oh, now that we are on a gamedev forum, afaik, UDK only support IOS? (iphone & ipad).

Another exclusive tools to ipad or something.

Does anyone think that Tablets will just become dockable PCs? I mean they certainly have all the power of a desktop PC. So why not have a tablet docking station with 5 or 10 USB ports and use it as you would a desktop?

how do you define "docked"?

a lot of tablet is already docked-able, and laptop - convertible, ala Transformer, and some Windows 8 tablet I forgot what name.

Some tablet (Asus?) came with dock/charger with a keyboard.

and again, how do you define docked? came to a desk with bluetooth keyboard, and connect an ipad to a larger hd screen?

Yesterday I went around testing hardware (i will buy an ipad). however I also gave windows phone a try. Good stuff. but windows 8 tablet is nowhere to be seen. (but that normal, from conversation it seems the latest ipad will arrive in malaysia between 2 to 5 month). so i cannot test win 8 tablet. but it won't change anything. exclusivity app already means that i'm getting an ipad.

but a win 8 tablet could easily means what you are talking about. with it openness (usb thumbdrive compatibility, i'm sure). so to a lot of people, win 8 tablet could really be their pc.

This conversation seems ...odd... for me being a business developer. With android having 50%+ market share last I checked in the enterprise managers see no option but for an app that targets all possible channels (all platforms). IOS certainly has more hype, but anecdotal evidence aside, android has greater sales and industry analysts project will have more apps by mid 2012 (http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-13970_7-20032228-78.html). OTOH, apple is projected to gain back some market share, though android is to remain the leader.

I suspect the reason has more to do with the fragmented hardware available than anything - with apple you have one choice of hardware. If you want a slide keyboard, a 3D screen, whatever feature catches your eye in the store, apple doesn't have a phone for you. But anecdotally it seems there are more iDevices around all the aforementioned fractured android hardware devices are all considered different phones.

That said Apple is, however, unquestionably the leader in the tablet space and the most successful android tablet (Kindle) doesn't even use the android UI.

The OS fragmentation trend is profound to the point where large-cap businesses with deep pockets use $$$ multichannel app development tools like Kony, while the small/midsize businesses that can't afford the best-in-class products use appcellerator (which is really just a wrapper that makes an HTML5 app behave like a native app). Of course I don't think these same tools apply to the mobile game development sector, but I imagine companies in this space have other ways of writing code once for both platforms.

But as for the original question - I think that for now, getting locked into the software ecosystem for mobile platforms is a mostly imagined phenomena (with iTunes being a notable exception). Most large vendors target both platforms, and the smaller organizations that produce platform-exclusive apps go in either direction. Don't forget that iPhone apps must be authored on Macs, which still have minority market-share in the PC space, a factor that really helps ensure there's a strong android-exclusive app selection as well.

Lithic, the problem is not only fragmented hardware, but also short "End Of Life". Someone joked at ArsTechnica that Android devices have 3 month EOL, which sadly, everyone agree.

While the numbers is rising on the android front, this is due to free (it took 99 per year to develop for ios), and access (linux, win pc can develop for android, but mac required for ios). But numbers does not means quality. Which back to the first point.

There was a graph somewhere that shows more than 60% apple users now run ios5 within two weeks (if i remember correctly), but only 1% running Ice Cream Sandwhich at the same time. Which lead to the EOL problem above. Dependes on the carrier and version, bugs are left unchecked - and no longer being updated. If it affect your app, you'd better drop it. This limit the version you can support. More than 80% still runs 2.3 .3 - 2.2 family. This limit the advances and quality of your app.

http://www.androidauthority.com/android-marketshare-gingerbread-froyo-ice-cream-sandwich-60474/

which lead to this sentence on your linked article:

[color=#000000][font=Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif]

"Developers still seem to be flocking to Apple. The Apple App Store attracted nearly 23,000 additional developers between August 2010 and February 2011, while the Android Market attracted just over 4,000 additional developers in the same time period. The average number of apps submitted per developer is 6.6 for the Android Market and 4.8 for the Apple App Store."

[/font]

[color=#000000][font=Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif]

There is a reason why company such as Autodesk willing to go exclusively iPad. Android, atm, just doesn't work out. It took so long and so much iteration before company actually ALLOW (by releasing unlocking tools) user to update their android OS.

[/font]

I'd just like to point all the people who wrote "Windows 8 is so great" to the few users who own a desktop PC and are forced to do something productive every now and then.

