Windows Phone App Manager
Getting Started
PO Box 11
Cammeray, NSW 2062
Introduction
It’s no longer simply enough for organisations to supply handsets for their staff. To truly leverage the investment in smartphones it’s important for them to continue to invest through the development of internal applications that will aid staff and to continue to engage them with the business.
The first application that a lot of organisations look to deploy is the concept of a Company Hub. You can think of this as the entry point into the organisation on the device. It can be used to direct users to other internal or store applications they may want to download, along with relevant websites, data feeds and company contact information.
The Windows Phone App Manager aims to simplify the process of developing and deploying a Company Hub application for the organisation.
Windows Phone currently supports two mechanisms for installing applications: via the public store, or via enterprise deployment. This excludes side-loading applications to developer unlocked phones during the debug and testing phase. Publishing via the Windows Phone store requires the application to be certified and is then available for download to anyone with access to the Windows Phone marketplace (in the regions published to).
Enterprise deployment on the other hand provides a mechanism whereby a company can self-sign and distribute applications to staff of the organisation. This involves the following steps:
-Acquiring an enterprise certificate
-Signing the application
-Distributing the certificate and the signed application.
Signing and distributing of enterprise applications is typically handled by a Mobile Device Management (MDM) software such as Intune. However, for organisations that haven’t deployed an MDM solution an alternative is for them to self-sign applications using the tools that ship in the Windows Phone SDK and then distribute the certificate and application via IRM protected email or secured website.
The Windows Phone App Manager eliminates
the need to install the Windows Phone SDK
The Windows Phone App Manager can be used to sign both applications based on an available template, or custom applications uploaded by the organisation. This effectively eliminates the need to install the Windows Phone SDK in order to compile and deploy enterprise applications.
In this document you’ll walk through getting setup with the Windows Phone App Manager and learn how to create and sign applications using the tool.
Download and Setup
The Windows Phone App Manager is published in the Windows 8 Store and is freely available throughout all available regions. Follow this link to the Windows Phone App Manager on the Windows 8 Store:
Note: The Windows Phone App Manager will only run on Windows 8 computers
Follow the prompt to Install the Windows Phone App Manager. Once installed it will appear on the Start screen. Click the Windows Phone App Manager icon to run the application.
Take a minute to read the introductory steps. We’ll elaborate on them in the document, so once you’re ready, click the Let’s get started! Button to proceed.
Signing In and Creating an Organisation
The first step is to sign in using your provider of choice. There is no best answer as to which provider to choose, other than to select a provider that you already have an account with. We need you to sign in at this point so that when you come back to the Windows Phone App Manager we can identify you and display information about your organisation and applications.
Depending on which provider you select you will the appropriate sign in prompt. [DL1]For example, selecting Microsoft will display the Microsoft account sign in prompt.
After signing in, you will be prompted to create an organisation by supplying a Company Name and a one or more Approved Domains[DL2]. Firstly, don’t worry, you’ll be able to edit this data later. Secondly, you can create as many organisations as you want, and delete the ones you don’t want. Lastly, the Approved Domains can be left blank – it’s used to validate users of the application if you decide to connect your application back to the Windows Phone App Manager (more on this in the Creating Applications section).
Once you’ve created your first organisation you’re up and running at the main screen of the Windows Phone App Manager. Here you can see relevant information about your organisation, applications that are managed by the tool and users that are associated with your organisation.
It’s recommended that you fill out the rest of the information in the Company pane. Here’s a quick list of what each item is:
Name / The name of the organisation. This is displayed when users select which provider they wish to sign in with (Connected applications only)Logo / The organisation’s logo. This should be 200x100 png with a transparent background. This is displayed when users select which provider they wish to sign in with (Connected applications only)
Auto Approve Domain / One or more semi-colon separated email domains which will be used to validate users eg builttoroam.com;pixelandsons.com (Connected applications only)
Signing Password and Certificate / The Enterprise Signing Certificate (pfx file format) and password acquired from Symantec, required to sign applications on behalf of the organisation (
Publisher ID / The ID of the organisation. Defaults to an automatically generated value but can be updated to align with a Publisher ID used in the Windows Phone store. This can allow applications to detect the installation of other applications with the same Publisher ID.
We’ll cover the Applications pane in the next section, and will come back to managing users when we discuss Connected applications.
Creating an Application
To create an enterprise application, click the + button in the Applications pane of the main screen. You’ll be prompted to give the application a title and select whether you’re going to use one of the existing templates, or upload your own custom application. Each of these will be discussed in turn.
Template Applications
A template application is one based on any of the templates that is currently available in the Windows Phone App Manager. Currently there is only one template but this will likely grow and/or evolve over time. At any stage you can take advantage of these new templates by republishing your application using this tool.
