Lock Screen

The HTC 8S finally allows Wi-Fi to stay on with the display off, making it the first Windows Phone device to offer this much vaunted feature.

We've noticed something pretty awesome on our HTC 8S (review coming shortly, folks), something that many have been calling out for from Microsoft since Windows Phone launched back in 2010. In the Windows Phone 8 build that's loaded on the HTC 8S, we can enable the setting to allow the WiFi connection to remain active when the screen times out.  Huzzah!

The rumor that the HTC 8S would bring this functionality was first reported back on November 22nd and it is now 100% confirmed.

We know that Microsoft is listening to users, as feature after feature consumers want eventually do show up in the OS. We think we have found another one focused on the Music player controls.

The complaint: once you start playing a tune in Windows Phone, the Player controls permanently stay on the Lock screen, even if the music is not playing any more.

Yes, some of you may be thinking ‘who cares?’ but we can assure you, many people find it annoying. In fact, there are third party apps in the Windows Phone Store to address this very issue with the most prominent being ‘Stop the Music!’. And we agree, there should be something more elegant than the current method.

Pinnable CC's and new notifications

Many of the new features of Windows Phone 8 are already known due to the leaked SDK over the summer but exactly how some of it will look is still a bit unclear.

Take for example the NFC Wallet app. It’s a safe assumption that it will allow many different options—storage of coupons, deal cards, frequent flier pass and of course your credit cards. It’s also not too wild of a guess that Microsoft will allow you to pin those to your Start screen for quick and easy access.

We’ve hinted at this before and the leak of the Windows Phone 8 SDK is validating our claim that “Apollo” will allow richer notification support for 3^rd party developers.

Developers will now be able to have their app send notifications to the Lock Screen with the content reflecting the app’s Live Tile:

“In Windows Phone, the lock screen contained a handful of notifications such as the number of new Outlook emails and text messages. In Windows Phone 8 Developer Preview, end users can choose to customize this area with any third party apps they choose. As a developer, you can enable your app to be used in this feature. “

An app can provide content for the following four items on the lock screen:

• The background image. This image is unrelated to lock screen notifications, and is documented at Lock screen background for Windows Phone.
• An app icon
• An app count
• App text

Can we expect changes in the Windows Phone 8 Lock screen? 

Back at the Summit a few weeks ago, Microsoft was very clear that they were not showing all of Windows Phone 8, in fact we were only getting a peek. The reason for that is multifaceted but their official position is they don’t want to show consumer features to consumers when we’re still months from release. Then there’s the whole idea of trying to prevent an Osborne effect i.e. hurting current sales by enticing customers to wait for new phones this fall.

One tiny area of interest was an observation today from a reader (erichon99) in the new Start screen video by Microsoft. At about the 2:15 mark (snapshot below) you can see some icons on the Lock screen: 1 Missed Call/Voicemail, 4 text messages and presumably 13 new Hotmail/Live mail messages.

What caught our reader’s attention was the new Hotmail/Live mail icon which ironically is the old Windows flag logo (yet the new logo is clearly used for the capacitive button). To be honest, we think this is just a mockup oversight and we have no idea if Hotmail/Live mail would use the old logo though we’re leaning towards ‘no’ on that one--in other words, nothing to see here. However...

In Microsoft's video there's an apparent oversight in logo-matching 

...this brings back to the beginning—what are those new features in Windows Phone 8? We don’t want to ruin Microsoft’s surprise but we can tell you that looking at the Lock screen for notification changes is a good start.

One area many have complained about in Windows Phone 7 is the lack of a “notification-center”. More accurately if a notification comes in for a 3rd party app and you miss it, well, you missed it. Sure you can use the app's Live Tile but that assumes (a) You've pinned it to your Start screen and (b) You've scrolled down to check it at some point. But can the OS be even more "glance and go"? The answer is 'yes'.

We’re not sure if Microsoft will have an actual notification-center on board (ala Android's "drawer") but we do know they solved this problem another way in Windows Phone 8—by giving developer access to the Lock screen with the added ability to have custom notifications. There are actually four options for developers to choose from with one of them being extremely creative as it will give you a fresh look to your Lock screen numerous times a day. We won’t say much more on the matter for fear of raising Microsoft’s ire but hopefully this tease will get you excited for what’s coming in Windows Phone 8.  

Microsoft is once again not copying the competition, they're doing it their way and in a few weeks, you can judge for yourself.

Windows Phone Hacker has released Lock Widgets for the homebrew community, just in time with the recent release of Root Tools 0.9. Lock Widgets enables users, who have access to a rooted Windows Phone, to use small tiles on their lock screens to act as glance widgets. Information which can be displayed include Twitter feeds, RSS feeds and weather reports, to name but a few.

Feature highlights of Lock Widgets:

• Weather widget
• RSS widget
• Twitter @user widget
• Memory widget
• Puts widgets on your lockscreen. Pretty simple.
• Daily Bing wallpaper
• Custom background

You can download Lock Widgets from Windows Phone Hacker's website, note that you'll need an unlocked and rooted handset to use this software. 

Source: Windows Phone Hacker

We previously took a look at Windows Phone Hacker's Lock Screen Widgets concept, where enough interest from the homebrew community would spark development to turn it into reality. It would appear as though enough interest was received as in the above video, we can see a working preview of said concept in an app form.

Work is still ongoing to apply UI enhancements and tidying up. Adding, re-arranging and removing widgets is fairly straightforward and selecting the Bing wallpaper is also possible. Suggestions are welcome for new widgets or on the app itself. We look set to see a beta version released next week (depending on continued progress), so stay tuned.

Source: WindowsPhoneHacker, YouTube

We previously covered the Windows Phone Lock Screen wallpapers by AJ Troxell, which provided owners with an extra layer of protection should they misplace their phone. The wallpapers are customizable with editable files included in the pack so personal information can be added including name, email, number, etc.

As AJ is being non-secret Santa this year with 12 days of freebies, and because the lock screen wallpapers proved to be popular, he's released version 2 today. What's new? 4 styles, 43 backgrounds, 4 variations of complete icon sets, and comes in Photoshop and Illustrator formats. Head on over to AJ's site (link below) to download version 2 of this truly useful pack.

Source: AJ Troxell, thanks AJ!

We've covered some wallpaper packs before, not to mention full size wallpapers being trimmed to fit the 480x800 resolution on Windows Phones. Unfortunately, should one not be familiar with a photo editing suite, then creating wallpapers can be a daunting task. Thankfully, WPWallpapers has been launched. This new website will focus on building a database of wallpapers that are ready for deployment, and can be downloaded easily.

But, how easy? Scanning Microsoft Tags easy. Each submitted (and approved) wallpaper will have a tag associated with it and will allow easy download by scanning away. A handy resource for those who change wallpapers often.

Source: WPWallpaper