That is, the few people who do not care about a pretty portable toy with a lot of animated pictures to Twitter their latest fart and to upload their latest silly picture to Facebook. Think of people who need to make a living from using an IDE, a spreadsheet, or a text processor, or just people who need to move around some files every now and then (you wouldn't believe how hard it is to open an Explorer window).

Or, the few people who need to use a mouse, which makes the entirely tablet-centric interface a real ordeal.

Or, the few people who don't own an XBox, aren't interested in an XBox, and wonder why their desktop operating system needs integration of an XBox online shop.

Or, in generaly, all the people who give a f... about all that "livin' in da cloud" crap. Someone earlier in the thread (was it Antheus?) had concerns about having a Google account. Fair enough, but why would any sane person want to have their computer's functionality bound to a MSN account and their personal files stored on Skydrive?

Why would anyone want any possibly sensitive private files being stored in some obscure, non-verifiable location with obscure and unreliable access control owned by a non-trustworthy private company at all?

Sadly, Windows 8 is "the new Windows" and therefore will sell, no matter what. In 2 years you will not be able to buy a new computer without it. And sadly, Ubuntu uses a tile interface already too (which was the reason for me to abandon it).

I'd just like to point all the people who wrote "Windows 8 is so great" to the few users who own a desktop PC and are forced to do something productive every now and then.

That is, the few people who do not care about a pretty portable toy with a lot of animated pictures to Twitter their latest fart and to upload their latest silly picture to Facebook. Think of people who need to make a living from using an IDE, a spreadsheet, or a text processor, or just people who need to move around some files every now and then (you wouldn't believe how hard it is to open an Explorer window).

Or, the few people who need to use a mouse, which makes the entirely tablet-centric interface a real ordeal.

Have you used it yet? The desktop button is right there on the start screen, and the desktop still functions practically the same way. Once in the desktop opening an explorer window is the exact same as in every other version of windows. You can also launch to the desktop if you set it up that way. I think you are totally blowing this out of proportion.

I'm excited for windows 8 tablets simply because they have a simple interface AND the developer friendliness of standard windows. Try opening an explorer Window on your iPad.

Or, the few people who don't own an XBox, aren't interested in an XBox, and wonder why their desktop operating system needs integration of an XBox online shop.[/quote]
Is this much worse than the 'Games Explorer' we've had since vista? If anything it's more useful than that.

Or, in generaly, all the people who give a f... about all that "livin' in da cloud" crap. Someone earlier in the thread (was it Antheus?) had concerns about having a Google account. Fair enough, but why would any sane person want to have their computer's functionality bound to a MSN account and their personal files stored on Skydrive?

Why would anyone want any possibly sensitive private files being stored in some obscure, non-verifiable location with obscure and unreliable access control owned by a non-trustworthy private company at all?
[/quote]
The cloud is coming on every platform, and nobody is forcing you to use it for everything. If they didn't support any sort of cloud service they'd be left behind.

I'm also confused about why you assume a private company can't be trustworthy. I think you'll find they are much easier to find and hold accountable than your average burglar or a fried hard-drive. Try calling western digital and asking them why they didn't have multiple copies of your data so when your hard drive failed you didn't lose your business report or the novel you've been writing for 5 years. I'm fairly certain a burglar won't leave a name and address so you can sue him later. As helpful as the data recovery people can be, the fire that burned down your house will probably also cause you to lose most of your data.

There was a graph somewhere that shows more than 60% apple users now run ios5 within two weeks (if i remember correctly), but only 1% running Ice Cream Sandwhich at the same time. Which lead to the EOL problem above. Dependes on the carrier and version, bugs are left unchecked - and no longer being updated. If it affect your app, you'd better drop it. This limit the version you can support. More than 80% still runs 2.3 .3 - 2.2 family. This limit the advances and quality of your app.

http://www.androidau...sandwich-60474/

which lead to this sentence on your linked article:

"Developers still seem to be flocking to Apple. The Apple App Store attracted nearly 23,000 additional developers between August 2010 and February 2011, while the Android Market attracted just over 4,000 additional developers in the same time period. The average number of apps submitted per developer is 6.6 for the Android Market and 4.8 for the Apple App Store."

[color=#000000][font=Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif]There is a reason why company such as Autodesk willing to go exclusively iPad. Android, atm, just doesn't work out. It took so long and so much iteration before company actually ALLOW (by releasing unlocking tools) user to update their android OS.[/font]

I've been screaming this over the past year that this is one of the biggest flaw in Android, and will continue to stay that way unless Google do something about it. When Google announced ICS, manufacturers are still releasing new phones running 2.3 and even 2.2! The gap between the new OS announcement until the customers can get their hands on the new OS is huge!

