Well, the honeymoon is over. The last time you heard from me, my relationship with the Lumia 920 and Windows Phone 8 was in its infancy, untainted by the painful reality that we truly are stuck together – for better or worse. We were newlyweds, dancing the night away and taking long walks on the proverbial beach. But now we have had time to live together, I’m beginning to notice its flaws. Some of WP8’s quirks are beginning to make me question the practicality of our arrangement. When this whole thing started, I assumed I was ready to make the switch from iOS to WP8, but as the days wear on it is quite obvious that Microsoft’s mostly great operating system still needs some work. And the most pressing to-do list item should be a notification center. Where the hell is it!?
WP8 uses toast notifications to alert the user of missed calls, new texts, etc. The problem is that without a way to store these notifications, they are lost after a brief appearance at the top of your screen. If you happen to be away from your phone when a toast pops then it may be gone forever, and that’s no good. The number of missed notifications for any particular app is shown on its Live Tile – assuming you’ve even made a Live Tile for that app – but even this half-assed workaround is imperfect. Once an app is opened, the number of notifications is erased from the associated Live Tile, even if you don’t deal with or read any of them.
It was a missed Twitter mention that first had me riled up about WP8’s lack of a notification center. Under normal circumstances, I would have shrugged it off. Social media has never been a huge passion of mine. However, this particular mention was special. After leading a presentation on a tech journalist I admire, I decided to express my admiration of his work via Twitter. As luck would have it, I received a reply, but due to my Lumia’s pathetic grasp of notifications, didn’t find out until much later. Since I missed the toast notification and had no Twitter Live Tile, I was never notified of the mention. It may seem trivial, but that Twitter exchange was a big deal to me and my Lumia let me down!
That wasn’t the only problem, either. A few days ago, my editor at DT attempted to contact me about a pressing matter and I missed the toast. There were no icons at the top of the screen to alert me and nothing on the lockscreen. There was a small number “1” on the Live Tile way down at the bottom of my homescreen, but I had no reason to scroll down there. My editor was annoyed; I was annoyed; and I knew exactly who to blame.
Microsoft uses the angle of “updates at a glance” a lot when promoting WP8, but has no system to back that claim up. Microsoft claims it “ran out of time” to include a notification center, but Windows Phone has been on the market for two years now and has gone through two major OS updates. If Steve Ballmer and company had time to include a “Kids Corner” why couldn’t they add one of the most essential aspects of a smartphone, especially considering both of WP8′s competitors, Android and iOS, have already implemented it.
My issues don’t end with notifications. Another side to WP8’s puzzling absence of important information is the icons up top that display the time, battery level, connectivity status, and ringer mode. By default only the time is consistently shown, while the other icons require a downward swipe. I understand the logic. Hiding extraneous information keeps things looking clean and helps Microsoft capitalize on screen real estate, but there needs to be an option to turn the hiding off. Only official apps support the downward swipe too, meaning third party apps (including Nokia’s) are incapable of showing the time, battery life, or connectivity. This oversight needs to be addressed and soon. Get it together, Microsoft. Seriously. You’re failing Smartphone 101.
Stay tuned next Monday for the next edition of Life and Tiles, when Andrew begins his dive into Windows 8 and the Lenovo Yoga 13. To catch up, read the entire Life and Tiles of a Windows 8 Convert series.
BS-ing again MS bashing isn’t helping you or anyone else
I have never missed a notification such as that as I see it in several different places: my 3rd party Twitter live tile; the Notifications on my Me tile; the notifications on my People tile; in my email. As for missing such an important notice on what I can only assume is your mail tile at the bottom of your Home screen, I also know exactly who to blame. The user who doesn’t scroll to find what is obviously an important app, or worse yet, a supposed tech reviewer who hasn’t taken the time to delve into customizing his home screen by simply moving the tile to a more prominent position.
I am also suspect of the title of this piece, which obviously took more time to compose than the reviewer took to learn the OS. You are hardly a Windows Phone Convert. More someone dabbling to get his next paycheck and using social media for important messages?
“Since I missed the toast notification and had no Twitter Live Tile, I was never notified of the mention.” and you blame the phone? You know how WP8 handles notifications, and the flaws therein, yet you don’t have a twitter live tile – that’s your own mistake. It’s not like the OS didn’t provide you with a means of seeing the update.
I have a Twitter live tile. Obviously. I just don’t enjoy having to scroll up and down my Start screen to catch up on notifications.
White people problems.
I think the easiest way to see a Twitter notification is through the ME tile. It logs your social network notifications in one spot, as well as giving you quick and easy access to post updates to social networks, check-in to locations, and set your chat status. It is one of my favorite WP7/WP8 features.
I figured this out much too late! Now I have a Me tile and it is soooo much better. Still would like something to hold onto my missed texts and phone calls, but it is doing the trick pretty well for now.
To those blaming the user for not learning the OS better, should ask themself, if it isn’t assanine to have the user scroll all over the place to see what has been missed? Be it Android or iOS, a pull down Notification menu is the simplest and most efficient way to see what was missed while away from the phone.
On my phone I have multiple apps that notify my of various things. If I didn’t have a notification center I would be scrolling all around to see what has been missed. I’m sorry, Microsoft dropped the ball on that one.
Seems someone didn’t understand the concept of live tiles. Using twitter without live tile and than blaming Microsoft? I’m using Windows Phones since the beginning and I never missed a notification center. Before I had an Android phone but its notification center was really annoying.
Hey Andrew, I have enjoyed all your articles so far. I am also a Win user.
A tip, maybe just change your TWITTER settings to be notified by mail of any mentions or direct messages. Then your email client on WP8 will push a note to your inbox anytime you get something important. That’s what I do…
Looking forward to the next installment.
For the record it is too bad you have a Lenovo Yoga and not a tablet with a PEN. I have a ASUS EP121 (waiting for the Surface Pro), and I must say that having OneNote with handwriting recognition and palm block makes the Windows EcoSystem the real “can’t go back to Apple”. A pad of paper should have a pen, and a tablet should have a stylus (one that has pressure and knows the difference between palm and pen).
I will have to try that out! I am in University so handwriting recognition would be awesome. As for the email notifications, I feel like that’s a patchwork problem to a larger issue. Notifications need some tweaking in WP8, it is almost here but falls just a little short.
I’m very late to the party with this one so apologies for the bump, but I find that the lock screen notifications work wonderfully well as a “quick glance” update of my phone. As mentioned earlier, other notification centres I’ve seen can get terribly annoying. I’ve sat next to people with iPhones that make all sorts of noises every 30-40secs, a public presence that usually embarrasses the owner to mute their device. I hope I’m not on my own with this…
Day 2 with my new Nokia Lumia 920 phone w/Windows 8 and I’ve managed to lose the “Local Scout” tile … swipe and not with the other apps either – help.
Hit the search button. At the bottom of the Bing search screen will be the local scout. To re-pin it to the Start screen, go into Local Scout button and press the “…” at the bottom of the screen.