HI, I saw some apps on play store and WP market. I found that many apps on WP are smaller in size as compared to the same app on Android.
Examples:
Official Twitter app: By Twitter
Android : 6 MB
WP : 2 MB
Facebook app:
Android (official) : 13 MB
WP ( by Microsoft) : 4 MB
LinkedIn app (Official)
Android : 5MB
WP : < 1 MB
NY Times (Official)
Android : 2.3 MB
WP : 1 MB
Whatsapp : By Whatsapp
Android : 8 MB
WP : < 1 MB
Foursquare (Official)
Android: 10MB
WP: 5 MB
Angry Birds Star Wars
Android: 38 MB
WP : 20 MB
Angry Birds Space
Android : 36 MB
WP : 15 MB
Anyone viewing this thread, please post apps sizes if you also find same thing for any other app.
So, how do will explain this small app sizes on WP compared to Android.
Is WP OS more CODE efficient than Android
Does this efficiency contribute to smoothness of apps. Please share your thoughts.
As a developer, I can say for certain several things
1) Yes, the OS is way, way more "code efficient" than Android
2) The code is downloaded and compiled only once. I will not get into details as to why this is happening, but on Android, as far as I am aware, JIT occurs everytime you run the application.
Also, Visual Studio is able to create far smaller binaries when compared to Eclipse.
Bytecode(android+eclipse) tends to produce really large "binaries" while the IL(WP+VS) tends to create very effective "binaries".
My game, which contains around 100 graphical assets only eats around 5.53 MB of space. So yes, C#/C++/VB handle assets and binary size better than Java.
There's been some talk lately about porting Android to use C# instead of Java. Some tests were done as far as performance is concerned. Really interesting results
http://www.cnx-software.com/2012/05...-massive-performance-improvement-over-dalvik/
http://www.koushikdutta.com/2009/01/dalvik-vs-mono.html
Then there is also the problem of hardware variety. Windows Phone basically runs on the same chipsets and only has a few supported resolutions, whereas on Android, there are great many chipsets, each with their own sets of hardware assets and many possible resolutions. Developers need to write more code to make sure their apps work fine on as many phones as possible.
mcosmin222 said:
As a developer, I can say for certain several things
1) Yes, the OS is way, way more "code efficient" than Android
2) The code is downloaded and compiled only once. I will not get into details as to why this is happening, but on Android, as far as I am aware, JIT occurs everytime you run the application.
Also, Visual Studio is able to create far smaller binaries when compared to Eclipse.
Bytecode(android+eclipse) tends to produce really large "binaries" while the IL(WP+VS) tends to create very effective "binaries".
My game, which contains around 100 graphical assets only eats around 5.53 MB of space. So yes, C#/C++/VB handle assets and binary size better than Java.
There's been some talk lately about porting Android to use C# instead of Java. Some tests were done as far as performance is concerned. Really interesting results
http://www.cnx-software.com/2012/05...-massive-performance-improvement-over-dalvik/
http://www.koushikdutta.com/2009/01/dalvik-vs-mono.html
Then there is also the problem of hardware variety. Windows Phone basically runs on the same chipsets and only has a few supported resolutions, whereas on Android, there are great many chipsets, each with their own sets of hardware assets and many possible resolutions. Developers need to write more code to make sure their apps work fine on as many phones as possible.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Oh boy. Where to start.
Firstly, the WP OS is not more efficient than Android. Android consists of Java in the form of the Davlik virtual machine running on linux. In no way is this less efficient than C# running on the WP8 virtual machine on the NT kernel.
Bytecode is not Android + eclipse. Eclipse is an IDE, like visual studio. Bytecode is the compiled output from the Java compiler in the form of .class files. You can use any IDE (or none) to develop Android applications.
The size of a binary bears very little relation to it's efficiency. It all depends on the environment it runs under. For example, a single API call may, in one environment, relate to, say, 20 calls into some framework that is bundled with the app - therefore making the binary bigger. In another environment the single call may result in a single call into a function provided by the virtual machine. The end result is that roughly the same amount of code is executed. Also, part of the reason why Android binaries are larger is because they contained a cached version of the app for quicker startup.
Besides code, a binary may contain other artefacts, like graphic files or different resolutions, which will make the binary bigger.
