Microsoft gives developers something to watch with official Channel 9 app for Windows Phone

By Daniel Rubino
published

If you’re a Windows Phone user, probably one of the cooler things you’re noticing these days are apps labeled as ‘Made for Windows Phones and Windows PCs. Is there anything more satisfying than having the same experience on your phone and PC? Today, Microsoft added another notch with the release of their Channel 9 app for Windows Phone. The app had been on Windows 8 for a while but now Phone users can get in on the action.

What’s Channel 9 (http://channel9.msdn.com), you ask? It’s Microsoft in-house broadcast channel. They mostly do developer series on how to better write apps, opportunities, and they even highlight new hardware releases for consumers. They’ve been around for 10 years already and were recently the hub for all of those online Build developer sessions.

Channel 9 Windows Phone app

Taking a look at the app, and it’s fairly basic, though well designed. You get a the main page with the latest videos and ‘Browse’ section with Tiles for subsections like Fresh, Top Rated and Shows. Tapping a video will give you a summary, user rating of the episode, ability to Share or add to a ‘watch it later’ queue.

Having a Phone app for Channel 9 is quite important, as the site’s videos are not on YouTube but rather use Microsoft’s Silverlight for streaming (last I checked). That can make watching videos on-the-go a bit troublesome. The app seems to work well, but I have had videos have some streaming errors on occasion, but overall it seems to be okay.

Are you a developer that enjoys Channel 9’s content? Head here to the Windows Phone Store to pick up the free app. Likewise, you can grab the Windows 8 Modern App here for your PC (opens in new tab).

Thanks, Lance_WPCentral, for the tip!

QR: Channel 9

Daniel Rubino
Daniel Rubino
Editor-in-chief

Daniel Rubino is the Editor-in-chief of Windows Central, head reviewer, podcast co-host, and analyst. He has been covering Microsoft since 2007 when this site was called WMExperts (and later Windows Phone Central). His interests include Windows, laptops, next-gen computing, and for some reason, watches. Before all this tech stuff, he worked on a Ph.D. in linguistics, watched people sleep (for medical purposes!), and ran the projectors at movie theaters because it was fun.

48 Comments
  • Dan..... Where is your full review of L630 ??? Sorry for being off topic.
  • Long story short: we're waiting on a proper review unit. The one we have is not finalized, nor were we supposed to have it. This is in Nokia's court now, but I'll press on it today.
  • Thanks for instant reply Dan.....:) And I will be waiting for your review....:)
  • No you're not.
  • Yes! Finally!
  • I asked for this app a lot and I knew Microsoft was listening.....just that it took a long time.
  • This app has no animated tile, while Channel 9 webpage (if pinned) does and it's so cool!! Active content and everything.
  • I had to check out out for myself. That's pretty sweet! I didn't know pinned webpages could do that!
  • A lot of the meta data you have to provide is the same, we'll look at updating the app to have a nicer tile. We actually have an update in the queue already that adds support to view your queue and a few bug fixes.  -- Duncan Mackenzie (dev lead, C9)
  • The icon of the app looks a bit androidy to me...
  • :)   We've had that mascot since 2004, a while before Android even existed, so any similarity is coincidental  
  • Okay got it!
    Thanks the explanation :)
  • Thank you Microsoft!!!!!!!
  • Now how about one for MVA?
  • I though since all mva vids are hosted through channel 9 we'd be Ok but I can't find any! Ah well, at least we got this app!
  • Just looked through the app: Not very good. Finding what you're looking for is a chore, many videos don't show up that I know are there somewhere. Honestly, I've tried some lame 3rd party apps that were better.
  • Is it searching that you are finding difficult? Or browsing? Understand that finding things is pretty important, we have around 40,000 videos so it can be hard to dig through them -- Duncan Mackenzie (dev lead, C9)
  • Oh cool! Been a subscriber of channel9 for a long time now. Love Bob Tabor's videos!
  • Good luck finding them on this app in it's current state. I hope an update happens soon.
  • Actually just found his videos no problem in the app.. just swiped to "more" and hit "search"...
  • Awesome happy to see this... Not bad for a first run at it
  • Pretty sure this was developed by Hidden Pineapple (the same guys behind Rowi). I have Channel 9 (beta) and it looks exactly the same.
  • Yep, that was the beta of *this* app, and yes... Hidden Pineapple did develop it -- Duncan Mackenzie (dev lead, C9)
  • The beta had a queue, and I'm not seeing that in the full version? Or does that only show up when signed in now?
  • Yes you need to be signed in (that was true in the beta as well, since the queue is *your* queue from your account on the Channel 9 site), but the link to show it was lost in the current version. We fixed that and are pushing an update now
  • How about pausing, and saving position? Plus showing that something is watched?
  • Looks good... Thanks!   How about background downloading and offline viewing?
  • Personally I'd love a Xbox One Channel 9 app
  • Your wish will be granted as soon as we can get it published -- Duncan Mackenzie (dev lead, C9)
  • Awesome. Currently the way I watch C9 the most is through an RSS feed on my TiVo premiere. It works ,but it's not ideal, it has some issues decoding the videos.
  • To bad they killed off inside xbox
  • Well designed but need update
  • Nice
  • I have some problem with C9 Modern App. On PC, It can't play any video. It show "The video failed to play". But it work perfectly on Surface RT.
  • As a general comment...
    Having a Phone app for Channel 9 is quite important, as the site’s videos are not on YouTube but rather use Microsoft’s Silverlight for streaming (last I checked).
    Our videos are nearly all MP4 now, so the default player on the site is HTML 5. If your browser doesn't support that, we will fall back to Silverlight or Flash, but it should definitely work on most mobile devices without the app if that is your preference. -- Duncan Mackenzie (dev lead, C9)
  • I thought it was my local channel 9 news app.
  • It seems to go a bit crazy in the notification bar with "1 new video"
  • I'm absolutely an Absolute Beginner for WP apps, so this will come in handy.
  • I remember watching hot apps on 360s inside xbox up untill they killed off the ix feature
  • Cool !!!! Thank you for the tip, wpcentral !!! I was about to loose this pearl !!!
  • Issuer with this Apollo and the Windows 8 app, no search facility, no marking something as watched. Plus can you parser something and go back and watch from that position even if the phone has been rebooted? These are all essential features..
  • Issue with this App and the Windows 8 app, no search facility, no marking something as watched. Plus can you pause something and go back and watch from that position even if the phone has been rebooted? These are all essential features..
  • Marking as watched is an interesting one, but they both (Windows 8 and phone) have a search option. In Windows 8 it is the standard search 'charm', in the WP8 app it is in the 'more' panel of the main navigation pivot
  • I wondered how you searched in Win 8.1.. I was half way through a video, would be great if this video was remembered as well as the position. It would be great if this information was synched with the app and the web. Is there a video on your to get the best of the website and the apps?
  • Finally!!! Such a shame it took them such a long time...
  • Epic fail. Search for Bob Tabor's videos gives no results, most videos are in foreign languages. Am I just having a bad user experience?
  • Cannot search for c# fundamentals either..
  • I love Channel 9. I could go on and on about that, but I'm just commenting because I watch enough to make playback speed theeee most significant feature of any Channel 9 viewing experience. Do others here agree, or am I unique?