# Scaling Mobile Development at Microsoft-- Mental Model

DevFeed: [Scaling Mobile Development at Microsoft-- Mental Model](<https://devfeed.tech/articles/scaling-mobile-development-at-microsoft-mental-model-22783.md>)

Original publisher: [Read original article](<https://medium.com/microsoft-mobile-engineering/scaling-mobile-development-at-microsoft-mental-model-9e51241ea41a?source=rss----87f10537e947---4>)

Author: Anand Nath

Published: 2024-06-12T14:37:04Z

Content type: article

Language: en

Sources: [Android@Microsoft - Medium](<https://devfeed.tech/sources/android-microsoft-medium.md>)

Topics: [Mobile](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/mobile.md>), [Development](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/development.md>), [Microsoft](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/microsoft.md>), [App](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/app.md>), [User Experience](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/user-experience.md>), [Android](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/android.md>)

Tags: [android](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/android.md>), [app](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/app.md>), [architecture](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/architecture.md>), [development](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/development.md>), [ios](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/ios.md>), [microsoft](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/microsoft.md>), [mobile](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/mobile.md>), [mobile-development](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/mobile-development.md>), [reuse](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/reuse.md>), [user-experience](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/user-experience.md>)

## AI overview

This first article in a series presents a high-level mental model for scaling development across Microsoft mobile applications. It describes separately maintained codebases and overlapping experiences, then discusses High Value Controls such as One Camera and One Player, including problems caused by siloed development such as inconsistency, limited interoperability, and redundant libraries.

## Source excerpt

Scaling Mobile Development at Microsoft -- Mental Model In the Scaling Teams Mobile Development series we looked at scaling development in a single mobile code base. Since then, we were at work, looking at up-levelling this problem statement and look at how to scale across mobile applications. Here is a new series which tries to throw some light around this topic. This article is the first of a series, starting with understanding the problem statement and a high level solution. In the following articles we will dive deeper with an example and discuss practical aspects of how we got it done. Let's dive in! Photo by Hans-Peter Gauster on UnsplashShared experiences Microsoft has a suite of mobile applications. Each of these applications are developed in separate code base, has its own release cycles. There are a lot of overlapping experiences across these applications. These experiences are also implemented, tested and maintained independently in each application. Here are some examples: File picking experience across Microsoft mobile apps.Calendar experience across Microsoft mobile apps.File sharing experience across Microsoft mobile apps. In order to drive consistent user experience across these applications, Microsoft is invested in developing "High Value Controls" aka HVCs. For example, there is One Camera which provides camera functionality for most of the Microsoft apps, there is One Player which provides video playback in Microsoft apps and some more. Most of the HVCs are developed in silos without any common considerations or guidelines. Some HVCs are developed inside one of the Microsoft mobile apps and then lifted out to be positioned as reusable. These come with the remnants of the app specific concepts and logic, which does not sit well with other apps. This kind of HVC development lack consistency, coherence and interoperability. This also leads to a series of issues for both the Microsoft mobile apps and HVCs. Issues for Microsoft mobile apps Note: In this