The idea of using C# on android is absurd. C# is not supported on Linux (by Microsoft). There is, however, the mono open source version of C# (always guaranteed to be out of date) but the android libraries provided by Google are written in Java and there is no way they will use a proprietary language, like C#, as it will require the use of Microsoft technologies to run and that means they will have to pay Microsoft a license fee.
Why on earth would the leader in smartphone abandon their existing technologies to adopt one that will require a complete redevelopment of Android and, in addition, pay a license fee to Microsoft? Answer == they won't. Ever.
Dr.Paul said:
Oh boy. Where to start.
Firstly, the WP OS is not more efficient than Android. Android consists of Java in the form of the Davlik virtual machine running on linux. In no way is this less efficient than C# running on the WP8 virtual machine on the NT kernel.
Bytecode is not Android + eclipse. Eclipse is an IDE, like visual studio. Bytecode is the compiled output from the Java compiler in the form of .class files. You can use any IDE (or none) to develop Android applications.
The size of a binary bears very little relation to it's efficiency. It all depends on the environment it runs under. For example, a single API call may, in one environment, relate to, say, 20 calls into some framework that is bundled with the app - therefore making the binary bigger. In another environment the single call may result in a single call into a function provided by the virtual machine. The end result is that roughly the same amount of code is executed. Also, part of the reason why Android binaries are larger is because they contained a cached version of the app for quicker startup.
Besides code, a binary may contain other artefacts, like graphic files or different resolutions, which will make the binary bigger.
The idea of using C# on android is absurd. C# is not supported on Linux (by Microsoft). There is, however, the mono open source version of C# (always guaranteed to be out of date) but the android libraries provided by Google are written in Java and there is no way they will use a proprietary language, like C#, as it will require the use of Microsoft technologies to run and that means they will have to pay Microsoft a license fee.
Why on earth would the leader in smartphone abandon their existing technologies to adopt one that will require a complete redevelopment of Android and, in addition, pay a license fee to Microsoft? Answer == they won't. Ever.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Uhh...
Where do I start?
I know bytecode is NOT android+eclipse, I only mentioned the IDE and System, just as IL si not visual studio.
The size of the binary is influenced by how good the compiler is. Although it is not the only the only thing to take into consideration, the compiler does have a role in this.
C# on Linux/Android/Mac/iOS IS supported by Microsoft under the community promise license, so everybody can port C# and .NET to any system as long as they don't use this on windows, WITHOUT having to pay Microsoft anything... I suggest you get some documentation on what Mono and Dalvik are.
C# is just as open source as C on any platform apart from Windows.
As a matter of fact, porting Android to C# would benefit the platform greatly, as google has some issues with Oracle regarding the usage of Dalvik and Java on Android.
Oh, did I mention android has to code MORE due to variety of code...hmm...
No. You cannot judge the efficency of the compiler based on the resultant code size unless you are comparing like for like. You cannot compare two languages running on two different platforms like this and come to the conclusion that because the bytecode is smaller it must be more efficient.
I expect you are too young to remember the CISC vs. RISC debate some 20 or so years ago. RISC processors generated far more instructions than a CISC processors to perform the same operation, and hence had far larger binaries. However, RISC machines were far faster. So the complete opposite of what you are saying.
Different compilers may well generate different size binary files if one were to compare compilers compiling the same language. But again this does not mean the code in the smaller file will run quicker. Indeed it may actually run slower.
Code size is no indicator of efficiency.
As far as c sharp is concerned, only the language is free to use. None of the frameworks are. And Microsoft do not provide a c sharp compiler on any system besides windows.
There is not a chance in hell that Google will adopt it. If they were to change from java they will either use one of the languages they have developed or develop something new
I used the appropriate quotation marks when writing "code efficient", as it is a very broad term and comparisons over who is code efficient and who is not.
The way I understand it, a code efficient system is a system that has very high performance, such as windows phone, not that it has anything to do with size of binaries, but the OP asked if WP is a "code efficient" system, so i answered xD
.Net framework is also free to reverse engineer. You still have to pay for compilers however.
Interesting sidebit: in internal Google E-Mails that got published during the Oracle vs. Google trial over Java it was actually mentioned that using C# instead of Java would have been an option due to the fact that there are less licensing hassles attached to it's core library (which actually is standardized with ECMA) as compared to Java. They decided not to go that route as it would have taken a year to adapt Android and instead risk getting sued by Sun (which was later acquired by Oracle). So: yes, C# would have been just as good an option. Using something like Google Go wouldn't have simply because there was no developer community and it's a lot easier to get people working on your platform if they don't have to learn a new language first.
That aside: most likely the binary size isn't all that much relevant for how big the downloaded files are. And I won't even go into the fact that some of those Apps aren't written in Java on Android but use the NDK (at least Facebook and the Angry Birds games do on Android, most likeley the later do it on WP8 too).
So in the end it's most likely down to the embedded Audio and Graphics resources. As was already mentioned Android devices have to support a lot more resolutions which makes it likely that LowRes graphics are included as well to not tax slower devices with high-res graphics for no reason (given that you won't see the difference on LowRes displays). Another reason for this with regular Apps is that WP takes a chromeless-design-approach so you rarely have graphics included that serve as UI chrome.
Another reason might be that Microsoft put quite some effort into driving home the point that resources should not be included or used in a higher resolution than what they are intended to be displayed at. The reason was that it might have led to troubles with the memory-constrained Tango-devices which only have 256 MB of RAM. At least for high-profile developers that work together with Microsoft it's likely that those optimized their Apps for it.
Lastly and also already mentioned: third party libraries. Historically Microsoft has always packed a lot of functionality directly into it's system frameworks. So it's entirely possible that WP devs use third party libraries less often. Case in point: database functionality: many Android Apps use SQLite and include their own binaries for it. WP provides SQLServer CE which can simply be used by any App that needs it. This might change though as for W8/WP8-cross platform Apps Microsoft themselves suggest including SQLite given that there is no SQL CE Support for WinRT-Apps.
And for the finishing lines something on compilers and code size. Intels C++ compilers regularly produce bigger binaries because of optimization techniques like loop unrolling, etc. They also normally outperform competing compilers in performance benchmarks. But it's not that easy if you look not at a single App's performance but at the whole system. Having an App take up more memory means that other Apps will have to be terminated sooner to avoid an out-of-memory scenario and it is more taxing on the memory controller, which depending on the chipset used might lead to additional performance problems down the road (the Nvidia Tegra 3 is said to be severely limited by its memory controller). But especially with Managed Code like C# or Java the code size of the IL does not really mean too much in that regard as the code is compiled anyway before being executed. So the memory actually taken up during execution is a lot different from what gets downloaded.
A more interesting comparison though would be wether the WP8 compiled XAPs are smaller than their WP7 counterparts, given that WP8 does precompile the IL in the cloud. Might be interesting to see which of those is smaller.
Just did some comparisons on size of binaries between 7.5 and 8
1) XAP compiled for 7.5 is 5.53 MB
2) XAP compiled for 8 is 5.76 MB
Seems the 8 version is actually bigger, although not by much.
I love this thread!
Sent from my RaZr on MIUI.
I know about the comparison between Android and Windows Phone 8 from users who have made the switch.
Related
Hi all,
I am new to WM5.0 programming but programmed for Winodws so i have some questions plz :wink:
does eVC++ 4.0 support developing for WM5.0?
what are the best books available for learning WM5.0 programming?
Mohammad
Best Book? You mean "Any"?
We have the same problem. The only book on CE 5.0 is in Chinese.
We ordered the newest CE book avilable, it's from 2003.
But there's a lot of CE documentation from Microsoft, and of course you can learn a lot here.
this is really strange, we find thousands of books about VC++, VB and others... isnt there a bool on WM5??
Not even CE 5.0, let alone WM 5.0.
But a lot of those VC# and C++ books are very pertinent.
Don't know of any books, but I can answer you question about eVC 4.
You can develop apps that will run on WM5, but you can't use WM5 SDK.
Mainly, this means that if you want to use a WM5 specific functions (not many of those) you have to go through LoadLibrary and GetProcAddress instead of direct linking.
Thanks, but I have installed eVC++ 4.0 and its sp4, when I try to run it, it tells me that it cant run because no sdk was found, so what to do if WM5.0 sdk cant be used with eVC++ 4.0??? do I have to use VS .NET 2005?
thanks all
Mohammad
mohgdeisat: You need to install the previous WM2003 SDK and can then develop apps in the normal way, that will run on WM2003 and WM5. What you can't do without WM5 SDK is develop apps JUST for WM5.
However, I imagine that you can install the WM5 SDK anyway, and directly use the Libaries and Headers manually, just by pointing the project settings to load libraries from the WM5 directories.
I do this in quite a few of my WM2003 apps anyway.
