Forthcoming Windows Phone Update: The bits that are real

Copy & Paste

It''s hard to believe something like this was missing, but even more so people actually missed using it (the generic excuse from fruit phone owners when bagging the platform).  Sure there are certain scenarios where it’s required, but only a few.

Having said that, in the first update you’re getting copy and paste.  For reals!  Now, developers don’t need to modify ANYTHING, you just get it for “free”, with some caveats of course.

The biggest one being, copy and paste is ONLY supported on the textbox control in 3rd party apps.  When I say supported, I’m talking about the OS automagically recognising the input control and giving the user the fancy text selection picker with a “copy” button.

One issue I have noticed though is certain apps don’t actually use the textbox to render read-only text.  For example, the Twitter for Windows Phone app, when you’ve clicked on a tweet to either view it or click on a link, the text isn''t rendered in a TextBox control.  Unfortunately you’re not going to get copy & paste there. The simple fix is to change to a textbox control for scenarios where a user might need to copy some text into the clipboard but it requires some effort from application developers.

Speed

We all love fast loading phones and apps,and what the Windows Phone team did with the first update is nothing short of pure awesome.  Take the “de Blob” game for example.  Loads in 37 seconds to the Main Menu screen on RTM,with the update, it is loaded and ready in 17 seconds. 

[Video to come, youtube doesn’t like me tonight]

And it isn’t just games that are going to benefit from the core improvements to how the OS loads and assigns memory, I noticed a definite improvement in loading heavy apps like Facebook & Twitter too!

Remember, this video isn’t the final released version.

Also, these speed improvements are “free”.  Developers don’t need to modify any existing applications.

ChevronWP7 Unlocker

One chapter closes, another opens. After the update, the ChevronWP7 unlocker will no longer work with your phone.  We’re in the process of scoping out a homebrew unlock and deployment solution with Microsoft but it''ll take some time.  Sorry but these things don’t happen overnight but you''ll be sure to hear it when it''s ready.