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from the Beta-with-significant-limitations dept.
"VLC, the popular Swiss Army knife of media players, took one step nearer to a Windows 8 Metro release after the beta was released on the Kickstarter project page. The version currently available is for x86 processors but an ARM compiled version is expected soon for Windows Phone compatibility. It seems to be merely a matter of time before VLC provides a common user interface, media sync route and (almost) universal file and codec support to (almost) every phone and tablet currently available.
From Update #19:
Today, the first Beta of VLC for WinRT is getting deployed on the store. As many of you know, the road to come to this point has been long... Very long... I've been driving or helping some ports of VLC on mobile, but this port has been the hardest, by an order of magnitude. [...] This application [...] is compiled for Intel x86 CPUs: Windows RT version will follow as soon as we are able to compile it. The ARM version will also apply to Windows Phone."
(Score: 4, Interesting) by seandiggity on Friday March 14 2014, @12:01PM
Windows RT was the ARM build of Windows that failed spectacularly, for many reasons. IMO the biggest offense was that it denies Window users their "killer feature": Windows has a large library of apps specifically written for it on x86 and, by extension, AMD64. Not being able to run these apps on ARM was a dealbreaker for many, and Microsoft furthered the problem by locking down the OS extremely and making it difficult to install anything outside of the Windows Store.
When I read the headline I first thought "Meh, who cares" but then I thought, "This may make it easier for the VLC team to provide builds for future Windows ARM incarnations." Maybe keeping a few users on that future OS will delay the M$ demise a fraction of a minute longer, though? ;)
Geeks like to think they can ignore politics, you can leave politics alone, but politics won't leave *you* alone. - rms
(Score: 1) by Baron Violent on Friday March 14 2014, @11:25PM
I never did understand why RT was released when it was and with the application library it had. I sometimes think they did it on purpose so it would fail - that way, they could just throw up their arms and say, "We tried, but nobody wanted it," and go back to focusing on Intel.
But good to see the VLC team working with RT!
(Score: 1) by seandiggity on Monday March 17 2014, @11:53AM
Microsoft's "strategy" is a moving target, except when it comes to litigation and intimidation. A rational person might say that not having a good ARM build of Windows is suicide for the OS. An MS stockholder would likely agree.
Geeks like to think they can ignore politics, you can leave politics alone, but politics won't leave *you* alone. - rms