Details
The details section allows you to configure attributes of your application that will govern how it appears on the users Windows Phone. Here is a list of the attributes and where they are used
Title (applications list) / The title of the application as it will appear in the applications list when installed on the user’s device.Template/Custom / This allows you to switch between using a template or uploading a custom application (discussed later in the Custom Applications section)
Template / The template that the application is based on. This will determine the layout and behaviour of the application. Currently there is only one template which is for a Company Hub style application
Title (primary tile) / The title that will appear at the bottom of the tile which appears when the user pins the application to the start screen.
Product ID / This is read-only field and is only relevant for organisations with other applications so that the application can be uniquely identified.
User Access / For Connected applications this determines if there are any restrictions placed on whether authenticated users can access the application
Application Icon / This is a 100x100 png image which will appear in the applications list
Tile Background Image / This is a 336x336 png image which will appear as the background of the tile that appears when the user pins the application to the start screen
Panorama Background Image / This is a 1600x1096 png image which will be set as the background of the main panorama within the application. It’s recommended that this image should have a high level of transparency to ensure the contents of the application is visible in both dark and light themes on the phone
Splash Screen Image / This is a 480x800 jpg image which will be displayed when the application is launched. By default there is no splash screen.
Version Number / The version number that appears on the about page
Copyright Information / The copyright information that appears on the about page
Support Email Address / The email address listed on the about page, with click through to send a support email
Terms of Use / A URL to the terms of use web page. Specifying this will display a link to this page in the about page
Privacy Policy / A URL to the privacy policy web page. Specifying this will display a link to this page in the about page
Internal Applications
This feature is still under development – you can use this to indicate other internal applications which will be available for the user to install via the application.
Store Applications
The store application pane lists applications that are available in the Windows Phone store that might be useful to users of the application. To add store applications, click the + button. Enter a search term and click Search to display a list of applications currently available in the store. Select the applications you want to include and click Select.
Websites
The websites pane lists web pages that may be of interest, or be useful, to users of the application. In addition to the URL of the page you want to link to you can also specify Title, Description and Recommended For (ie why someone would want to click on this website). Currently Description and Recommended For are not used by the template but expect them to be surfaced in the template in the future.
Feeds
On the feeds pane you can add data feeds from Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, YouTube or Blogs (RSS). In addition to the title, you needs to specify the Url and Type of data feed, along with a description and why the feed is recommended. Again, the description and recommended for attributes are currently not being used.
It’s important that the Url for each feed type is structured correctly:
YouTube/Flickr/RSS
Any RSS based feed
Offices
On the offices pane you can specify any number of offices. All attributes are displayed within the application, with the Region property being used to group addresses. You can use the map to specify the exact co-ordinates of the office to facilitate driving directions.
Custom Applications
The other type of application is a custom application. You need to upload your custom application xap file (do not sign the xap before uploading – the application will do that for you). Although you can specify other attributes such as Store Applications, Web Sites etc, these are not used by the custom application. The only changes made to your xap are:
-Replace the title with the value specified in the Details pane
-Native compile of the application
-Signing application with enterprise certificate, making it ready for internal distribution.
Publishing Applications
The final step, now that you’ve configured your application, is to publish the application. This involves running the native compilation and signing process. Hitting the Generate button on the right side will produce the appropriate xap file, which can then be downloaded by clicking the Download Link in red. You can also download a compressed copy of the certificate, ready for secure distribution.
Standalone XAP
The template application can operate in two modes. If you generate a Standalone XAP, what you are effectively saying is that the application shouldn’t have any reliance on the Windows Azure Mobile Services.
Mobile Services XAP (Connected)
The Mobile Services, or the Connected, XAP is an application that connects back to the Window Azure Mobile Services in order to dynamically retrieve the list of store applications, feeds, websites and offices, each time the application launches.
Users
Users of a Mobile Services enabled application will have to select a provider and sign in using their existing set of credentials. If user restriction is enabled for the application, the user will be prompted to enter their email address as part of their profile. Hitting the submit button will validate that the email address domain belongs to the AutoApproved Domains, before sending an email out to their email, containing a validation pin. The pin needs to be entered within the application before the user can start using the application.
User Management
On the main page of the Windows Phone App Manager there is a Users pane. This lists all users that have signed into the application. Any user can be disabled by simply clicking on the appropriate User tile. This is a toggle, so clicking the user again will re-enable that user.
[DL1]‘Depending on which provider you select, you will be taken to the appropriate sign in prompt’
[DL2]‘Company Name and one or more Approved Domains’