windows phone developer story

Windows PhoneDeveloper Story

Alan MendelevičAdDuplex, amChartsailon@ailon.org@ailon

@ailon

(Personal) [Hi]story

Prehistory

• In professional software development since 1995

• .NET developer since 2001 (beta)• WPF & Silverlight developer since

2008

Mobile development “experience”

• Downloaded Symbian SDK in 2005• Read a book on Windows Mobile

development in 2007

The Road to Windows Phone

January 2010 – MIX10k

• Won a trip to MIX10 conference with Silverlight 3 game called Tic-Tac-Toe 3D

February 2010 – MWC 2010• Windows Phone 7 Series announced

at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona

• Developer story to be detailed at MIX10

March 2010 – Silverlight and XNA

• Silverlight and XNA announced as developer platforms for Windows Phone before MIX10

Excited!

March 2010 – MIX10

Can’t let go

• Following #wp7dev community on twitter

• Blogs• Events

August 2010 – amCharts Quick Charts

• Open source charting controls for Windows Phone released

http://wpf.amcharts.com/quick

November 2010

• Purchased LG Optimus 7 phone• ChevronWP7 released

December 2010 – Tic-Tac-Toe 3D

• Port of web (Silverlight 3) version

• Published through a virtual friend in Germany

December 2010

• Pushing for wider Marketplace expansion Created a developer survey for

Brandon Watson (Director of Developer Experience, Microsoft)

International Windows Phone 7 App Marketplace Petition (1600+ signatures)http://petol.org/wp7intl

January 2011 – AdDuplex

• Launched AdDuplex – ad exchange network for Windows Phone apps

February 2011 – Mango

• Next major release of Windows Phone OS code-named Mango announced at Mobile World Congress 2011

March 2011

• Speaking at Login 2011 and other events

• Yalla Apps announced

April 2011 – MIX11

May 2011 – ToMetric

• User experience oriented unit converter

• Reuses core logic code from web site developed last year

• Published through Yalla Apps

May 2011

• Interview on Windows Phone Dev Podcast

• Speaking at Mobile Monday

Development experience & tools

Great and free tools

• Expression Blend, Visual Studio, XNA Studio• http://create.msdn.com

Expression Blend

Great tools

“Truth be told, I had fun with the Windows Phone SDK. Whereas the Android tools and APIs frustrated me to no end, I had little trouble picking up Windows Phone and translating many of the paradigms and lessons I’ve learned on the Apple platform to Microsoft’s”Justin Williams, iOS developerhttp://carpeaqua.com/2011/01/02/from-iphone-to-windows-phone-7/

“The more I make things with the WP7 SDK, the more I like it. I feel safe writing all the XAML from scratch”“… I'd certainly prefer it to Android's SDK”Steven Troughton-Smith, iOS developerhttps://twitter.com/#!/stroughtonsmith/status/67125106463350784https://twitter.com/#!/stroughtonsmith/status/67130744719409152

“It’ll take me 2 to 4 times as long to build a similar app in iOS versus Windows Phone.”Kelly WhiteYet Another Podcast #33“I am a Java Profesional by day, #wp7dev and #android

game developer by night. I prefer WP7 over Android.”Andrew Postmahttp://twitter.com/#!/AndrewKPostma/status/70501048619507712

Some issues

• Limited APIs in current version (no sockets, no raw camera access, no local DB, etc.)

• Some performance issues (lists)• No multitasking• All (supposedly) solved in Mango

Experience developing Tic-Tac-Toe 3D

• From web to phone in 10 minutes

• Tombstoning – substantial amount of time to implement

• Adapting for touch• Publishing via a

virtual friend

Marketing, Distribution, Monetization

Marketing channels

• Twitter #wp7• Windows Phone blogs

wpcentral.com wmpoweruser.com 1800pocketpc.com

(bestwp7games.com)

• Podcasts Windows Phone Dev Podcast Windows Phone Radio

Distribution

• Official Windows Phone Marketplace – inaccessible to Lithuanian developers

• Global Publishing Partners appamarket.com – recommended by

Microsoft for CEE YallaApps.com – focus on MEA region

• Friends, family, business partners

Monetization: Free vs. Paid

• Free get 10x more downloads than paid (even with fully functional trials)

• Paid apps with trials get 70% more purchases than without trials

• Free with ads works better for long running apps (for US developers)

Monetization: Advertising

• Microsoft’s pubCenter Pays by impression US-only (expanding this year)

• Google AdMob, Smaato, etc. Pay by click

Monetization: Public info

• $200-400 per dayElbert Perez (11 games)http://www.occasionalgamer.com/

• $28,000 in 4 monthsRichard Foster (14+ apps)http://advertising.microsoft.com/foster-windows7apps

• $30Alan Mendelevich ;)

• Ad Exchange – promote apps for free

• Advertising – commercial ad campaigns

• Mixed model – exchange + monetization

Why develop for Windows Phone?

Easier to get to the top

VS

Small market Huge market

Huge player Small player

Market share WILL grow

• Nokia• Basically no missing

features in Mango• Heavy investments

from Microsoft

Tools are great and getting better

• Accelerometer/gyroscope emulation

• GPS emulation• Profiler

Great community

• Large and friendly community on Twitter (#wp7dev, #wpdev)

• Active forums at App Hub http://create.msdn.com

• Accessible product teams• Intersects with general Silverlight

and .NET communities

Summary

• Modern platform which is a joy to develop for

• In it for a long run• Main pain-point: distribution and

consumption in Lithuania

Thank you!

@ailon

ailon@ailon.orgdevblog.ailon.org

Image sources

• http://www.flickr.com/photos/digital-noise/3725891305/

• http://www.maxima.lt• http://www.flickr.com/photos/tonyjc

ase/2591754028/