The ScoreMobile app is updated!

the ScoreMobile app has release a new update! The following leagues are available:

• NHL
• CFL!!!
• MLS Soccer
• MLB Baseball
• F1 Racing
• NBA
• NFL
• NCAA Basketball/Football
• LIGA, SERI, Champions, EPL Soccer
• NASCAR
• PGA
• WTA, ATP Tennis

It's still a bit buggy however.  The upgrade claim to have performance improvements but it was not noticeable.  My score app of choice is still Pro Sport Scores

If you just did an upgrade from Marketplace, the new leagues will not show up.  Having done WP7 development it looks to be a ScoreMobile app bug.  However, all you need to do is uninstall the original ScoreMobile app and reinstall (a ploy to boost number of downloads???). 

WP7 News at MWC 2011

Not going to bored you with the details, if you want detail information on the MWC 2011 regarding WP7, you can either go here or here.  I am just going to summarize what happened at the MS keynote here:
 Go WP7!

1. Preview of updates
2. "NoDo" update coming in March.. yay to copy and pasting and faster game launches
3. CDMA versions coming in March (not sure how this impacts Telus/Bell)
4. *side note* - LG hates WP7 - no handset at MWC 2011 apparently - maybe they'd do better if their WP7 handsets doesn't suck
5. "Mango" preview? Multitasking! Broader integration with SkyDrive - including Office Hub - you can share and view other people's documents on SkyDrive using your WP7 handset, Twitter Integration in People's hub.
6. Ooooooo!  Demo time!
7. Recap of what you and I know already....
8. More Demo recap....
9. Zzzzzzzz....
10. Demo of future stuffs - likely the Mango update
11. Multitasking - switch between apps is instantaneous.  Press and hold the back button to bring up apps running in the background (ala WebOS) - large swipeable cards - not sure how to kill an app running in the background however.  If they really is like WebOS, perfect swiping the card up to terminate?
12. IE9 on WP7 - pisses all over Safari on iPhone 4 as IE9 is hardware accelerated
13. Extra demo?  Kinect and WP7 in perfect harmony.  Girl on couch using WP7 to throw balls at a guys' balls.
14. 8000 apps, 30k registered developers, 1 million SDKs downloaded since launch.  More apps downloaded on day 1 of WP7 than any other day 1 devices (seriously?)
15. Nokia dude!  Microkia is going to be great!
16. Ovi map type capabilities to not only WP7 bing maps, but to all Bing Maps...

As I was following the keynote at 7am PST, you can see that near 7-9 i nearly passed out.  But interesting stuff came back with the Mango tech demo.  MS assured that they were showing early builds of real code.  Go agile development!

ING Direct Canada App is here!

The ING Direct Canada WP7 app is now available in the Zune Marketplace. 

You can sign into your ING Canada account, view your accounts and transfer money to/from your other bank accounts that you have setup with ING.

You can download the app here (opens zune marketplace)

How to fix your WP7 Bing Map search in Canada

(Note that this should not be a problem if you are using "Mango".  to check, go to Settings->about and click on the "more information" button.  Check the OS version for something greater than 7720, if your phone's version is less than this, install Zune Desktop on your PC and plug in your phone and Zune desktop should tell you that you can update)

One of the biggest problem on a Canadian WP7 map search in Canada is the search results.  You know what I am talking about, you want to say search for the Zellers stores around your location and your damn WP7 device will find you City of Zellers somewhere in Russia.  However, I do have a very simple fix for us Canucks....

If you have gotten a Canadian WP7 handset, you'd probably be pretty pissed when you use Bing Map to search for say McDonald's around your area and the Bing Map would give you MacDonald city in British Columbia or some place like that.  Searching for a local address was quite frustrating as I had to type the entire address (including the city) and I was beginning to wonder what the hell was the "Use My Location" toggle for in the map search settings?

It was so frustrating that I was hoping for a Google map to appear on the WP7 marketplace.  Read on for the solution.

HTC HD7 - Now Available on Bell!

Bell's WP7 device line up has double in size today.  Joining the LG Optimus Quantum (honestly, i'd stay away from this because Windows Phone 7 and landscape mode currently is a little bit "iffy") today on the Bell network is the HTC HD7 device.  The 3 year contract price is a reasonable $99.95 and off contract, you can have this beauty for a somewhat standard smartphone price of $599.95.

What's so cool about the HTC HD7?  Besides bringing 4.3" of awesome, here are some of the tech specs:

UMTS/HSPA: 850/1900

GSM/GPRS/EDGE: 850/900/1800/1900

Internal memory: 16GB

Talk Time: up to 5.3 hours

Standby: up to 13.3 days

Screen resolution: 480x800 pixels (standard WP7 requirement)

Size: 122mm x 66.4mm x 11.2mm

Weight: 162g

One of the special feature of this WP7 handset is of course the large screen.  Like the HTC Surround, it comes with a kick stand but no surround speakers.

Being built by HTC, you can expect it to be built like a tank (ala Surround).

Check out the rest of the spec here

Microsoft + Nokia = match made in heaven?

Can't really say I am surprised at this morning's development at Nokia + Microsoft.  In case you haven't heard, the big news this morning (the day before MWC next week - or the business day before MWC...) is that Nokia + Microsoft have signed an agreement to join forces to battle the likes of Apple and Google.

Nokia efforts at that POC "MeeGo" wasn't getting them anywhere.  It looks old and crappy (I am looking at you Blackberry OS 6) before it ever came out on the market.  Nokia did the right thing in killing off MeeGo.  Unfortunately, this sounds like a big layoff is coming soon at Nokia.

Even though Nokia is losing market share to the likes of Apple and Google, they are still "massive" in terms of market share worldwide in terms of dumb phones and is still a "brand name of choice" in many countries.  So what does this marriage brings to the table?

Windows Phone 7 "NoDo" Update Imminent??

Looks like the Windows Phone 7 "NoDo" update is coming very very soon to your WP7 device.

Microsoft had just released the Windows Phone Developer Tools update.  Copy and Paste is added to the emulator so that's definitely in.  Besides the performance enhancements to speed up the booting of some games (graphically intensive games), there really is no word on what else this "NoDo" update brings..

Still no word on when the public release is available..  February 7 is a rumoured date but I am a little bit skeptical about that date.  If MS is taking a page from the way they handle Xbox360 updates, I still think that they are going to announce the "go live" date for the Windows Phone 7 update...

This is taking from the Microsoft's AppHub development website: