Microsoft says developers have earned $2.5B through ID@Xbox

According to Microsoft, game developers have made a fair chunk of change through its ID@Xbox program.

ID@Xbox is the gaming brand’s program to support independent developers and has been used to publish titles including Dead by Daylight, Warframe, SMITE, Dead Cells, Spelunky 2, The Long Dark, Kerbal Space Program, Human Fall Flat, Overcooked, Grim Dawn, Outer Wilds, and thousands of others.

Needless to say, ID@Xbox has been rather successful. The program has enabled...

29 March 2022 | Gaming

Microsoft sets out to woo regulators with ‘Open App Store Principles’

Microsoft is getting ahead of potential new laws governing app stores by announcing its Open App Store Principles.

Last week, Developer reported on Apple’s latest fight against such legislation after the company sent a letter to US lawmakers urging them to reject S. 2710—a bill that would force Apple to open its notorious “walled garden” and enable the sideloading of apps.

Microsoft has managed to avoid being the focus of high-profile antitrust investigations in...

10 February 2022 | App Stores

Extending Microsoft’s Azure Digital Twins for real-time analytics

As countless applications need to track live systems, developers face the challenge of implementing real-time analytics that can react to incoming telemetry and quickly identify problems or opportunities. Examples include telematics software that tracks vehicles in a fleet, security software monitoring physical points of entry or network endpoints in a cyber infrastructure, health-tracking systems that analyze telemetry from wearable devices, and many others. These applications are all...

10 January 2022 | Analytics

Developers can now add real-time analytics to Azure Digital Twins

ScaleOut Software is extending its Digital Twin Streaming Service to add real-time analytics to Azure Digital Twins.

The company’s Digital Twin Streaming Service is used for deploying digital twins on a highly scalable, in-memory computing platform in the cloud.

Several real-time components have been added as part of the new integration with Azure Digital Twins. For example, rather than require the use of Azure’s serverless functions, the new extensions enable...

16 November 2021 | Analytics

Thomas Dohmke will be GitHub’s new CEO

Thomas Dohmke is taking over from Nat Friedman to become GitHub’s new CEO.

Dohmke co-founded HockeyApp – a service to help distribute beta versions of apps and get analytics and crash reports – in 2011, to solve some of his paint points as a developer.

He took this passion for solving pain points to GitHub in 2018 after leading Microsoft’s acquisition of GitHub alongside Friedman.

In a blog post, Dohmke wrote:

“Leading the home for all...

3 November 2021 | Databases

Microsoft: Universal Windows Platform is finally being sunset

Thomas Fennel, Principal Program Lead at Microsoft, clarified this week that Universal Windows Platform (UWP) is finally being sunset.

In an announcement on the GitHub repo for the Windows App SDK, Fennel says that UWP will only receive “bug, reliability, and security fixes,” and won’t be receiving new features. In other words, it’s being deprecated.

This won’t be of any surprise to just about, well, anyone, but Microsoft has skirted around what’s happening...

20 October 2021 | Platforms

Gitpod unveils OpenVSCode, a cloud-based IDE ‘free from Microsoft’s control’

Gitpod has unveiled OpenVSCode, an open-source project that makes the IDE accessible in the browser “free from Microsoft’s control”.

Microsoft’s Visual Studio Code (VS Code) is free, open-source, and is one of the world’s most popular IDEs. VS Code supports the development of mobile, desktop, and web applications and games using languages including Python, C++, Node.JS, ASP.Net, and more.

A browser-based version of VS Code was launched as part of GitHub...

28 September 2021 | Cloud

Windows 11’s app store supports Android apps, enables devs to keep 100% of profits

Microsoft has unveiled Windows 11 along with a new app store that supports Android apps and enables devs to keep all of their profits.

Windows’ built-in app store has never exactly been a huge success when compared to those of Apple and Google. Microsoft has made several attempts over the years to give its app store a jumpstart – including giving developers up to a 95 percent cut of profits instead of the 70 percent that has long been the industry norm – but it’s never...

24 June 2021 | App Stores

Xbox sets out its vision to bring ‘gaming to everyone’

Ahead of its E3 2021 showcase with recent acquisition Bethesda, the Xbox team has set out its vision to bring “gaming to everyone”.

Enabling everyone to enjoy gaming has become an increased focus for Xbox in recent years – whether that’s through delivering groundbreaking accessibility devices and features to help those with limited mobility, a cheaper console with next-gen performance, new finance options like All Access, or the flexibility to play anywhere with cloud...

11 June 2021 | Developer

BUILD 2021: WSL now supports GUI apps, Project Reunion and Windows Terminal receive updates, Visual Studio and .NET 6 get new previews

Microsoft has used the first day of its annual BUILD conference to announce a swathe of updates to its Windows development products.

The first announcement is that support for GUI apps when using Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) is rolling out as of this week.

A preview of the functionality has been available since last month and is designed to allow developers to run their favourite Linux tools, utilities, and apps directly in Windows 10. Last week, Google announced...

26 May 2021 | Development Tools