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Microsoft Makes It Easier to Bring Android and iOS Apps to Windows 10

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Re: Microsoft Makes It Easier to Bring Android and iOS Apps to Windows 10

#11

Post by marpstar »

melling wrote: post #8
plorkyeran wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd guess that obj-c compilation is just done with clang (as they're already using clang for Android). The fact that they've apparently reimplemented UIKit/Foundation/etc. is the more surprising part to me.

Unfortunately, many developers are going to be writing code in Swift. Xcode and Swift are baked and there's plenty of Swift information (e.g. http://www.h4labs.com/dev/ios/swift.html ) At this point, it's probably not worth writing in ObjC just to be compatible with Windows.

sure, maybe today. but this lays the groundwork for Swift to eventually come to Windows as well. seems naive to think that this wouldn't be their end goal.

Re: Microsoft Makes It Easier to Bring Android and iOS Apps to Windows 10

#12

Post by BinaryIdiot »

sremani wrote: post #5

It is inevitable, they are going where the apps are. Android apps will run in isolated mode on Windows 10 and you can develop Andriod apps using VS. iOS was a surprise but that would make porting more apps easier. I hope this would finally give the enough apps for Windows phone.

> I hope this would finally give the enough apps for Windows phone.

I agree; I bought a cheap-o Windows Phone to test and do development with. I'd love to use a Windows phone as my primary phone but 90% of the apps I use and need are nowhere to be found. If this can get them to bring them over, even if they don't tailer the experience it will hopefully still be good.

Re: Microsoft Makes It Easier to Bring Android and iOS Apps to Windows 10

#13

Post by JTon »

BinaryIdiot wrote: post #9

This is amazing. I'm very curious how it works under the hood with the Android and iOS platforms. It wouldn't surprise me if it gets translated into MSIL. That's how I would do it at least. Also curious what the limitations are. If this works as advertised the Windows Mobile store could go from mediocre to pretty awesome as long as they get tailored for the platform.

I know devs for BB10 felt burned when BBRY announced the Amazon app store is coming preloaded on BB 10.3 OS for "entertainment" apps. Where the native BB World app store remained for "productivity" apps. Speaking from experience, the momentum for top tier AAA apps has all but shriveled up and died

Re: Microsoft Makes It Easier to Bring Android and iOS Apps to Windows 10

#14

Post by rickyc091 »

melling wrote: post #8
plorkyeran wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd guess that obj-c compilation is just done with clang (as they're already using clang for Android). The fact that they've apparently reimplemented UIKit/Foundation/etc. is the more surprising part to me.

Unfortunately, many developers are going to be writing code in Swift. Xcode and Swift are baked and there's plenty of Swift information (e.g. http://www.h4labs.com/dev/ios/swift.html ) At this point, it's probably not worth writing in ObjC just to be compatible with Windows.

Swift probably still won't be used in production for some time due to the editor (Xcode) being extremely buggy. Error messages aren't great and with each new release of Xcode, there are syntax changes.

Re: Microsoft Makes It Easier to Bring Android and iOS Apps to Windows 10

#15

Post by melling »

marpstar wrote: post #11
melling wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, many developers are going to be writing code in Swift. Xcode and Swift are baked and there's plenty of Swift information (e.g. http://www.h4labs.com/dev/ios/swift.html ) At this point, it's probably not worth writing in ObjC just to be compatible with Windows.

sure, maybe today. but this lays the groundwork for Swift to eventually come to Windows as well. seems naive to think that this wouldn't be their end goal.

I'd love for Swift to be open source. Realistically, it'll take 2-3 years at best. I've been waiting for F# to mature for cross-platform development. That would be a great language to move to.

Re: Microsoft Makes It Easier to Bring Android and iOS Apps to Windows 10

#16

Post by TheTaO »

However exciting this is, I wonder how the support and future development will be accounted for. Porting an application is probably easy but the moment android adds a feature that is not supported by the Microsoft abstraction, you are either opting to choose the least common feature set or are maintaining two separate code bases. Both very unfavorable outcomes.

I love windows phone and don't really miss many applications on it but I know many people do. Hope this fixes it.

Re: Microsoft Makes It Easier to Bring Android and iOS Apps to Windows 10

#17

Post by cwyers »

melling wrote: post #8
plorkyeran wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd guess that obj-c compilation is just done with clang (as they're already using clang for Android). The fact that they've apparently reimplemented UIKit/Foundation/etc. is the more surprising part to me.

Unfortunately, many developers are going to be writing code in Swift. Xcode and Swift are baked and there's plenty of Swift information (e.g. http://www.h4labs.com/dev/ios/swift.html ) At this point, it's probably not worth writing in ObjC just to be compatible with Windows.

I think the point of this is to port existing apps. Microsoft has a lot of different technologies (like .NET with Xamarin) to build multiplatform apps going forward. But this helps Microsoft catch up to Android and iOS in terms of app availability now.

Re: Microsoft Makes It Easier to Bring Android and iOS Apps to Windows 10

#18

Post by sz4kerto »

TheTaO wrote: post #16

However exciting this is, I wonder how the support and future development will be accounted for. Porting an application is probably easy but the moment android adds a feature that is not supported by the Microsoft abstraction, you are either opting to choose the least common feature set or are maintaining two separate code bases. Both very unfavorable outcomes. I love windows phone and don't really miss many applicat…

Usually you can't really use cutting edge features anyway as the devices run older OS version (at least that's common in the case of Android)

Re: Microsoft Makes It Easier to Bring Android and iOS Apps to Windows 10

#19

Post by melling »

rickyc091 wrote: post #14
melling wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, many developers are going to be writing code in Swift. Xcode and Swift are baked and there's plenty of Swift information (e.g. http://www.h4labs.com/dev/ios/swift.html ) At this point, it's probably not worth writing in ObjC just to be compatible with Windows.

Swift probably still won't be used in production for some time due to the editor (Xcode) being extremely buggy. Error messages aren't great and with each new release of Xcode, there are syntax changes.

People are already using Swift in production. In fact, they suffered through the slow compiles, etc of the older Xcodes.

http://making.duolingo.com/real-world-swift

I wouldn't write any new code in Objective C. Swift is just a better language to work with. 12 months from now, you'll be much happier that you wrote 25k lines of Swift in 2015 instead of Objective C.

Re: Microsoft Makes It Easier to Bring Android and iOS Apps to Windows 10

#20

Post by higherpurpose »

I wonder if Google will realize it's now going to be forced to push "Android laptops" for "native performance" on the market instead of doing it on top of Chrome OS (like Microsoft is doing here) which is a battle it's going to lose.

Android laptops = all 1.5 million apps work by default (although might have some UI issues at first, depending how Google implements them - I think they should just put them in "windows") - unlike ChromeOS/Windows 10 approach which will require devs to add every single app to those stores.

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