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The more serious Microsoft gets, the sillier I become.

Meet Cortana!! What's new in Cortana!! Where's Cortana?? Start using Cortana!! What can I say to Cortana?? What can Cortana help me with?? Cortana's Notebook!! Cortana's settings!! Favorite places and Cortana!! Find music with Cortana!! My inner circle and Cortana!! Quiet hours and Cortana!! My interests and Cortana!! Add interests in Cortana's Notebook!! Remind me, Cortana!! Play music with Cortana!! Use Cortana in my car!! Solutions to Cortana issues!! Why didn't I get a reminder when I was supposed to?? Cortana alpha!!

[hides phone] Where's Cortana?? [counts loudly] Ready or not here I come!
[finds phone] Here you are!! Peekboo I see you!! [covers camera] Gues who??
Cortana: "It's you, [your name]. He he that was fun. Let's play again!!"
Play dress-up with Cortana!!
Welcome to my Inner Circle Cortana. I'll light the candles and you summon the demons.
One fish!! Two fish!! Red fish!! Blue fish!!
I do not like them Sam I Am.
I do not like Egghead Speaky Glam.
I will not speak into a box.
I will not summon clips from Fox.
I will not use it on a train.
I will not plant it in my brain.

Cortana is your personal assistant on your Windows Phone. She's there to help make things easier for you and keep you up to date on the things that matter to you. Whether it's to keep you looped in with your world or help you manage your everyday life, Cortana is there for you.

Keeping up to date with Cortana!!
Quiet hours and Cortana!!
Pillow fights with Cortana!!
Having a blast with Cortana!!
Explore My Secret Places with Cortana!!
Having a cigarette with Cortana!!
How high can I toss Cortana??
Cortana summon World's Most Expensive Flashlight[tm]!!
Does Cortana sleep in the Cloud??
Am I being sucked into the Cloud??
When I die, Cortana, will the Cloud remember me??

There are just a few things to do to get going with Cortana --- like making sure she's on.

Things to do!! Doing things!! Doing the doing-things thing.
Let's get going Cortana!!
Are you on?? "Yes I am on."
Are you on?? "Yes I am on."
Are you on?? "Yes I am on. Battery low."
Are you on?? "Shut the fuck up meatbag."

No, it really isn't. ICS lets a user connect to a PC and access the internet through that PC. The PC becomes an access point.

WiFi Sense lets your friends connect directly to your router, by securely sharing its details with them. Your PC doesn't even have to be on.

This is how it's possible for your friends to share those router details with their friends. Win10 doesn't know it's your router and not theirs, it will let anyone with the password enable WiFi Sense sharing.

Oh, excuse me then. I thought you were simply too stupid to understand common hardware. You claim you do have that basic level of intelligence. You simply lack all ability to actually convey your knowledge to others.

No fucking shit, Sherlock. But that has nothing to do with WiFi Sense. Ever hear of internet connection sharing and ad-hoc networking? That's how WiFi Sense works, stupid little shit.

I just read the explanation on http://www.windowsphone.com/en... , and it doesn't sound like internet connection sharing at all. It sounds like credentials are being sent to people so they can join a network without the consent or agreement of the network owner/administrator.

Back to the original post I replied to;

*facepalm*

If you're asking this question, you shouldn't be trying to admin a corporate network.

At the very least (assuming that AC is you), you either are too stupid to understand the meaning of the post you replied to, or, as stated above, you are too stupid to make a coherent argument.

From prior experience, anyone who uses *facepalm* as their argument usually falls into the second category.

WiFi Sense can automatically connect you to open WiFi networks that other Windows Phone users have crowdsourced by connecting to them. These are usually open WiFi hotspots you see when you're out and about. When one of these crowdsourced hotspots is in range, WiFi Sense can connect you to it automatically to give you Internet access. When you first set up your phone, you can determine if you want WiFi Sense to do this, and you can change this setting whenever you want.

