Engadget has just posted a few screenshots of upcoming games developed for Windows Phone 7 Series. What I liked about the screenshots is the resolution at 800×480 pixels – it really shows tremendous detail. It will definitely be interesting to see how it looks in full motion on a 3.5″ screen.

The XNA Game Studio 4.0 used to create Windows Phone 7 games will be released “in the coming month” so expect to see much more eye candy quite soon.

Microsoft shows off XNA games running on Windows Phone, full 3D is a go (Engadget)

Palm has now launched their “Plug-in Development Kit” (PDK) for the Palm Pre. The PDK is based on the following core technologies:

The Windows Phone 7 Series sessions at MIX 2010 have now been announced and they look quite interesting:

1. Changing our Game – an Introduction to Windows Phone 7 Series
2. Building Windows Phone Games
3. Building a High Performance 3D Game for Windows Phone
4. Designing and Developing for the Rich Mobile Web
5. Overview of the Windows Phone 7 Series Application Platform
6. Windows Phone UI and Design Language
7. An Introduction to Developing Applications for Microsoft Silverlight
8. Building Windows Phone Applications with Silverlight, Part 1
9. Building Windows Phone Applications with Silverlight, Part 2
10. Windows Phone Application Platform Architecture
11. Development and Debugging Tools for Building XNA Games for Windows Phone
12. Distributing and Monetizing Windows Phone Applications and Games
13. Silverlight Performance on Windows Phone
14. Unit Testing Silverlight and Windows Phone 7 Applications

At the TechEd Middle East Dubai 2010 Opening Keynote, Eric Rudder demonstrated how XNA games written in C# will integrate across PCs, Windows Phone 7 devices and Xbox 360 consoles. And it looks very promising!

I like how they did not only make Windows Phone 7 Series cross-platform compatible with PCs and the Xbox 360, but how they have also added synchronization features to the platform.

This blog is now optimized for smartphones thanks to the excellent plugin WordPress Mobile Edition.

Inspired by Palm’s use of the Cufón JavaScript API to generate images of custom web fonts I have decided to try it out on my WordPress blog headers. Installation was very easy in four simple steps:

1. Download the WP-Cufón addon, unzip and copy to wp-content/plugins
2. Go to http://cufon.shoqolate.com/generate/ and convert a TTF or OTF font to JavaScript
3. Create the folder wp-content/plugins/fonts and upload the generated font.js file to this location
4. Activate the WordPress plugin and go to settings, and choose your font name and what it should replace

Works very well with the WP-Thesis theme I use on my blog.

Chris Pirillo has just posted a video walkthrough of Windows Phone 7 Series:

What I found most interesting is that it takes exactly 3.0 seconds to open an email from the inbox (16.10 into the video). That’s about 2.9 seconds longer than it takes on an iPhone. There are also THREE transitions happening when you click on an email from the inbox:

1. Transition from inbox view to a view with just the person’s name
2. Transition from this view to a view with (a) person’s name, (b) toolbar, (c) menu
3. Transition from this view to a view with (a) email contents and (b) toolbar

If Microsoft indeed want corporate users to use this device they should remove most of the transitions and focus more on workflow and efficiency of using the device. That’s what you want to show up if you want to keep your corporate Windows Mobile users from switching to iPhones.

If you already own an iPhone with a mobile data subscription, why should you have to pay for another mobile data subscription just to be able to use your iPad when on the go? Since the iPad and the iPhone use different SIM cards you can’t really move your one and only SIM card around either.

A Swedish iPhone user Jezper Söderlund decided to email Steve Jobs himself if tethering would be supported on the iPad, and he got a direct response from Steve himself:

No.
Sent from my iPhone

From Steve Jobs emails Swede that the iPad won’t tether to the iPhone (9to5mac)

Michael Gartenberg has posted an interesting post about the fragmentation of the Android operating system, and how it needs to be addressed immediately to prevent Android devices from being as fragmented as desktop Linux systems:

I recently tried to install one of the few good Android games and found it won’t work on Nexus One as it has a nonstandard screen resolution. This isn’t just about older devices either — many new devices were announced at Mobile World Congress running either Android 1.5 or 1.6. When does it end? Either Google addresses the fragmentation issue immediately or it will find that Android suffers the same fate as Linux on the desktop.

From Entelligence: Will Android fragmentation destroy the platform? (Engadget)

Smashing Magazine has posted a nice article with tips on how to best market your new mobile application:

• Be Unique
• Be Tweetable
• Cater to Blogs
• Control the Hype
• The article concludes with a great example: “Being Awesome in a Saturated Market”.

The article is definitely worth a read if you are interested in mobile applications.

How To Market Your Mobile Application – Smashing Magazine