This is why I don't attend Android OS conferences that talks about new OS, because it's pointless. They can talk all they want about improvements, bug fixes, and new features, but I still have to code in 2.2 at least for another year.

The adoption rate is really really REALLY slow.

I'd just like to point all the people who wrote "Windows 8 is so great" to the few users who own a desktop PC and are forced to do something productive every now and then.

That is, the few people who do not care about a pretty portable toy with a lot of animated pictures to Twitter their latest fart and to upload their latest silly picture to Facebook. Think of people who need to make a living from using an IDE, a spreadsheet, or a text processor, or just people who need to move around some files every now and then (you wouldn't believe how hard it is to open an Explorer window).

Really? Because I used it for about 20mins in a VM yesterday and I had no trouble at all getting 'back to the desktop', opening various windows or indeed installing VS11 Beta (just to see how much pain it was going to cause me); granted I threw 8 gig of ram and 4 cores at the VM but the OS was fast to respond and good to work with even in that setup, which was surprising.

Or, the few people who need to use a mouse, which makes the entirely tablet-centric interface a real ordeal.

Or, the few people who don't own an XBox, aren't interested in an XBox, and wonder why their desktop operating system needs integration of an XBox online shop.

Or, in generaly, all the people who give a f... about all that "livin' in da cloud" crap. Someone earlier in the thread (was it Antheus?) had concerns about having a Google account. Fair enough, but why would any sane person want to have their computer's functionality bound to a MSN account and their personal files stored on Skydrive?
[/quote]

The key word is 'few'.
Congratulations you are no longer the target audience for the OS. Instead MS have decided to setup an OS experiance for the people who do want a tablet to do those things, or do want to connect with their XBox and who don't want to worry about where their data is living.

Granted my experiance is currently only the aforementioned 20 minutes however I can see why, for the average user, this would be an improvement in their experiance with using a computer. Maybe, longer term, it won't fit my usage model and I'll stick with Win7 but I'm not going to sit and cry about a UI change when finally someone IS trying something new for the first time in... god knows how long...

(Before someone says it, neither Apple nor Android have done anything "new"; all they have done is taken the desktop and put it on a small touch screen. You still launch things via static icons, you still point and click; the Mango UI is the first new commerical interface I can think of since the shift from the command line many many years ago. Yes, my next phone will be a Windows based phone, maybe a Nokia Lumia 900 when it reaches the UK because having seen Metro in use there and having used woth an iDevice and an Android device it just looks and feels better.)

Have you used it yet?

Well yes, necessarily... I couldn't complain if I hadn't.

The desktop button is right there on the start screen, and the desktop still functions practically the same way. Once in the desktop opening an explorer window is the exact same as in every other version of windows.

Yes, except you have no start menu, and except simple tasks like double-clicking "My Computer" and browsing your hard drive don't work the same way any more, and except you need to do funny sweep tricks all the time. For example, that seems to be the only way of getting out of the screen saver (or maybe I'm just too stupid to get it done otherwise).

I'm excited for windows 8 tablets[/quote]Look, I'm not saying anything against Windows 8 for tablets. Not in any way. Run the same programs that you know at home and on the way? Sure, cool. Heck, I would have to be crazy not wanting that. What I oppose to, however, is turning a desktop into a tablet, simply because that is not what it is, and that is not what works well.

It would be perfectly good if they just did the same operating system (including the touchscreen drivers and some special power saver features and whatnot, if you will), but shipped with a normal "frontend" (desktop, taskbar, whatever) suitable for a desktop. Plus, replaced the task bar application (which really is just that, an application... it's not "The OS") with the tile thingie if, and only if, you install on a tablet. Because that's where it really makes sense. Or, of course, if the user insists on using tiles.

Is this much worse than the 'Games Explorer' we've had since vista?[/quote]Well yes, in my Windows 7 install, the totally useless game explorer is available somewhere, I would have to search to actually find it. The bottom line from what you get when you turn it on is: "This is a computer, and besides, you can play games too, and we built in parental control". The bottom line under Windows 8 from what you're presented when you turn it on is: "Yo tis haz da kool blinkin lights toyz, play games and twitter and upload kool stoof to Facebook".

Sure enough, if you spend a few days, I'm sure you can turn Windows 8 into something usable on a desktop machine, too.

I'm also confused about why you assume a private company can't be trustworthy.[/quote]I'm surprised you would assume this. Companies are about making money, not about being nice and trustworthy. Big companies are about making more money. Keeping your data secure and in an acceptable legislation costs money. Analyzing and selling your data brings revenue. So much for motives.

