by dave on April 13th, 2010 /
Category: News
Mary Jo Foley has just posted that the first Windows Phone 7 devices out of the gate won’t have browser support for Silverlight. We already knew that Silverlight 4 won’t be ready in time for the Windows Phone 7 launch, but Microsoft had been distributing version 3 with SDKs anyway.
Well it turns out devices compiled for Windows Phone 7 written in Silverlight will run fine, but Microsoft doesn’t plan to support in-browser Silverlight plugins until a later release:
“In its first release, the Windows Phone browser does not support a browser plug-in model. We are evaluating this for future releases of Windows Phone. It is very straightforward to take an existing Silverlight browser based application and re-compile it to target the Windows Phone. Silverlight 4 has not yet been released. We will be sharing more details on Windows Phone support for Silverlight 4 once both products are in the market. Stay tuned.”
[via]
by dave on October 26th, 2009 /
Category: News
Bolt mobile web browser has been taken out of Beta version and is now officially Bolt 1.5. Bolt is a very capable web browser for Windows Mobile and BlackBerry devices that uses server-side technology to deliver full media support to the the mobile web browser. Bolt version 1.5 allows streaming videos of any length, includes a handy download manager, and reloads previous pages from cache instead of downloading them again – saving time and data costs.
The main selling point of Bolt is it’s speed: it downloads pages quickly and without fuss: the ESPN.com homepage downloaded in about 15 seconds. Most of that (about 10 seconds) was staring at a blank screen, but once the first bit loaded the rest really seemed to zip along. Other than the snappy performance, and the fact that its free, the rest of the browser doesn’t offer a very enjoyable experience.
The UI is missing some of the key features we see on new apps these days: big buttons, easily selectable lists, etc. You can see from the bookmarks page below – it isn’t terribly finger-friendly.
That said, Bolt 1.5 is a quick and reliable web browser. I hope version 2.0 address the UI issues, including improved navigation, and then Bolt could be a real threat to Opera and Skyfire.
You can download Bolt 1.5 for free from the Bolt website.
by dave on October 14th, 2009 /
Category: News
The battle of the Windows Mobile web browsers continue to heat up with the release of Bolt 1.5. Bolt takes after Skyfire in that it uses server-side technology to render a desktop-PC-like browsing experience on the mobile: full video, audio and other rich media support.
From their website:
LIGHTNING FAST MOBILE BROWSING
- Routinely loads pages at least 25%-50% faster than competing mobile browsers
- Patented navigation and display technologies get you where you’re going faster
WATCH. CONNECT. SURF.
- View streaming videos from sites like YouTube, MySpace and Google
- Enjoy full desktop PC-style Facebook and social media functionality
- Subscribe to RSS feeds
- Shop securely
- Browse any website
UNCOMPROMISED WEB EXPERIENCE
- Full desktop PC-style browsing on all types of mobile phones
LIGHTNING FAST MOBILE BROWSING
- Routinely loads pages at least 25%-50% faster than competing mobile browsers
- Patented navigation and display technologies get you where you’re going faster
WATCH. CONNECT. SURF.
- View streaming videos from sites like YouTube, MySpace and Google
- Enjoy full desktop PC-style Facebook and social media functionality
- Subscribe to RSS feeds
- Shop securely
- Browse any website
UNCOMPROMISED WEB EXPERIENCE
- Full desktop PC-style browsing on all types of mobile phones
- Web content is never reformatted, repurposed, or removed
Web content is never reformatted, repurposed, or removed
by dave on September 16th, 2009 /
Category: News
Opera has just dropped a beta version of their popular Opera Mini browser, and it looks like they’ve hit the nail on the head. Adding tabbed browsing, a much-improved “quick dial” for your bookmarked pages, plus a few other additions and improvements could put Opera back on top.
Opera has put up a nice video showing off the new features, you can view the Opera Mini Beta 5 Video here.
The only thing it is lacking that the reigning champ, Skyfire, has over Opera Mini now is Skyfire’s incredible support for media, including Flash and Silverlight.
Interested in giving the new Opera a try? Head over to Opera’s website and download it! Please leave some comments with your thoughts after you’ve tried it out!