This will still make a WM2003 app, but it will support WM5 features, if you're lucky.
I don't suggest installing Visual Studio unless you have to, but if you're serious about developing on WM5, then I very much recommend it.
And remember, Microsoft gives a free trial version of the Professional version, for download (2.7gb).
http://forum.xda-developers.com/viewtopic.php?t=59991&highlight=visual+studio+trial
If you have to reinstall every 3 months, it's still cheaper then buying it I guess. :wink:
V
Actually, you can't install the WM5 SDK unless you have the studio. I tired and got the message "You have no products that can use this SDK installed ..."
It wouldn't let me continue.
If someone knows of a workaround for this (that does not include installing VS 2005) I would be glad to hear it.
Take apart the cabs/installers and extract the headers and libraries.
I can zip them up if you want, I suppose.
I may be confusing myself with Platform Builder, but that's how I'd do it if I had to.
V
Thanks for the idea V and the offer. No need to zip the stiff though.
Thanks guys,
I am really interested in building WM applications as I believe that WM development will have a giant jump in then next years.
I am ready to install VS .NET 2005, but I am not interested in developing .NET applications for WM5.0 environment, I read about CF and CE programming and I came up with a conclusion that if I want to develop serious commercial and robust applications then I should use C++, either pure WinAPI programming or at least use miniMFC library.
I really care very much about robustness and resource usage of applications, I also want to use a productive development tool/environment.
My question is, when you compare between miniMFC vs pure WinAPI programming you find miniMFC more productive, yet WinAPI is more robus,portable and efficient, so I have to compromise here... What do u think should I use miniMFC or WinAPI? does the development in WinAPI bring great performance advantages over miniMFC?
Thank you
Mohammad
I think you are missing something here.
MFC (mini or not) is basically a collection of prepared code. It still uses win32 API (there is no getting away from them unless you are using .NET) but it raps them up in convenient classes. If you are writing a large app, with a lot of interface components (multiple dialogs, view windows etc) MFC can save you a whole lot of coding, though statically linking it will add about 0.5MB to your app size.
Using MFC also doesn't exclude using win32 API directly to reclaim functionality that MFC skips.
When writing small utilities or system add-ons like today plug-ins it is best not to use MFC to reduce app size.
While I agree with you 100% that .NET CF is still to resource hungry for Pocket PC and Smartphone devices, it should be noted that when writing large GUI rich apps that require database or other outside components using .NET saves a whole lot of work for the programmer (while the user pays the price in speed and memory).
Thank you,
I know that MFC wraps win32 api in classes for the ease of use, it has also a good OO hierarchy, and this is very good, it increases productivity but as far as I know there are costs when using MFC library, those include Exe file size, memory usage, and even cpu resource usage.
As I read from many books, programming windows applications using pure Win API enhances performance (speed/resource usage) but I dont know to what degree it enhances performance.
in short, MFC is more productive, easy and well managed.. but WinAPI is more efficient.. but when I use Win API program development will take longer time than it takes with MFC, so is using Win API (no MFC) is justified by its performance advantages over MFC (or miniMFC)??
Thanks
Does .Net have something like JIT Compiler?
mohgdeisat, sorry, I misunderstood you. When you asked if you should use MFC or pure win32 API I assumed you thought they were mutually exclusive.
I haven't actually measured this with any tool, but from writing apps both ways I can tell you that while file size can get significantly larger (by as much as 0.5MB maybe more) as far as speed is concerned there seem to be no noticeable difference.
Also you have the option to link to MFC dynamically which will eliminate the increase of your exe size.
The difference in programming effort is very noticeable, specially when building dialogs and handling their controls. What needs only a couple lines of code with MFC is likely to take whole functions without.
So for a large program I recommend you to use MFC or look in to some alternatives like ATL.
Hi folks
Recenty I got the Windows XP Embedded kit, and I was really satisfied and surprised with the performance of the directly built system on an old machine like a P1 @ 200 MHz with 64 MB of RAM, without a hard disk.
The main goal would be to run truly win32 apps on mobile devices, to give better functionality and compatibility.
Yet the builder supports x86 architecture only, but cannot be a big problem to port it to ARM pocessors.
What might be difficult are these things:
-Getting win32 drivers for built-in devices (ex. integrated SDIO/USB WLAN, BT adapter, touchscreen, and sound devices, and apps for them!)
