Microsoft Touch Mouse (Image: Microsoft)
Microsoft really loves their developers and those who love to tweak their tech with today’s announcement of the launch of an SDK for their multi-touch mouse, dubbed the “Touch Mouse”, and pseudo-approval of users who have older Windows Mobile devices to upgrade their phones using the beta of Windows Phone 7 Mango.
The multi-touch SDK of the Touch Mouse comes after the release of the Kinect SDK, and shows that Microsoft is trying to extend the life of this mouse by allowing third-party software to interact with the gestures that it picks up from the mouse.
According to I Started Something, there are two code samples written in C# and C++, and the SDK outputs a 13 x 15 grayscale pixel sensor image from the mouse’s own sensor.
Meanwhile, Microsoft has told AllThingsD’s Ina Fried that users who happen to have the old Windows Mobile 6.5 have approval by Microsoft to play with the beta of Windows Phone 7 Mango – of course, with some warning.
“We say tinker away with Mango and enjoy the juice,” spokesman Bill Cox said. “But beware the fine print — unlocking phones may void your warranty.”
Of course, Windows Phone 7 users will be getting the update – for free (note that Apple) – once the code has been finalised. Mango features hundreds of new APIs for developers to tinker and add to their applications, in addition to integrated Twitter support and multitasking which looks like WebOS. Yes, I made that comparison.
The video can be seen below.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iq7le236lHI
However, a big question we should all ask ourselves is – Has Microsoft changed their perspective on the modding and developing community? Take a look at Kinect, the company came out all strong demanding that they should stop hacking the Xbox 360 add-on, and even threaten to use its lawyers to sue. Now, Microsoft announced a backdown, opened it up using its Open Source license and allow developers to make Kinect applications – legally.
In addition, Windows Phone 7’s jailbreak ChevronWP7 – which was up in the first few weeks of January before getting pulled – is being slightly reworked in collaboration with Microsoft.
So, take a look Apple. You could learn something.