Attention, Windows Phone 8 owners… you may not have spotted it, but there’s a pretty decent update already available – code-named “Portico”. (Aside: If you visit certain Italian cities – like Bologna – you’ll see porticos as the things that provide the apparent multitude of graffiti artists shelter from the sun/rain/Carabinieri).

“Portico” is not a wholesale new version, but rather a bunch of fixes and/or additions to the platform. You may be notified of the availability of the update, but if you poke the phone to check (via settings | system | phone update -> check for updates) then you’ll know for sure.

EE rolled out the update to both Nokia 920s and HTC 8Xs, so everyone who got their phone through Microsoft UK should be able to get Portico (which updates to OS version 8.0.10211.204, as seen in settings | system |  about).

Can’t take the call, reply by text

Thanks to Richard Watson for pointing out one of Portico’s coolest features, the “text reply” function – and it’s enabled by default. When someone on another mobile phone calls, you can choose to text back an automatic response from one of 4 pre-defined messages (“I’m on the phone, please leave a message” / “Sorry I can’t take your call, please try again later” / “I’m not available, please call someone else” / “Stop calling me, I’ll report you to the Police” etc). Great for when your boss calls and you want to respond “I’m on the phone, please try again at the end of the working day, about 9pm”).

If you’re a recently lucky Windows Phone 8 recipient, you’ll no doubt have followed all of the instructions in how to set up your new phone, so you’ll already know that you can go to My Phone and reinstall all the apps you’d downloaded onto your previous WP7 device (note that the previously recommended Reinstaller app no longer works, due to changes in the Marketplace/Store architecture).

The Windowsphone.com What’s New page gives a quick summary of what the main differences are between WP7 and WP8 (from a user’s point of view, at least – there are many other differences under the covers, since WP7.x was based on Windows CE whereas WP8 now runs on a Windows 8 based kernel).

Here are a few other tips that might be of interest…

Identify your phone

When everyone around you has a Black Lumia 920 too†, you might find it helpful to quickly identify which is yours, so you don’t mix up your phone with others’. One quick way of doing so is to customise the lock screen – easy enough to do, but if you’re going to the bother then why not put your own contact details on it so if your phone gets lost, it might be returned?
There’s a simple app called Metro Lockscreen Creator (a trial version does everything you need, since you’ll probably only ever run it once) – it just creates a simple block picture with a photo you select, and some text (your name, perhaps, or phone number).

Run the app, create the lockscreen and then point your phone at the picture it generates…
† other phones are available. Like blue HTC 8Xs, for example.

Bonk to send

The Register enjoys discussing “Pay-by-Bonk” (fnarr, fnarr) etc, meaning using new Near-Field Communication technology (which is now part of WP8) to allow actions like paying for goods or transferring data in some way.  One obvious way of using this is to send photos to another WP8 user – try tapping on the “…” icon at the bottom of a photo you’re viewing, choose share… and then Tap+Send. You then tap/press your phone against another WP8 device, and the receiving device will prompt the user if they’d like to accept the incoming pic. The phones will use Bluetooth to transfer the content, so you will need to keep them relatively close until both sides confirm the transfer has taken place.

If you can find another WP8 user who’s willing to let you try, give it a go – it can be quite hard to get started, but once you’ve done it a couple of times, you’ll be well enough versed in the technique to make it a smooth and pain-free experience in future. Chortle, Chortle.

PhotoBeamer

Whilst on the topic of pics, those of you with a Nokia handset (including Windows Phone 7.5 users with an older Lumia) can try out their PhotoBeamer app. Install from the Store (or click the previous link and follow the tag on that page), and use the app to navigate to photos you’d like to share with others. Meanwhile, on any computer with an internet connection, browse to www.photobeamer.com and point your phone at the QR Code on the screen. Immediately, you’ll send the photo you’re looking at to the PC screen, and you can use the phone to swipe back and forth around an album too. Genius.

Ringtones

Setting your own distinctive ringtone on WP7.x was always something of a faff, in fact it was the subject of ToW #93. Nowadays, it’s a good bit simpler though for best effect, you’d still be wise to edit the track you want to use, since the hook of the song you like (that you’d want to use as your tone) is probably not right at the start of the song.

To create a ringtone, just drop your choonz into the \Ringtones folder on the phone (by plugging it into your PC, running the Windows Phone app on your PC to manage it properly). No need to worry about tagging with a genre or anything.

This week sees a short but sweet Windows Phone tip, courtesy of Kevin Lief. He paints the picture of being in a meeting when someone says “did you get my email about … etc?”

Of course you got the email… but getting it and reading it are odds apart sometimes. How many times have you seen an email, maybe skimmed it (flagged it even) but haven’t quite got round to reading it in detail?

If your inquisitor expects you to show that you’ve at least put their email on your to-do list, Kevin’s tip might work for you.

• Grab your phone and open the People hub, then select the Contact for the person who sent you the email.
• Flick left to “history” and you’ll see the last messages you’ve received from this sender…
• Point to the email in question, showing the sender, and admit “This one? Yes, I got your email, though I haven’t finished reading it yet…”

Of course, it helps if you have your colleagues’ details saved in your contacts list. If you don’t, try opening their details in the Outlook address book and hit Add to Contacts – or if you’re on the hoof, try searching the person’s name in the People Hub, and if you can’t find it, tap “search Outlook directory”, then open the contact, then hit the save icon at the bottom to add to your contacts.

Random thought: the “save” icon, like that in many applications, is a 3.5in diskette icon. When was the last time you used a computer that had a floppy disk drive (even if the disk was anything but floppy), where do you keep the last diskettes and what did you save on them? Answers on a postcard please