For almost two weeks, my main computer – a ThinkPad W510 (circa 2010) has been running Windows 8. Courtesy of the Logitech Touchpad T650 I’ve mentioned here and many times on Twitter, the experience has been – to me – much smoother than when I was trying to use Windows 8 (in a VM, admittedly) with a mouse during the previews. Three things I want to say up front: I’m trying to be positive and fair, and give Windows 8 on a…
Early Aug. 2012 – Short of information about how the Windows Store, the forthcoming home for Windows Store (nee Metro) applications was doing, I began exploring the store, trying to assess how many applications were actually there. I had heard rumblings of 400 or so applications. As I said late in Sept. 2012, my intentions were never malicious. I pondered whether there was any way to query the store programmatically. Here’s how it went down. Aug. 15, 2012 – I had…
If you’ve known me long, you’ve known that I’ve been far from Windows 8’s biggest fan. For me, that’s been for a specific reason. The concessions that Windows 8 makes to being touch focused have – I strongly believe – compromised the ability for those of us damned to the desktop to really use the platform. While I believe Microsoft intends for Windows 8 to be a success both with tablets and on non-touch devices, learning to use the operating…
The recent statistics Microsoft handed out about regarding the Windows Store made me think a bit. Microsoft noted that some apps on the store have had significant numbers of downloads. The fact that several “parts of Windows 8 and Windows RT” are only available as a download from the Windows Store innately twists what “some apps have had millions of downloads from the Windows Store” can mean. Some third parties have claimed to have statistics on this as well. In general,…
Today while navigating the new Windows Store apps that arrived today, I ran across something that sort of broke my heart. I found dozens of copies of the same app from the same developer. Not identical, mind you. Subtle differences in how input boxes are laid out, as well as different names, colors, and application icons. Take a look at FlourMill here: and then Personal Recipe Book here: The developer, under the name LunaPlena, has submitted 118 apps in the last two…
Apologies for the lack of updates recently. While the Windows Store has been growing by ~500 apps per day worldwide, only a fraction of these are truly stellar apps, and filtering out the wheat is still a manual process – something I can only do when time allows. Similarly, my rollup reports of the store are a relatively manual process that I hope to automate someday. That day is not today. Given a subtle jab that might seem to infer a…
When you start working with Microsoft licensing – well, to be fair, almost anyone’s enterprise licensing, it can be mind-numbing. Truth be told, when I stepped up to pinch hit for my colleague, to cover the immense changes to SQL Server 2012 licensing, I developed a migraine with vertigo – something that hadn’t occurred for several years. While it could have been coincidence, we’ve taken liberty with it at work, and turned it into a running joke for our boot…
Last Thursday, my app counter went rather off the charts. Since the day before launch, the Windows Store has been adding 500 or so apps per day (with one exception). There aren’t a ton of stellar apps. I’m doing my best to document those that I do find on my Twitter feed, and I’m working on a better methodology. But for now, that’s where I put them. On Thursday and Friday in particular, I expected a bump in the number…
The Prestige is one of my favorite movies. Every time I watch it, I notice a nuanced plot twist that I missed before. Since I started counting, the second most frequent question I get after, “how many apps are there?” is, “how are you doing this?” “Now you’re looking for the secret. But you won’t find it because of course, you’re not really looking. You don’t really want to work it out. You want to be fooled.” Back in August,…
The last 48 hours have been very significant for the Windows Store. More than the count – which is up significantly just in the last 2 days – apps from many mainstream news and entertainment sources have begun to arrive, and some new apps have shown up that take advantage of the WinRT platform on Windows 8 and Windows RT. I’ve posted quite a few updates in the last 2 days about what’s new and relevant on the store on…