You can get to the new AppWave Store in two ways:http://www.appwavestore.com or http://www.windowsapps.com.
There's more information about the store and some background in these two press releases.
- AppWave Store Transforms the Windows PC Experience with "Smart App Streaming"
- Survey Shows Over 72% of Workers Find Their Productivity Affected by Having to Search For, Install and Upgrade PC Software
Why do I like the AppWave store?
Well for some people, I'm sure the reason is that it makes it easy to download and play Angry Birds in Space. But I really like it for some other reasons.
1) Installing apps on my computer is as easy as installing apps on my iPad my Android phone
I really like the install experience for applications that I get through the AppWave store. Instead of having to go through a multi-step download process and clicking through five screens in an install wizard, I just click the icon in the AppWave store and the app gets installed on my computer. Of course the first time you also have to install the free AppWave Broswer, but that's just a one time thing.
2) It keeps my computer clean
I always have issues with my computers over time as I install and uninstall a lot of software. When I bought my netbook computer last year, I decided that I was only going to have a web browser on it and very minimal other software that I absolutely needed. It's always a struggle to keep myself from installing different software that I come across because I have my rule to keep that computer clean. With AppWave, I don't have to worry. The apps I choose to install are all managed by AppWave and don't add files all over my computer and registry. I feel confident that installing additional apps via the AppWave Store won't affect the performance of my computer.
3) It's convenient
The other day when I was trying to map the new RAD Studio $99 Promo SKUs in Code Central for registered user downloads, I was having a problem with a web dialog not appearing correctly in Google Chrome. I tried again with Internet Explorer but the dialog still wasn't displaying correctly. At that point I thought maybe Firefox would work. I don't have Firefox on my computer and I could have searched for the download on the web and installed it but instead I just went to the AppWave Store, clicked the Firefox icon, and in maybe one or two minutes it was completely installed an running. I really like how easy and convenient it is to find and install via AppWave.
Check out the AppWave Store and let me know if you agree.
12 comments:
The 3/ would be more efficient if you have explained that you had instal RAD Studio Promo with AppWave Store !
There is no way to sign in using Facebook account :(
The team is working on getting Delphi and C++Builder trials up there in the near future. That's one of the things I requested and I'm looking forward to that.
No way to sign in with a Facebook account at this point but it uses the same login that you use for EDN or to register your Embarcadero products so at least no need to create a new account if you're already a Delphi user.
When I tried to install the first app the app browser crashed with an EOutOfResources. Trying to submit a bug report using the supplied wizard did not work.
After restarting the app browswer I could actually start the app. It then went to tell me that it is only free for personal, non-commercial use, an information that was not available from the app list.
The FAQ does not mention how much traffic the app browser is going to create. Does it download the app each time I launch it? I guess not, but it does not say so.
So far, I am not impressed.
Another time Borland/Codegear/Embarcadero wastes time and money.
You are not able to deliver modern looking powerful community tools (forums, issue tracker, git repos etc.) but feel the need to compete in an area where people have already found their way and an official windows metro marketplace will arrive soon.
Forget it. Nobody, imho, waits for appwave. Better kill it soon instead of wasting more money!
Seems to be a good idea !
Is there any planned 'free' license for open source appli. developpers ?
>windows metro marketplace
Surely that will just be a way of finding apps and downloading them.
I think the main point about AppWave is that the apps are streamed and cached but isolated from the main windows install, and allow usage and monitoring information on the apps as they're used.
This kind of approach would trump a vanilla 'find and install' app website and is the sort of thing that's manna from heaven if you're an IT infrastructure manager with a large site and lots of software, and associated ongoing licenses to pay. If you have a site-wide license for X users and only 20% of those users actually run the software, you can cut that licensing cost whilst also spending less time maintaining all those installs, for instance.
The same history from past, where they took money from Delphi and invested in ALM.
Now they are investing on this app wave, which they have been trying during the last 2 years with success.
They should put money in Firemonkey, which is broke and has a lot of bugs.
don't see the point in this, it's obviously target to people who can't even do the basic tasks of googling some software vendor's site, download a file and install it. They just make everything more simple for people who fail at doing the basic things with a pc.
I think the same about metro on desktop pc's, i can understand it for tablets but who in their right mind would wan't metro on their desktop pc. Again it's for people who can't do the basic tasks on a computer.
Allways making things simpler while limiting those who actually know there way around with a computer.
Waste of time and money.
The point with the store is that you can spend less time googling apps, going to numerous vendor sites that require you to enter credentials, and undergoing an lengthy install process. Because apps are streamed directly to your desktop and you only need an EDN or user account, you can ultimately save a lot of time. BTW: there are separate R&D teams for AppWave and RAD so AppWave Store does not impact the continuous development work the RAD team is doing
Thanks for pointing those things out.
I think in the end it all comes down to the UI and user experience you prefer and AppWave may not appeal to everyone but it will to a lot of people.
On my Android phone I use Launcher7 with the Windows Phone look because I prefer having a few larger buttons on my home screen with my email, call and text counts easily visible instead of a lot of small buttons for apps that I don't regularly use.
On my computer I like AppWave because it saves me time finding and installing software and keeps my computer clean.
One more story related to AppWave and All-Access that just happened today.
My co-worker Sasha needed to look up some InterBase sales data for a meeting. We do that by querying a database of sales transaction info using Embarcadero Rapid SQL and then do a pivot table report on the data. For some reason, her product license expired so it wouldn't run and she couldn't look up the info she needed.
I run Rapid SQL via AppWave and it uses an All-Access product license that is managed by our IT department so I had no problem running my copy and I was able to get her the information she needed in time for her meeting.
In the meantime, she put in a request with our Help Desk to get an All-Access license too. Then IT just updates that master license once a year and we have access to all Embarcadero products whenever we need them via AppWave. It's much easier that way.
Post a Comment