game separately, but in all of them at once.

Plus tenth: standard navigation system

While there are still debates on the “Internet” about which is better, Microsoft is quietly building into its Lumia smartphones free full-fledged offline navigation system HERE and has no problems with it. The system is really very powerful, there are updated maps of all countries of the world, there is a really full driving mode (offline!) in the HERE Drive application with voice prompts, there is also an application indicating the nearest places (from cafes to shopping centers) in the mode of overlaying on a three-dimensional map with positioning in space.

Minus y HERE maps, perhaps, one: cards are downloaded only into the built-in memory and categorically do not want to live on a flash drive. Well, no one is perfect.

As for offline navigators on Android, here we can allow a small lyrical digression into the topic. A few days ago, the author of this article watched a video of one popular autoblogger, in which he proved to us that a separate navigator where better than a smartphone. At the same time, the rather ancient Samsung acted as a smartphone, and the much-cursed Navitel acted as a navigation system. That is, it turns out like this: if you have an old Samsung smartphone, and you bought Navitel at an expensive price, then it’s better to buy a separate navigator.

The main thing is that you can’t argue with anything here. Everything is just like that. And many owners of old Android devices think the same way.

Conclusion

Of course, the Windows Phone operating system also has its drawbacks (remember, no one is perfect), but we hope we have clearly demonstrated to you that this OS is quite competitive. In terms of simplicity and convenience, it is not inferior to iOS, and smartphones on it are several times cheaper. Like, for example, or, which we recently talked about.

In this article, we look at the Windows Phone 8 operating system, its features, applications for WP8 and the operation of devices that use it.

Here we will not conduct a detailed review of its interface or share impressions of the operation of this OS. The purpose of the article is to understand the features of both Windows Phone 8 and the devices on which it is installed. And also sort out the main nuances and distinctive features of smartphones running Windows Phone 8 that are not obvious at first glance. This operating system came out several years later than the boom of touch-screen devices and now remains in the shadows, partly because it is simply unusual for most users.

Features of Windows Phone 8

The WP8 interface is very different from its competitors, although this platform provides users with an almost identical set of functions. For most smartphone users, it’s a little unusual to work with this OS, but they say you can get used to it in just a couple of days. WP users point out the exceptional convenience and “smoothness” of the OS, while users from the other camp are perplexed.
Among the striking differences of WP8 are, first of all, high stability and speed of operation (even on weak devices) and, at the same time, limited possibilities for customizing and customizing the operating system. Yes, WP8 is faster than iOS and gives users less flexibility in terms of interface customization.

Pros and cons of the system

Let's first look at the pros and cons of Windows Phone 8 relative to its competitors solely as an operating system, without taking into account applications and devices on WP8 for now.

Pros:

As noted above, WP8 works stably, without freezing or rebooting - there are always enough resources for applications.
WP8 is well optimized and works quite fast. And those moments in which it can slow down are smoothed out by animation.
Due to the closed nature of the OS, there are no viruses for it.
Integration with social networks at the operating system level. Contacts from networks are merged with phone book, and Facebook chat is implemented in the same format as SMS correspondence.
The ability to fully control the device remotely from a computer.
Built into the OS is the ability to use it at the corporate level: encryption, remote data wipe, etc. In this regard, WP8 is more functional than iOS and more secure than Android.

Minuses:

Limited interface customization options.
A closed file system, which imposes small restrictions on the operation of applications. The following cannot always be implemented: sending files, managing media content, etc.
Lack of a “notification center” or, in common parlance, a curtain. On the other hand, all the features provided by iOS or Android in this way are compensated by other OS features.
Inability to use most Google services (more on this below).
Some users are not satisfied with the format for adding and editing contacts in their phone. On the other hand, this is compensated by the versatility of the contact system.

Windows Phone 8 and Google

Google, for various reasons, is not going to release mobile applications for WP8 for its services. Rumor has it that this is due to marketing strategy.
Most notably, on WP8 you can't sync your calendar with Google Celendar, there's no authentic Google Maps, and there's no separate app for Gmail. Access to YouTube for Windows Phone apps is also blocked.

Applications in Windows Phone 8

In the first time after the release of WP8 OS, it was significantly inferior in terms of the number of applications in the market. After some time, the situation leveled out, and now applications for most popular services are available on the Windows Phone Store. On the other hand, small companies and startups rarely release applications for Windows Phone.

The operating system from Microsoft uses MS Office (free mobile version) and Internet Explorer. Worthy alternatives there is no native browser on this platform, but it almost always works quickly and adequately. Nokia devices also come with Nokia Maps, which, according to some reviews, is better than Google's.
Among other things, the so-called “Rooms”, inside which users are in constant contact, receive notifications from social networks about the activity of other room participants, can use multifunctional chat, etc.

Censorship inside the WP Store is almost as strict as in Apple Store— the number of frankly lousy applications in the marketplace has been reduced to almost zero.
Also, developers for Windows Phone are officially recommended to create applications using a uniform design and standard navigation methods for all. Which gives its results: applications on Windows Phone look much less varied than applications on other OSes, and users always know what to expect when they swipe/tap on the screen.

Windows Phone 8 devices

A few facts:

This OS can only be found on smartphones: for tablets, either Windows RT or full-fledged Windows 8 is used.
According to Microsoft policy, any device running WP8 is guaranteed three years of support for operating system updates.
Since Windows Phone is a proprietary and paid OS, the range of manufacturers of such smartphones is extremely limited.
Windows Phone smartphones become significantly cheaper when newer devices are released, unlike Apple or Samsung products.

WP8 devices are most popular in developing countries - due to the availability of high-quality budget models. In addition, some organizations are implementing WP8 devices at the company level due to system security and enterprise features.

via Alexandr Mikhaylenko, Windows Phone user