-Saving user data on turning off (Ebmedded systems are designed for a workstation, like a cash register: prebuilt apps, and nothing more comfort ) like WM200x
If anybody has any suggestion are to get a warm welcome
bye
Yet the builder supports x86 architecture only, but cannot be a big problem to port it to ARM pocessors.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Are you kidding me?
This would mean reverse engineering and recompiling every binary in the OS.
Do you have any idea how many hours something like that would take?
yup, you're right, but in theory it's possibe. I've seen a running DOS on a Microchip micro-controller, or for example the Atmel STK 1000 is Linux based, also seen an mPlayer app operational on the demo board at the college.
as you see, i'm not an experienced programmer, but i'm not afraid to ask
Yeah, the basic low-level binaries must be recompiled, and once it's ok, it might be usable with regular win32 apps, until you run an old DOS app, wich directly access the hardware.
A few years ago i was able to port Z80 software to 8086, and it wasn't easy.
I don't really know these things, just want to see opinions, possibilities, and suggestions.
exe files are binarys which are instructions directly for the cpu
it's not parsed by the operating system
so compiling the os is not enough every application needs to be recompiled too
The programs you mentioned have source available in one way or another (since DOS is very old there are clones, like freeDOS).
If you have the full source for an app and the right compiler, porting it to another CPU is feasible.
But, this is not the case with embedded XP. Getting the full source is impossible which means most of the system will have to be rewritten from scratch.
Just look at the Wine project to see what it takes, and they "have it easy" - they are just trying to simulate the APIs not change processor architecture. (Lets make it clear - ARM instruction set is very different from x86).
And as Rudegar said it will not let you run any program that has not been specially compiled for ARM CPU.
I know it sounds like we are trying to kill you idea here but its nothing personal, unfortunately it just isn't feasible. We would all like to be able to run desktop apps on our devices, but simply having embedded XP on them would not accomplish that. Also while many old DOS apps can be run using various emulators like pocketDOS, almost all Win32 apps take more resources than our little gadgets can offer.
I am fairly sure though that in 5 -10 years that problem will be fixed.
<_< man hours or not, reveng'ing this will have a bigger impact than just winDOS Mobile devices. Desktops have a use for this, definitely (because the Vista-Only crap is starting to hit the market). Too bad they don't provide assembly in programming classes anymore, obviously because they don't want anyone else to reverse engineer anything and spoil their foisting fun. <_<
In any case, IIRC XP Embedded is missing the install/uninstall engine, so you can't customize it after it's flashed onto the board. This isn't quite a good start - XPLite or 98Lite are better for reverse engineering from scratch (but they're too powerful for mobile devices).
The other alternative is porting ReactOS, which is a reimplementation of W2K. Those guys are "having a lot of fun" getting things to work, tho. <_<
Maybye Windows CE6 yes, but Windows XP Embedded no, because they must run at 686-AT/X platform IMB. Sorry of my English
linux would be a path
with most linux programs you can compile them yourself
using good old
./configure
make
make install
of cause gui programs could have issues displaying correct
on such a small screen
You MIGHT be able to pull it off by installing a minimal (very!) WinMo firmware and then have it autorun Bochs, which is known to be able to run the PC version of XP.. A customised, thinned-down XPe image should run fine under Bochs.
--W5i2
Hey guys, as the title says i study computer science, and i use java and c#.
But its only on desktop platforms.
How much does it differ on an android platform?
Is it really just differences the APIs or is it a completely different approach to programming fundamentals?
Also what is the best way to go about developing? Can i get an SdK that plugs into netbeans or the like??
thanks
I too, study computer science - besides already working in these and related fields. My first impression of Android development is that there are a few paradigm differences that one has to accept.
For example, on desktop platforms, development and execution of applications follows a clear line through your code while on Android (and possibly other mobile platforms I am not currently aware of) your application architecture is based around the concept of activities. Traditional predictable execution like you would know it from a console application has to be emulated as the activities virtually replace the usual entry point (that would be, the main method or function). Anyhow, once you're actually developing anything serious, you'll get used to it pretty fast, so I wouldn't worry too much about it.
Furthermore, if you're coming from C# and have used WPF or Silverlight, the Android SDK/NDK does indeed look like hell to you. I came to Android and iOS development from C++ (indeed I have gained a lot of experience with C++; that's why I learnt C# and used WPF in a week's time) and at this point, you really start to feel how Android has grown very fast over the past 12 months. Deprecated APIs aside, it seems really hard to me to keep up with the developments so far.
