The Microsoft Build 2017 Recap: What To Expect When You’re Expecting Windows
by Brett Howse on May 19, 2017 8:00 AM ESTFirst Thoughts
Build continues to be one of the most important events for Microsoft for the year, and this year there was plenty of announcements for what’s coming this year for Windows, Azure, and more. There are plenty of chances for developers to make their impact, with a surge in computing devices available now. Phones, PCs, tablets, Xbox, IoT, and other devices are permeating the world we live in, and Microsoft is hoping to not only provide devices, but to also power cloud connections through Azure, and they continuously update their tools to enabled developers to do more.
On the Windows front, there is plenty to look forward to this year. The Fall Creators Update is going to bring some excellent additions to Windows, after the Creators Update which just came out was a more muted release. OneDrive Files on Demand, Linux Subsystem updates, and more apps finding their way to the store thanks to the help of the Desktop Bridge for Windows should provide pretty much anyone with something to look forward to.
Microsoft also announced quite a few updates to their developer tools, and they continue to expand their cross-platform capabilities after the purchase of Xamarin last year. Visual Studio Mobile Center was announced, Project Rome to add the Microsoft Graph to apps, and a Xamarin Live Player was announced which lets you deploy, run, test, and debug iOS apps from a Windows PC.
Windows is not the dominant platform it once was, but with Azure, Office 365, Microsoft Teams, SharePoint, and more, Microsoft still has plenty of platforms to target. Windows has a diminished role in the world of 2017, but Windows 10 is running on over 500 million devices, and if Microsoft can ever get developers to embrace the store, they should have an easier time in the future with updating the base frameworks.
This looks to be another exciting year to keep track of what’s coming out of Redmond.
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close - Friday, May 19, 2017 - link
I'd guess you're not using Enterprise. The "test this app" experience might be MS's way of steering businesses towards Enterprise rather than Pro.Sivar - Friday, May 19, 2017 - link
I suspect the downloads are done by some third-party software.SaolDan - Friday, May 19, 2017 - link
I second thisclose - Saturday, May 20, 2017 - link
It's actually something MS included as "a feature". The content delivery manager with the pre-installed apps option. You can disable this in registry or local policy.As far as I know it comes in the Pro versions although some older MSDN Windows Enterprise ISOs came with it enables. I guess MS received enough feedback from enterprises to cut the crap so now they just try it on regular customers.
blakflag - Friday, May 19, 2017 - link
I would love it if all my apps could be fetched through the store. The problem is most of them are NOT UWP, and created by small developers (utilities and such). Hopefully MS has made it really easy to get apps into the store, because otherwise most of my apps will never be there.Meteor2 - Saturday, May 20, 2017 - link
I probable have 4-5 programmes beyond Chrome and Office, all but one open source, and none came through the app store. The App Store itself is mainly full of junk.blakflag - Sunday, May 21, 2017 - link
Yeah I know it is. I just wish it weren't. :) I actually find Chocolatey to be pretty useful for open source stuff, although I worry a lot about someone uploading a trojan package since it's much newer and less popular than Ubuntu repository for instance.blakflag - Friday, May 19, 2017 - link
The Linux subsystem is truly amazing stuff, and I already find it useful. Unfortunately there is no GPU-acceleration which is a buzzkill for me. Trying to learn machine learning techniques on Windows is really painful since the library support is not so great.Eden-K121D - Friday, May 19, 2017 - link
I really hope they follow through Fluent design language,Wide Color gamut, and HDR support.I really don't want my 2017 computer run a UI which looks horrible
BrokenCrayons - Friday, May 19, 2017 - link
I see no point in messing with Linux inside of Windows when I can simply use Linux atop bare metal and get the distro I want the way I prefer to use it. As well, I don't have to deal with always-on, Google-levels-of-creepy Cortana lurking and listening or non-removable OneDrive. The visual activity history is nice, but I'd hope it can be totally disabled. Knowing how MS works these days, probably not and it's likely part of their data mining efforts as they play catchup with Alphabet and others.