14 DAY TRIAL // One of the possible ways to tackle the lack of apps on Windows 10 Mobile is by bringing Android and iOS apps in the store, and Microsoft has developed special tools that can help developers with that.
In a new blog post published today, the company shows the iOS version, internally codenamed Project Islandwood, at work, trying to prove developers that creating an app for the iPhone and then bringing it on Windows 10 Mobile is a piece of cake.
Nick Gerard, Program Manager at Microsoft, shares the code of a project that includes the creation of a to-do list app for iPhone, which is then ported to Windows 10 as a universal app, thus running on both PCs and smartphones.
While the post is very technical and includes only information that would come in handy to developers, it’s very clear that Microsoft is putting a lot of effort into this new approach and hopes that, together with the community, it could convince more app makers currently in Apple’s yard to embark on the Windows 10 Mobile train too.
What about Project Astoria?
Microsoft doesn’t talk too much about its efforts to bring apps from different platforms on Windows 10 Mobile, but the company actually unveiled these plans with much fanfare in mid-2015. Since then, however, Redmond has been mostly tight-lipped on this new push, and sources close to the matter indicated that the company actually shelved plans for at least one of the projects.
Project Astoria, for example, is believed to be put on hold at the moment, after previously taking shape quite nicely in preview builds of Windows 10 Mobile.
Running Android apps on Windows 10 Mobile was possible through some third-party apps, but at least it worked and showed that Microsoft was advancing at a really fast pace with this project. And yet, there’s now evidence that Microsoft has given up on the idea of bringing Android apps on Windows 10 Mobile, focusing instead on Project Islandwood more than before.
Windows 10 Mobile is projected to debut sometime in the near future, but don’t expect the RTM version to bring support for Android or iOS apps.