Source

When you share WiFi network access with Facebook friends, Outlook.com contacts or Skype contacts, they'll be connected to the password-protected WiFi networks that you choose to share and get Internet access when they're in range of the networks (if they use WiFi Sense). Likewise, you'll be connected to WiFi networks that they share for Internet access too. Remember, you don't get to see WiFi network passwords, and you both get Internet access only. They won't have access to other computers, devices or files stored on your home network, and you won't have access to these things on their network.

Source

WiFi Sense can automatically connect you to open WiFi networks that other Windows Phone users have crowdsourced by connecting to them. These are usually open WiFi hotspots you see when you're out and about. When one of these crowdsourced hotspots is in range, WiFi Sense can connect you to it automatically to give you Internet access. When you first set up your phone, you can determine if you want WiFi Sense to do this, and you can change this setting whenever you want.

Source

When you share WiFi network access with Facebook friends, Outlook.com contacts or Skype contacts, they'll be connected to the password-protected WiFi networks that you choose to share and get Internet access when they're in range of the networks (if they use WiFi Sense). Likewise, you'll be connected to WiFi networks that they share for Internet access too. Remember, you don't get to see WiFi network passwords, and you both get Internet access only. They won't have access to other computers, devices or files stored on your home network, and you won't have access to these things on their network.

Source

The way I read it, they probably don't.

The FAQ seems to imply that it is only applicable to open routers:

What does Wi-Fi Sense do?

Wi-Fi Sense connects you to Wi-Fi networks around you to help you save cellular data. It can do these things for you to get you Internet access:

Automatically connect you to open Wi-Fi networks it knows about by crowdsourcing networks that other Windows Phone users have connected to. These are typically open Wi-Fi hotspots you see when you're out and about.

Still very questionable, but perhaps not nearly as pervasive. I'd think it would mostly apply to hotels, restaurants, and other places of business.

What phone do you have that doesn't have a Minecraft version? It was ported to WP8 near-instantly upon acquisition. http://www.windowsphone.com/en...

If you're still running WP7, well, um... sucks to be you? Considering that there are sub-$100 (full price, no carrier subsidy) WP8 devices, there's no excuse for running a two-years-since-last-release OS. Even carrier contracts bought at exactly the wrong time would let you upgrade by now.

You're probably a Windows Phonie. FWIW I have a Windows Phone that I use as a backup phone, and honestly it's a piece of shit.

For example if I open the built in weather app, it takes 6 seconds to open, and when it finally opens I get...another load screen that lasts 5 seconds...and after that, I get a screen full of advertisements and a tiny bit of actual weather information.

Meanwhile here's a youtube video showing KitKat running quite smoothly on a Nexus One, which has a 1GHz single core CPU and 512MB of ram (And just so happens to be Google's minimum requirements.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

And before you make any comments about Android slowing down as you install apps, that's a relic of days past before Google required OEMs to support the TRIM function, thus as data was written and re-written, things slowed down over time, even if you rebooted. However that is no longer the case.

Meanwhile your vaunted Windows Phone requires more than twice the CPU, twice the RAM, in addition to four times the NAND capacity, just to load that piece of crap weather app really slowly. Microsoft even says so themselves:

https://dev.windowsphone.com/e...

You were saying?

No. That's the style of site built by marketers who don't know what the fuck they're doing with Bootstrap. "Oooh...that's a nice feature, throw it in. I like how that moves, throw it in. What? Organize thoughts into actual informative pages? Screw that, we'll just put everything we have out there on one page and make the user scroll for miles and we'll just dazzle them with all the cool moving images and eye candy! Beats having to work to actually compile information." And it's not just start ups that fall victim to this bullshit. Google, Apple, and Microsoft are just as guilty, though MS shows a bit more restraint on the flashiness. It shows a complete lack of self control and critical thought in their product message. Seriously, dude, I've seen geoshitty sites that were built better and actually conveyed meaningful information about what they were selling.

