Microsoft are holing a press event today to give us a "sneak peek of the future of Windows Phone". Terry Myerson, VP of Windows Phone, took the stage and bragged that seven of the top nine phones in Amazon's marketplace are Windows Phone handsets.

But that's the past - Joe Belfiore took over to preview Windows Phone 8. One huge change in WP8 is the shared core - shared with Windows 8 that is. With it, devs for either OS can easily port their work to the other OS.

There will be 8 platform announcements based on this shared core.

Windows Phone 8 will support multi-core processors thanks to the shared kernel. For this fall, Microsoft will focus on dual-cores. Next up, higher resolutions will be supported - WVGA is joined by 720p (1280 x 720) and WXGA (1280 x 768). All existing Windows Phone 7.5 apps will work without modification on the new OS regardless of the resolution.

Removable storage is another highly requested feature that will be enabled with WP8.

Belfiore also showcased a game, Marble Maze, on a Windows 8 tablet that runs with minimal modifications on a Windows Phone 8 handset.

Windows Phone 8 will launch with Internet Explorer 10, which borrows a lot of pieces from the desktop browser. JavaScript performance is improved and sites that work on the desktop browser will work on the phone too.

IE10 on the phone will share in some security features of the desktop browser - like warning users of potentially malicious sites. The HTML5 support is improved both in terms of features and speed.

Windows Phone 8 also makes the jump to native code apps - which both improves performance and makes porting stuff like games written for Windows 8 RT to Windows Phone 8 a breeze.

The new mobile OS will have full support for NFC too and will support 3rd party apps. This will allow your phone to replace a lot of things that you used to keep in your wallet (all WP8 phones will have the NFC hub). Microsoft bragged that their NFC wallet is better than Google's because the security is handled by the SIM card instead of the phone itself. The Wallet will debut on Orange France.

A handy use for NFC is business cards - Joe Belfiore showed how easy it is to add a contact to the phonebook using just such a card. NFC can also be used to easily start a multiplayer game between two users using Windows Phone 8 or Windows 8 devices.

Yet another use for NFC is Tap-Send, which can be found in the share menu. It allows you to just tap two WP8 or Windows 8 devices to transfer a file between them.

As expected, Windows Phone 8 will use Nokia's mapping services. The map data can be stored on the phone, so you can use it offline. All third party apps can use Nokia's services, even offline.

Windows Phone 8 will appeal to corporate users with secure boot and BitLocker encryption. It will also allow administrators to manage devices remotely and push apps to them, which will really make supporting company phones easy.

The final of the 8 platform changes is an updated start screen. It features new Live tile sizes - both smaller and bigger tiles are now available. And better still, the user gets to change the size of each live tile. WP7.5 tiles will work without modification on the new OS, just like apps.

Changing the size of a tile will change the functionality it offers. There will be more colors to choose from for the live tiles too.

Source

------

My next phone :)

I thought they were holding a conf tomorrow? O.o Anyways, might be my next phone!

WHEN?

Can't wait to upgrade!

Interesting, but I thought the Windows Phone conf was on Thursday.

I have to say that nothing in that review 'wowd' me. Still think Android is for me. However, that Surface Pro tablet is potentially where I go for laptop replacements. 

Seriously guys, WHEN?

(i just hope they add new colors, I've used all of the old ones till boredom)

Windows Phone 8 and Windows 8 to have same core software? That's pretty wow to me.

@VicViper: Whenever Windows 8 comes out?

Looks like MS will create a divergence in its mobile line.

Source

"Microsoft got credit for ripping up Windows Mobile 6.5 and hitting the reset button: unfortunately it seems to be trying to do the same with Windows Phone 8, leaving early-adopters behind. The news from the Windows Phone Summit today that existing handsets won’t get WP8 but will, instead, get a partial upgrade called Windows Phone 7.8 with the new Metro Start Screen but not much else means everyone who has supported Microsoft and its OEM partners so far can’t expect much in the way of software longevity."

That is unexpected. I figured they'd try to copy Apple's aproach vs doing even worse than Google.

When Windows Phone 8 comes out, actually. Did they announced a date?

Its PR talk. Its not going to be as great as you think otherwise the Windows RT tablet talked about on Monday would also be amazing. The two platforms still use different innards, i.e. CPU technology. Phones are on ARM CPUs and won't run the same software.

I think this is more like Apple and Google Chrome where mobile apps will be on both devices. Don't expect your digital copy of photoshop to run on both.

EDIT: I just read a better description of this win8 winphone8 core and actually I may be fully wrong in my initial thoughts. Seems like they are going for a more identical integration. I wonder why this wasn't mentioned on Monday. The PRo version said it ran all the same apps and that wasn't even mentioned as a possibility for the RT version. Yet, I'd think the RT version is essentially winphone8. hmm.

Yikes... lame!