I Can't Touch Windows Mobile

I have been using Windows Mobile for about six months now and have finally gotten to the point where I need to start talking about some of its shortcomings. All in all, I do not regret using it since it has been very easy to prototype with but having looked at all of its competitors save maybe Symbian, I can't help but feel that they will be in trouble if they do not make significant changes in the coming years.

One of Windows Mobile's biggest shortcomings, is the lack of a Touch Screen API. While some might disagree with me on this, there is NO easy way to handle touch screen input in Windows Mobile 5 or 6. Having explored this topic quite a bit, I have found that most ways of dealing with touch normally rely on creating custom form controls that use some button hacks to listen for a touch and drag operation. I understand that when this platform was released the number of touch devices were limited, however, in this market they are not. In fact, windows mobile had by far the largest number of touch screen phones yet gives developers no easy way of using utilizing them.

A lot of this comes from the fact that Microsoft seems to want developers using the new Managed C# frameworks rather than the Native C++ frameworks. I thank them for this! Writing Visual C++ is hard enough on the desktop and gets worse on the device when memory is such an issue, however, some key features are not included in the Managed Libraries, such as a Touch API.

Needless to say this will be addressed when Microsoft unveils their new Touch Framework for devices and for Windows Forms, but they might loose some developers like me in the process. Apple and Google have very nice Touch APIs for their mobile devices and its obvious given the amazing applications people are writing for them. It's funny how Google still has the killer app for Windows Mobile... Google Maps Mobile. It really utilizes the touch screen, but like many amazing Windows Mobile Apps is completely written in C++.

Maybe this is Microsoft's way of getting serious developers into programming for Windows Mobile by only showing off these advanced features for skilled C++ developers, but why are pushing this C# thing so hard then. I would love for someone to correct me and give me a great solution that doesn't involve me going over to the codeproject and downloading some half baked control.

I Love you for so many things Windows Mobile, but wish you were a bit taller!

Kent