Windows Phone 7: The AnandTech Guide
by Brian Klug on March 21, 2010 12:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Windows Phone 7
- Mobile
The State of Cut and Paste
Microsoft stated explicitly and rather abruptly during a Q&A session during day two of MIX10 that there will be no copy and paste support in Windows Phone 7 Series. The annoucement was as simple and unambiguous as that; current plans are that Windows Phone 7 Series hardware shipping holiday 2010 will not have cut and paste support.
This is relatively ironic, considering Windows CE and Windows Mobile have had copy and paste support since day one. Furthermore, Windows Mobile users long cited lack of copy and paste support as a fundamental shortcoming present in other competing OSes. Obviously, having no support for clip-boarding or copy and paste is a step backwards. At this point it's a decision backed up by what Microsoft cites as a number of use studies which show people don't really use copy and paste. Microsoft left the door open slightly, noting that it "isn't sure when it will be added," but then later clarified and noted that it would likely not be included in the current release.
The reasons for this decision are ultimately puzzling. Microsoft cites a number of use studies mentioned earlier where users generally focus on a few predictable forms of information: addresses, phone numbers, or snippets from a web page. Instead of letting users copy and paste this information, it's hoping that users long-press on context-highlighted text and take action from there. "People often want to take an address and view it on a map, highlight a term in the browser, and do a search or copy a phone number to make a call. Instead of the user manually doing a copy and paste in these scenarios, we recognize those situations automatically and make them happen with just one touch," said Casey McGee, a senior marketing manager in Microsoft's Mobile Communications Business group.
The implementation is relatively similar to what we've seen already on iPhone OS. Text the OS recognizes as being a semantic match for either a phone number or address is highlighted. Tapping on those launches either the dialer, or Bing maps, as expected.
Note the orange text - these are clickable
Longer presses on almost anything result in another dialog appearing. From here, you can forward through SMS or email if the selection is text (or a URL), or save to the photo library or MMS if it is a picture.
Microsoft hopes this intelligent data-recognition process mitigates lack of copy and paste, but in practice there are many more use scenarios where true copy and paste support is advantageous.
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Hrel - Friday, March 26, 2010 - link
Yeah, pretty sure I'll never buy any portable ANYTHING that doesn't support expandable memory. I don't need more iphones out there, thanks anyway.jconan - Tuesday, March 23, 2010 - link
Will Microsoft support Unicode in its WP7S phones? They never got around to it on the Zune. I hope they do for WP7S and hopefully in Courier. It's easier to read text the way it's meant to be read than in gibberish ascii with diacritics.MonkeyPaw - Monday, March 22, 2010 - link
Wow, all this talk about Web-capable smartphones sure makes me wish for a mobile version of Anandtech.com. :|toyotabedzrock - Monday, March 22, 2010 - link
We have heard this promise of adding features before!RandomUsername3245 - Monday, March 22, 2010 - link
The article says, "There's also of course the stigmata attached to buying a phone preloaded with a bevy of carrier-branded applications."The author should have used "stigma" rather than "stigmata". Stigmata is a Roman Catholic reference: (from dictionary.com) marks resembling the wounds of the crucified body of Christ, said to be supernaturally impressed on the bodies of certain persons, esp. nuns, tertiaries, and monastics.
CSMR - Monday, March 22, 2010 - link
Stigmata is just the plural of stigma. "Stigmas" is normally better but stigmaga is correct. So the problem with the sentence is that "is" is singluar and "stigmata" is plural.jhh - Monday, March 22, 2010 - link
Applications can't currently run in the background, but they can process push notifications. Does this mean that any application that wants to provide background processing needs to wake the phone via push notifications? If so, do those mean that the push notifications need to come through a Microsoft back-end notification server? If so, that would be another case of application lockdown. I can't see Facebook or Twitter wanting to run their traffic through Microsoft just to be able to use the notification service.ncage - Sunday, March 21, 2010 - link
Is it perfect? Nope but i still think its pretty dang good. Can't wait. I will still probably get a nexus one when it comes out tuesday but will get a wp7 near xmas. Have a BB Tour now and i hate it with a passion. If your not an email addict then i don't think you would ever like a BB. I'd get a palm pre instead if it didn't sound like they were just about to die. RIM should buy them.hessenpepper - Sunday, March 21, 2010 - link
Will the tight hardware requirements allow Microsoft to release upgrades directly to the end users or will they release in to the manufacturers/carriers? Will we be at their mercy for timely upgrades?MGSsancho - Monday, March 22, 2010 - link
Part of the reason Microsoft wants tight control over hardware is so they can focus on other stuff and not write 9000 drivers. Windows CE works on ppc, x86, arm with varying amounts of ram and configurations. It is the same strategy Apple has, only have a few select hardware platforms and focus on the user experience.