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Microsoft releases free Windows Phone 7 Series developer tools
News by Todd Haselton on Monday March 15, 2010.
Today at the MIX Conference in Las Vegas, Microsoft showed off its free new developer tools for Windows Phone 7 Series.
The developer packages include Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 Express for Windows Phone, XNA Game Studio 4.0, an Windows Phone 7 Series emulator, and a beta of Express Blend 4. A release candidate for Silverlight 4 is also available today.
The new development platform will combine features from Silverlight 4 and XNA Framework for application and game development. Developers will have access to the accelerometer, a Microsoft location service, a notification service, hardware-accelerated video, internet information services, multitouch support, and camera and microphone functionality.
Microsoft discussed its new Windows Phone Marketplace, which will now support try-before-you-buy apps, mobile billing, advertising-funded apps, and credit card purchases.
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About the author
Todd Haselton
Todd is a senior editor at MobileBurn and works out of his home in New York City. He covers news for us and also writes reviews. You can follow him on Twitter at @RoboTodd
fisherma @ 4:05:56PM EDT on Monday March 15, 2010
this is a good step on MS's part. esp if theyre switching platforms (new OS) for their upcoming Win Ph 7. but its only a small first step in getting into the hearts of developers -- who create apps and content, which helps drive the adoption of a platform. you want a developer to try your integrated development environment and flirt with making an app or two for you phone? make the dev software free. not trial. not express. free. that way they dont have to get approval from their manager; dont have to go through any procurement process; dont even have to ask their wife. they can download and start in on a tutorial. and if their operating system were less expensive too, that would also help.
hate to bring up the "A" word here, but Apple has it right charging $0 for is pretty impressive x-code development environment (included with every Mac sold or download for free) and how much is the iPhone software dev kit that integrates into the x-code dev environment? again, free. oh wait, and if you want access to pre-release beta software for their platforms, well that costs money but still only $99 bucks for an annual membership.
MS, please stop being cheapskates and trying to get big dollars (visual studio 2010 is $549 for the _upgrade_ at Amazon). if you want me to develop for you youre going to have to at least do what others are doing to encourage adoption.
but again, some encouraging first steps. kudos for giving it a try.