What personally annoys me the most - that is, by far the most - is the Java programming language and it's omnipresence in the system. For an at least somehow experienced C++ programmer, the way concepts are implemented in Java, and this statement is not limited to Android in particular, seems awefully redundant and painful to use. But if you like it that way, you'll be fine. I have set up a template for myself so I can write most of my code in C or a bigger subset of C++ even though the NDK guidelines explicitly oppose it.
You are not limited to Java, you can use C and C++ through the NDK. I use the Eclipse IDE along with the ADT plugin, you could use Netbeans as well.
HTC HD2 might not be the fastest running device out there but it is undoubtedly the most popular Hardware platform vis-a-vis the no of OSes (Winmo,WP7,Android,meamo/meego(partially) and several desktop linux distros) supported. The basic aim of using one OS or the other is to optimize the utilization of system resources or in other words, to get maximum performance/usability from the given hardware in this case the HD2.Now to find the best performing custom ROM (why do we still call it a ROM, its not read only anymore )we can resort to certain benchmarks and tests to come up with the best performing ROM of a certain platform. But If I were to find out based on a certain basic parameters what is the OS that best utilises my HD2 (or any other phone for that matter) sadly I'd be at a loss. To my mind a good way of getting there would be a cross platform benchmark which could test all the platforms based on some basic parameters (suggested below) and give out the result, as to which OS performs the best on a given phone. I suggested HD2 because it can test most of the platforms supported by XDA (and I happen to own one)
Parameters
call connection delay
call Audio quality
SMS/MMS sending/recieving efficiency
UI fps
WIFI reception/connection reliability
camera/camcorder result and performance
audio/ video playback quality
RAW CPU/GPU performance
battery life for a diverse set of tasks
(the list might need expansion but these I think are the basics)
Now a seasoned dev can approach the problem in any way possible but here are my suggestions for a means to get there.
1. One option would be to base this benchmark/tests on a cross platform emulator which works on a wide variety of OSes.
2. Java is said to be platform independent so in theory it can be used.
3. Make all the tests to run in the Browser.
Another advantage of this would be that devs would know the limits of a particular hardware and can develop accordingly. As an example, when devs found out that the HD2 can capture 720p video on WP7 they started porting this ability to android as well.
Need expert and non expert opinion on the practicality of this.
s8isfi said:
HTC HD2 might not be the fastest running device out there but it is undoubtedly the most popular Hardware platform vis-a-vis the no of OSes (Winmo,WP7,Android,meamo/meego(partially) and several desktop linux distros) supported. The basic aim of using one OS or the other is to optimize the utilization of system resources or in other words, to get maximum performance/usability from the given hardware in this case the HD2.Now to find the best performing custom ROM (why do we still call it a ROM, its not read only anymore )we can resort to certain benchmarks and tests to come up with the best performing ROM of a certain platform. But If I were to find out based on a certain basic parameters what is the OS that best utilises my HD2 (or any other phone for that matter) sadly I'd be at a loss. To my mind a good way of getting there would be a cross platform benchmark which could test all the platforms based on some basic parameters (suggested below) and give out the result, as to which OS performs the best on a given phone. I suggested HD2 because it can test most of the platforms supported by XDA (and I happen to own one)
Parameters
call connection delay
call Audio quality
SMS/MMS sending/recieving efficiency
UI fps
WIFI reception/connection reliability
camera/camcorder result and performance
audio/ video playback quality
RAW CPU/GPU performance
battery life for a diverse set of tasks
(the list might need expansion but these I think are the basics)
Now a seasoned dev can approach the problem in any way possible but here are my suggestions for a means to get there.
1. One option would be to base this benchmark/tests on a cross platform emulator which works on a wide variety of OSes.
2. Java is said to be platform independent so in theory it can be used.
3. Make all the tests to run in the Browser.
Another advantage of this would be that devs would know the limits of a particular hardware and can develop accordingly. As an example, when devs found out that the HD2 can capture 720p video on WP7 they started porting this ability to android as well.