Google (like Apple), wants your credit card info for the play store

Is it really any different from ways to pay for purchases on Windows Phone Store?

I use the App for Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8:
Windows: http://apps.microsoft.com/wind...
Phone: http://www.windowsphone.com/en...

Apple phones have already had this for years.

Blackberry phones have already had this for years.

Android phones have already had this for years.

Windows phones have already had this for years.

What exactly is this law going to change, force FirefoxOS or Sailfish phones to add a remote killswitch? It sure sounds like people are getting riled up about something that has already been done to 99% of the smartphones on the market because now it's "the rules" that they continue to due what they're already doing.

AFAIK it's the only mobile OS doing so.

That seems to be true. Here's additional proof that Windows Phone and iOS do not currently support such feature.

Oh please, you are *completely* full of shit. WP8 has Pocket File Manager, and WP8.1 has added even more support for file access (I don't know if anybody has yet published an app that uses it to make a general-purpose file browser).

Yeah, the apps can't *see* much because they run with excruciatingly low privileges - PFM has a special capability that gives full access to some locations most apps can't access at all - but the SD card and public folders are accessible.

There's also homebrew, like https://wp8webserver.codeplex.... or http://forum.xda-developers.co...

Swype is a popular third-party keyboard for Android phones (and also available for Windows phones and other platforms).

I know it's popular to bash Microsoft and their products, but Swype is not available for Windows Phone. Windows Phone 8.1 adds a "Word Flow Keyboard", but it is developed by Microsoft as part of their OS. Third party developers cannot create keyboards for Windows Phone.

But you don't have to take my word for it. Currently Windows Phone does not support Swype.

Instructions are available here?

Keep in mind it is a one way ticket. No way to downgrade back to 8.0 and reset wont work. If you are not an American you lose your metric standards too and have miles and temperatures in F. Cortana is optimized too for American accents in this release.

SO it is caution if you own a Windows Phone. I own one and I will not be upgrading as I use the conferencing feature on my phone anyday and do not want to take risks.

My iPhone came with Apple maps yet I use Google maps, I don't use an iCloud email and the default search engine just happens to already be Google, but I can change that.

So you do realise that just because something is the default doesn't mean you have to use it don't you? There is a simple browser setting to change the default search from bing to google. You also don't have to use Outlook.com just like on Android how you don't have to use Gmail. And you can use Google Maps through the website or through an app like Maps+.

Grand Theft Auto, you say?

Talk for Me - Windows Phone: http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/store/app/talk-for-me/1a9d317f-e55c-44c1-a643-e1dd4b4fafa9

Yeah, if only there was a third option

(note, I love my android devices)

Have you even tried to find a Windows Phone? [...] I gave up.. I actually wanted to develop apps for it.. and it just became too much frustration

I suspect the "I actually wanted to develop for it" was a lie, too... given that they're so easy to find and the dev tools are free for it.

I was under the impression that it was like the iPhone, costing a recurring fee to be able to run programs that you wrote on a device that you own. This link claims that each "valid and current developer account on Windows Phone Dev Center [...] lets you register three devices for app development", and this link claims that a developer account costs $99 and self-destructs after 365 days.

LinkedIn, that's a great example! Thank you!

Do you ever wonder why an app that has the cumulative average rating of 4.5+ stars (may be more) has so many bad reviews recently? And don't you wonder why there is so much disparity between the good reviews and the negative reviews.

The MS app store doesn't tell you which version of the Windows Phone each review is based on, but may be you could take a guess at what's causing the new influx of negative reviews among all the five stars reviews this app currently enjoys?

