Windows Mobile 7 Is Leaking

Windows Mobile 7 is currently being developed by Microsoft.  As usual, there's one of three things available on the Internet about it:  One person inside Microsoft gives a fistful of information about products being worked on, for laughs, or for money, or because they're unhappy, or because they're thrilled about it. Or perhaps Microsoft as an entity decided to leak out some information about their product to start some buzz about it. Or maybe somebody is just making stuff up. If so, it's interesting stuff they're making up.

Windows Mobile 7 will use touch gestures, similar to how the iPhone does. You will be able to flick through lists, pan, swipe sideway, draw on the screen. A lot of emphasis has been put on making navigation easier and doing away with scrollbars, including a new scroll handle that allows for multiple ways of finding items extremely fast.

Windows Mobile 7 will use motion gestures, something the iPhone does not. It will not use an intricate and complicated series of gyroscopes and accelerometers. Instead, it will use the camera on the phone to detect motions and create appropriate actions. You will be able to shake, twist and otherwise manipulate the phone and get things done. The phone will be able to perform actions when placed face down on a surface, and it will know when it is in your pocket or bag.

Windows Mobile 7 will have an exciting locking screen, that will allow you to play around with it, draw on it, shake it and completely otherwise mess with it.

Windows Mobile 7 will have dramatically improved visuals, different from the iPhone and much more similar to the dark and futuristic visuals of Windows Vista. It will feature graphical transitions, subtle effects, and other things to make it more interesting to look at. This is not detailed in the document, but featured in the multitude of screenshots.


As you can imagine, the iPhone is mentioned in the thing, mostly for the touch-screen. Maybe someday soon we can have a decent handheld computer you can occasionally use to phone people, instead of a phone you can compute on a little bit.