Need expert and non expert opinion on the practicality of this.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This idea has quite a few major flaws,
1) All platforms are designed a certain way (atleast in embedded systems where resources are scarce) and hence even though one platform might outperform the other, it might not have the features necessary or required by the user, ie. I "LOVE" WP7, the UI is fluid and the design is awesome, it works wonderfully however it being a recent addition to the market means that there aren't many apps and also due to the restrictive nature of wp which forces me to either dualboot or stay with android, Dualbooting has it's own flaws as battery is still very bad in sd android and WP7 so that leaves me no choice but to either go to WM6.5 or Android since the Linux Distros aren't targeted for a phone, even though they might work, there are flaws such as having to open terminal and executing scripts for smallest of the work like switching bluetooth on/off, and absence of audio even after ALSA modules for evo based msm kernel were out.
2) Raw performance means nothing, you aren't going to crunch numbers or perform scientific calculations on your phone, it doesn't matter if it's of no use, what you should be looking for instead is "Productivity"
3) Windows Mobile was an awesome platform with countless apps and functionality but it was just too old for the market, ie. Look at the difference in UI of WP7/Android to WM6.5
4) Java is NOT platform independent, it is just ported to enough places that the code you write will work on most of the machines, ie. Try executing java code on windows phone, also it is not the same libraries of java used through out, microsoft uses their inhouse developed java version while android interprets java code into dalvik byte code before execution, Linux favors opensource libraries which are known to be much slower than the ones provided by Sun. Neither is the browser same in all, you also have choice of browsers in platforms themselves and all of them are generally specialized for different tasks such as firefox for android can run html5 code and is said to be the most compliant browser but is way slower than the stock one or the Dolphin HD where as the stock browser or Dolphin are incapable of CSS3 transitions and most of the html5 content.
*you cannot measure "fps" in UI, everything is not rendered the way you are thinking it is, try switching on forced screen refresh through development tools on an android phone and see, most of the time you'll notice that most of the parts on the screen remain static and it's only the new components that are blit over the older parts in framebuffer.
There are a few more flaws but since i'm running out of time, ill stop here.
As for me, nand android (cyanogenmod nightlies) are the best, Doesn't lag in normal use, enough eye candy, good enough battery life and is quite stable and soon with the new DSP code we will have 720p recording on Android too.
Thanks for the detailed reply. What I understand is that there is way too much diversification for a the same code to run.
I have with experience in VLSI, shell scripting (bash, windows powershell) and basic programming languages like C and Python (Matlab too, which uses a similar syntax).
I want to get into app development but I am completely new to this and unfamiliar with the whole structure - the IO libraries, rendering libraries especially. I mainly like to develop it for Windows 11 (but would be nice if I could make it cross platform, say using something like Vulkan as rendering library).
I wish to make a stylus based note making app (similar to one note, drawboard pdf etc). I wish to know about the libraries available for taking input from surface pen (or other pens). I found that there are a few API available for windows - RealtimeStylus, Windows Ink, etc but I am unable to find anything cross platform. I would like to know if there are open source, or cross platform alternatives. Alternately, I would like to know if it is possible to bypass these and create a custom API myself (including my own algorithms for tracing curves and predicting handwriting etc, at present I am left to use whatever was done in these APIs I think), also possibly making it lower latency within the app. To some extent I realized that pen position is very similar to trackpad input (on the data input to pc side) and then we have tilt and pressure sensitivity data which I'm not sure how it is accessed and used. I remember reading a little about libsdl sometime ago. I would like to know if there are alternatives to libsdl, or if Vulkan supports any alternate libraries.
I would like to know how I could code a program that works on both x64 and aarch64 on windows 11 (Not into 32 bit as I belive my tool will use more than 4GB RAM anyway, as a priority), and as mentioned above, it would be fantastic if I could make it cross platform. What I got from this page is that ( https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/arm/ ) if I write my program in C++ it should be possible to compile it for both x64 and aarch64 (and make possible optimizations for each of them separately). I am not sure how the whole development environment works - what is dotnet, what is unity, what is xamarin, and differences between each. I found a few code macros in dotnet that help in rejecting certain inputs (could be useful for palm rejection etc) : ( https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/do...s.uielement.isinputmethodenabled?view=net-5.0 ) (https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/api/system.windows.uielement.ishittestvisible?view=net-5.0 ). As far as I am aware dotnet is cross platform. I might want to make instruction level optimizations to the software (like SSE, AVX, certain 64 bit instructions etc if that gives any hint) and would like to know if the dotnet environment/toolkit has sufficient low level coding possibility to access these. Also, I am curious if it supports vulkan or opengl. Vulkan is written in C++ and supports multiple platforms so I am more inclined to try it.