But... let's actually assume good will. Let's say Microsoft is a charity based organization offering you Skydrive because they're nice guys.

You have no idea where the servers are located. Maybe in a city close to you, maybe in China. Even if you do know now, this may change tomorrow. You may be on holiday when the "we're changing our ToS next week" mail comes in. Or you may not read it, you may miss it. Or you may object to it, and they still do what they want with your data. Because it's them having your data, not you.
Also, you don't know who accesses your data with or without the consent of the datacenter owner or the service provider. You don't know when the next "oh we accidentially compromised the data of 5 million users" incident happens.
Or maybe tomorrow, Microsoft figures out that you've pirated some of their product or you are a XBox network cheater, maybe because incidentially you have the same name as someone else, or maybe because someone transposed a digit when reading a logfile, giving him your IP address. So they decide that since you violate their terms, they'll just delete your data. Ouch.

And if you're about to say "that won't happen", I own an entirely legitimate copy of Windows XP on an old testing machine which is "pirated". I paid some real money for the license at a presumably respectable reseller (Alternate) 4 or 5 years ago, I positively didn't pass the serial number to anyone, yet two years later it was blacklisted (nice surprise when you do a Windows update!). Which means no more and no less that instead of my legitimate number, I'm now really using a pirated one (from the internet), which ironically works just fine. That kind of thing really sucks when it comes to a serial on some old computer that you use once every few weeks, but imagine how much it sucks if someone decides to delete all your data. No thank you. My data, my harddisk.

I think you'll find they are much easier to find and hold accountable[/quote]You can be sure that the 50 lawyers who wrote the 20-page terms of service (that you probably can't understand as a whole, in every detail -- I can't, anyway) thought of hiding enough clauses to exclude that. Also, as a major company, when it really comes hard, what you do is you found a subsidiary that takes the legal responsibility, and have that one go down the drain. That's an entirely popular method for "magical debt disappearance", tax evasion, or for ignoring labour laws when laying off a few thousand people. I don't know what it costs in the US, but in Europe, such a stunt costs you roughly 25,000 -- if 50,000,000 are at stake, it's worth it...

I have photos from my holidays on my computer, as well as any letter (personal or business) that I've ever written, and facsimiles of every important document or certificate in my life. I don't want some bored geek in a datacenter in Langley reading my letters, and I don't want some cracker in Tomsk looking at my holiday photos. I don't even want that guy to know I exist. Nor do I want some nutter in a datacenter downtown getting the idea that it would be extremely cool going to a pharmacy with a copy of my approbation, or to a gun shop with my firearms license, for that matter. Also, I don't like Microsoft deciding tomorrow that it's cool to sell a profile with all my data to Doubleclick.

While it's true that my harddrive may get stolen or be destroyed in a fire, I've not been burglared for 4 decades, nor seen a fire, other than in the fire place (also, I have trust TrueCrypt on the espionage part, and the second disk which is locked in the safe in another house on the loss part).

I don't deem it very likely that a burglar will be able to extract many of my holiday photos from a TrueCrypt drive. On the other hand, online data theft -- and I'm not talking about the ridiculous cases, but about the ones with shocking dimensions (thousands of people affected) -- happens almost monthly.

I got 3 new VISA cards in 2 years because VISA can't keep their computers secure and they weren't certain whether I was one of so and so many thousand people whose data had been compromised. Heck, this is about real money, their money, possibly billions... and they can't do it right. Do you think Microsoft does much better than that for anything you store on their computers and that they don't nearly care as much (because it's not their money)?

The cloud is coming on every platform, and nobody is forcing you to use it[/quote]Directly, no. Indirectly, yes. It begins with the install process where you register for a MSN account. It takes some real dedication to find how to install Windows 8 without, it's nowhere near "optional" or "obvious".

Also, the reason why large-capacity storage devices are affordable is because everyone wants them. By "pushing the cloud" to the masses, naturally people will buy fewer and smaller storage devices. OEMs will eventually rather aim for "minimum boot disk" type of systems rather than "big multi terabyte", simply because they can sell it for the same money, but it's cheaper. Which means that development of larger, faster, and more affordable storage devices will decline. With the exception of "server grade hardware" which will be a lot more expensive.

Similar may happen on the CPU market. If the trend is "everything is mobile, all of the time" then consequentially software will be written "for mobile", and fewer high-power CPUs (and GPUs) will be produced. That's something OnLive aims at, too. Eventually what you have now as a $100-200 graphics card will only be available as extra expensive "graphic workstation hardware".