WIndoWs PHonE: 7.5 versus 8

Windows PHonE:   7.5 versus 8

 Here’s a quick walkthrough of the changes you
can expect to see in the latest windows phone.

left side pics for windows 7.5 and right side pic for 8

 Home screen

 The new home screen allows users to the resize their Live Tiles to three different sizes - small, medium and large. The rationale behind the new Smart Screen is to allow Window
Phone users to customize the start screen based on what’s important to them – hence, the data it displays will be  different, depending on which size is chosen. Like the Windows 8 start screen, the tiles now go all the  way to the edge of the display, which means the odd gap on the right side is no more, and you’ll get additional real estate for information and Live Tiles. Because of that, the arrow leading users to the app listing has been transferred to the bottom; otherwise, you can simply flick to the left to get a hold of all your apps. 

                 
                  one note Mobile And office
 

 OneNote Mobile is now separate
from Office Hub and functions as
an standalone app and tile (and of course, you can pin it as a Live Tile on your home screen). While it remains very much a note-taking/
list-making app in essence, WP8 has
thrown in a few new features, like the ability to dictate a note and have it automatically transcribed into OneNote, or to send a freshly-taken photo to your notes. On the other hand, the new Office document list can sync across your various Windows-powered devices such as a WP8 device, Windows RT tablet or desktop running on Windows 8, making it easier for users to move from one device to another. Upon accessing the same
file on your WP8 device, the file will  open to the same page or point as where you left off. This applies for Excel and PowerPoint documents too. All office apps (Excel, PowerPoint, Word) have also seen incremental UI enhancements, enabling easier reading and viewing modes. As part of Microsoft’s strategy to assist users to find the documents they want, the Office Hub has a
“Recent” panel which provides faster access to documents stored
on SkyDrive, SharePoint, and on Office 365. Replacing the
“Locations” panel in Office Hub of Windows Phone 7.5 is the new “Places” panel, where you can browse the documents by the
locations they are stored.  

                                   nokia maps

Much like how Apple ditched Google Maps in favor of a home-grown maps app (albeit powered by data from TomTom), Microsoft decided to drop Bing Maps integration on WP8, in favor of Nokia’s map software, powered by Navteq. Microsoft’s partnership with Nokia also means that Nokia Maps will be exclusive only to Nokia-branded WP8 smartphones, but will be preloaded on all WP8-powered devices, regardless of brand. This has also helped Microsoft improve its traffic data coverage, expanding to cover more countries and showing more secondary streets. Improved coverage aside, users can download maps for offline  use, which will come pretty handy when traveling overseas without the benefit of mobile data, as it while roaming can get pretty expensive.  Turn by turn navigation however, is available on a separate app called Nokia Drive and while Nokia has mentioned that it is available to all manufacturers producing WP8 handsets, it is entirely up to the latter to decide whether to include it on their devices.

                            rooos in people hub

The People Hub stays more or less the same, with slight changes to layout, except for one addition: Rooms. Think of it as a more full-fledged version
of Groups, an update that was introduced in the Windows Phone 7.5 release. Groups allows you send
mass text/emails individually as well as see their latest status updates and photos from social networks
such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.  However, there’s more participation and interaction in these invite-only Rooms: you can
chat with members freely in a group conversation, share media such as photos and videos, own a common calendar and share notes, all of which are automatically synced across all Room members’ phones. Like many of the features available on the
WP8, these individual Rooms can be pinned to your home screen for quicker viewing.

                                Internet Explorer 10

Microsoft will be releasing new
versions of its Internet Explorer
browsers on Windows and Windows
Phone at the same time. With WP8
now running on the Windows NT
kernel, the IE browsing experience
on both PC and mobile platforms
will be more similar than before.
While WP7.5 had IE9, WP8 comes with the IE10 browser. On the
surface, IE10 looks more or less the same as its predecessor; the
real improvements are underneath. Microsoft mentions that this
version will offer the same efficient level of HTML rendering as the desktop edition, twice as much HTML5 support as IE9 and a new SmartScreen anti-phishing filter that draws data from millions of Windows PCs to block malicious websites in real-time.
As an example, the Nokia Lumia 920, Lumia 820 and Windows
Phone 8X by HTC performed better than the iPhone 5, at around
900ms for the former three WP8 devices, and 917.3ms for the latter, in the SunSpider JavaScript test. More importantly, iOS devices have dominated this particular benchmark, up until now. 

 The finishing touches
 
There are other improvements made to the Windows Phone 8 to
enhance the overall user experience that aren’t very obvious.
Let us show you where they can be found.