Developers: MS Hopes To Lure iOS Apps With API Mapping Tool

Microsoft isn't standing idly by while Appple's app store fills with software; fysdt writes "A newly-announced service called the iOS to Windows Phone 7 API mapping tool acts as an interchange for developers to take applications they've already written for Apple's platform, and figure out ways to get the code work with Microsoft's standards."

Biggest problem with iOS development

[Rik Sweeney]

is that you have to (AFAIK) buy a Mac to develop for it. I can't really fault Apple on this as it's a great business strategy, but I simply can't be bothered so I'll only make apps for Android, which doesn't require me to buy hardware.

If Microsoft wants their phone to succeed, they need to make sure that their SDK is available on as many platforms as possible.

Re:I remember before Jobs was all about lock-in...

[Samantha Wright]

The answer you're looking for is "its progeny", which is the much-loved Cocoa toolkit. I was speaking of the OpenStep initiative itself, which consisted of a rebranded NextStep (which was also ported to x86) and API compatibility layers for NT and Solaris, neither of which exactly passed into legend.

One thing that's not often remembered is that the OS X kernel and APIs ran on x86 since Steve brought NeXT back to Apple with him. (Rhapsody [toastytech.com] and later OpenDarwin [wikipedia.org].) The rush for the big switch wasn't nearly as large as is often assumed, as Apple was quite prepared for it.

Re:I remember before Jobs was all about lock-in...

[Samantha Wright]

It is, of course, also one of the most epic displays of grassroots community bait-and-switch in history: let volunteers spend years fixing and perfecting the port of OpenDarwin to x86, then kill the community when its code starts facilitating Hackintoshes. Classic Jobsian ill will: "if you haven't paid me in the last eighteen to twenty-four months, I owe you nothing."