Buggy in wp8 l920. Lots of errors
by Mark
3/18/2013
Constant error messages. Never seems to get fixed.
by Michal
3/18/2013
Bags with connection, but it is nice app. Update pls
by Jain
3/18/2013
Good app.. Never had any problem. But lacks many features as compared to other platforms.
by TAHMINA
3/18/2013
Broken - errors all the time
by Alessandro
3/17/2013
Quite complete and usable, a must have for me!
by User
3/16/2013
Good app, but please add a feature so we can see sent emails. Thanks.
by User
3/15/2013
Not as good as the google or apple versions
by User
3/15/2013
Too many oops something went wrong errors...
by Gerald
3/15/2013
Doesn't load properly on Nokia 930 Windows 8 phone
by Abdulrehman
3/15/2013
Many bugs- errors out freqly
by chrissy
3/15/2013
Login fails immediately, doesn't wait for async call to data auth service. :(
by Michael
3/14/2013
Fix this garbage app!! Can't believe you published linkedin on windows phone like this.
by User
3/14/2013
Nunca me corrio
by Ramkumar
3/13/2013
Doesn't work 90% of the time. Failed to load data with error messages.

Those negative reviews coming from the "wp8 l920" user and the "Nokia 930 Windows phone 8" user are interesting, aren't they? Personally, I wouldn't be surprised if the only negative reviews this app was attracting were only from the WP8 users, and the only glowing reviews were coming from the WP7 users. It's too bad I can't prove this without the shadow of a doubt. Someone like you would never believe such a guess on my part.

And what breaking change between WP7 and WP8 could possibly trigger this "Doesn't work 90% of the time. Failed to load data with error messages"? I did promise you I'd look into that. Let's see. I would guess those two changes:

Change
When your app makes an SSL request to a web service or web site, apps that target Windows Phone 8 contact the issuer of the site's certificate for the security certificate revocation list. This additional network request in Windows Phone 8 apps increases the time required for the SSL request. If the certificate revocation list is not received in a timely manner, the SSL request may time out, especially over a slow or unreliable network connection.

Impact/Workaround
Make sure that your app handles the possibility of a timeout and retries the request or continues without the requested data.

Change
In Windows Phone 8, the background transfer service will transfer on the following data networks while the app is in the foreground. In Windows Phone OS 7.0, transfers do not occur on these data networks, regardless of whether the app is running in the foreground.
2G, EDGE, Standard, GPRS
In Windows Phone 8, transfers won’t proceed on these networks while the app is not in the foreground. This limitation is shared by the HttpWebRequest object, so performing your own transfer doesn’t provide any advantages over using background transfers. On networks that are 3G and higher, background transfers will proceed on both Windows Phone 8 or Windows Phone OS 7.1, regardless of whether the app is running in the foreground, assuming all other conditions are met.
Background transfers will occur in W

Check out the reviews of the Windows Phone app. When a newpaper's app has obvious misspellings that are uncorrected for over a year, it doesn't reflect well on that newpaper's mobile team.

Does winphone have skype working properly yet?

Yes. As of WP8.

Meaning it can fireup the app when a call comes in?

Yes. As of WP8.

ssh

Have fun.

Don't bother, there is at least one application that proves the GP is full of shit.

MetroTube is awesome, but it too was a victim of Google's shenanigans with Windows Phone and only recently released an update to fix it.

http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/store/app/metrotube/8d93224f-2808-e011-9264-00237de2db9e Metrotube is not free.

Don't bother, there is at least one application that proves the GP is full of shit.

We should never bring up that the Symbian Market Place alone had 80k apps.

So like... 1/10th of the number of apps both iOS and Android accrued in shorter time, and already surpassed by WP 7.5?

Face it, development for Symbian was pain and tears. Qt relieved it, but only to an extent. I was around when they were trying to design Qt Mobility APIs around both S60's existing APIs and various Nokia managers with requirement lists apparently thought up in bouts of Powerpoint creativity. It's good luck that most of that shit will die off because nobody in the right mind will want to implement or use it anywhere else.

We should never mention that most of the "Apps" were actually applications as opposed to 90% being frontends for someone's blog or pictures of food and multi-lingual fart apps.

Yeah, let's carefully pick our examples. This passage actually speaks against Symbian: it shows that even a code monkey with little skills can develop and submit an app for a modern mobile OS. But let's lament the old expertocracy, where one could feel special for learning a lot of platform quirks that you must have known in order to make your oh-so-serious application work.

And I see you've been put to your place already by somebody anonymous with a hell of a life.

Ahh yes; a person who posts for Nokia on Slashdot.

I must apologize: I was confused by Slashdot's ever-helpful layout and mistook a neighboring comment of the obligatory AC on a witch hunt for insufficiently anti-Microsoft opinions (the comment he responded to was already modded down, of course), thinking it to be a reply to the thread starter.

Hey, here at Slashdot we are not spoiling a good Nokia bashing submission with boring facts.

Riiight.... Would be terrible to have that. We should never bring up that the Symbian Market Place alone had 80k apps. We would certainly never mention that there were plenty of other places to get apps (e.g. the best SSH apps never made it to the market place at all). We should never mention that most of the "Apps" were actually applications as opposed to 90% being frontends for someone's blog or pictures of food and multi-lingual fart apps. No, it would never do to suggest that a system like that had a more solid eco-system than Windows has on the mobile even though Windows has been there longer than Symbian.

And I see you've been put to your place already by somebody anonymous with a hell of a life.

Ahh yes; a person who posts for Nokia on Slashdot. A person who has sat there in the middle as his own country's main employer is destroyed to save it's American shareholder's investment in Microsoft. A person who has seen the company he works for ripped off; selling it's soul and still ending up displaced by a cheap Chinese clone maker. A person basically working to fuck his own countrymen by taking as much of their lifeblood as possible away from them and sending it to Redmond. That person is trying to intimidate anonymous posters on Slashdot by threatening to accuse them of having a "hell of a life". You think we will go off and commit suicide or something? Do you have a sense of irony?

Looks like it. Since they are saying WP8 has >100k apps. They must be counting WP7 apps.

http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/store

PUNCHLINE:

http://www.windowsphone.com/en-US/How-to/wp7/mac-connector

The page hit counter said I was visitor #107. I never realized there were that many Mac owners who had a Windows 7 phone!

PUNCHLINE:

http://www.windowsphone.com/en-US/How-to/wp7/mac-connector

All the browsers available in the App Store are just wrappers and skins on the Safari browser engine, except Opera Mini, which runs the browser engine in the cloud to escape Apple's banning of running Javascript(or any other JIT code).

That's why there is no Firefox or Chrome(or even IE ;) for iOS.

Perhaps the browsers available in the App Sore are just wrappers and skins for Safari, however the developers are welcome to charge for them, hence there are other browsers available, hence no monopoly. Sorry.

I think similar logic can be applied to Windows RT as well. If it's anything like Windows Phone(which I very well suspect it is), you can wrap and skin IE in an app and charge for it.

Eg. http://www.windowsphone.com/en-US/apps/60aa8848-6cc8-4ec4-94b7-1d134550b57b?wa=wsignin1.0

Hence, no monopoly. Sorry.

There are 85,000 apps in the Windows Phone marketplace now, not stellar but nothing to sneer at either.

Really? Let's see if it's nothing to sneer at. Here's a list of the top apps in the entertainment category on the windows phone app store. It is a cesspool of misogynist "boob" apps, sex position apps, rip-off iOS and Android apps and the rest is just pure throw-away junk.

*sneer*

It's not much different in the Android Marketplace... excuse me... Google Play.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/category/ENTERTAINMENT?feature=category-nav

However, I am sure "Pocket Girlfriend' is an app that you'd need.

There are 85,000 apps in the Windows Phone marketplace now, not stellar but nothing to sneer at either.

Really? Let's see if it's nothing to sneer at. Here's a list of the top apps in the entertainment category on the windows phone app store. It is a cesspool of misogynist "boob" apps, sex position apps, rip-off iOS and Android apps and the rest is just pure throw-away junk.

*sneer*

Bah! yet again Microsoft leads the way with everything from the little squeaker to Nuclear farts (which are PROFESSIONAL nuclear farts no less) to finally The Ultimate Fart! and all of them will cost you money! Never let it be said that Microsoft can't make the WinPhone just as stupid as everyone else!

Bah! yet again Microsoft leads the way with everything from the little squeaker to Nuclear farts (which are PROFESSIONAL nuclear farts no less) to finally The Ultimate Fart! and all of them will cost you money! Never let it be said that Microsoft can't make the WinPhone just as stupid as everyone else!

Bah! yet again Microsoft leads the way with everything from the little squeaker to Nuclear farts (which are PROFESSIONAL nuclear farts no less) to finally The Ultimate Fart! and all of them will cost you money! Never let it be said that Microsoft can't make the WinPhone just as stupid as everyone else!

WP7 is even worse than Android - in Android, fart apps are usually buried and don't appear in search. In Windows Phone, I found a completely useless app in the top-45 list, which is sad because the next page is even worse.

Scott Adams likes WP7 more than iOS and Android. http://dilbert.com/blog/entry/windows_phone_challenge/ I think slowly it will catch on and will certainly be the #3 player in the mobile space. Maybe #2 eventually. They also made the marketplace available on the web so you can push apps to your phone. In addition to skydrive storage, find my phone, etc... that has been there since launch. http://www.windowsphone.com/en-US/marketplace

This is why MS has a fighting chance.

Microsoft is behind in the mobile space, and even I think they're pretty much of a long shot. But it's silly to count them out completely because, for one thing, you're not going to get developer tools as easy to use or high quality from Apple or Google. Besides their traction in the corporate world, the insanely high quality of their software tools and the amount of help they provide developers is one of their biggest strengths. Once you get developers developing high quality applications, you start getting the users.

You're quite a hate filled little individual today aren't you. Microsoft have already released the details of the "app store" for Windows Phone 7 at http://developer.windowsphone.com/ and they seem far less draconian than Apple's policies in regards to apps that compete with Microsoft's own offerings.

The thing you Apple fanbois fail to realise is that Microsoft relies heavily on their partners to produce software for the Windows platform and that's what helps it maintain in it's monopoly.

I'm not suggesting that Microsoft DON'T commit evil deeds, but before you go slagging them off you should perhaps have a look at the hoops Apple make people jump through so they can be "approved" and realise that they are FAR worse.

Yes there is an app store and IIRC you can sell apps there or serve up apps from your server using .NET compact framework or Visual C++. Here is the SDK if you want to give it a spin, but of course you'll need VS proper (no express) to use it.

And while Jobs is an avid competitor, I seriously doubt that the has any animus for Microsoft.

Google, on the other hand, is threatening Apple in its biggest growth market: mobile devices. Google offers an alternate ecosystem to Apple, to .Mac and now iDisk. Google is encroaching, encroaching, encroaching more into Apple territory than Microsoft is. Apple probably feels betrayed by Google (and vice versa, after the rejection of Google's app in the AppStore.)

All three are competing with each other in various sectors, but I think if there is bad blood anywhere right now, it is between Apple and Google.

Well then Apple has something coming to them if they don't see that they will have just as much (if not more) beef with MS as they do with Google. Let's go through your list:

- alternate ecosystem to Apple on mobile devices: check (wait until WinMo7 later this year for a bigger surprise)
- .mac: check (hotmail, msn, etc.)
- iDisk: check

They will still be competing in the area of phones, tablet devices, notebooks/netbooks. And we didn't even get started on desktop/laptop operating systems where MS has anywhere from 80% to 90% market share.

Oh and they've got something else coming to them - MS' motto is NOT "do no evil". In short, they should be aligning themselves with Google even if they get half the "deal" they think they are getting from MS. I thought they'd been burned before by the same company... fool me once....

Oh yeah?

How do you explain this then?

will Windows Marketplace be the one to get it right?