Microsoft Releases Its First-ever IPhone Application

Microsoft's first-ever iPhone application is a slick photo viewer with a browsing capability that handles a large number of photos on a mobile device screen.

Microsoft said the aim of the mobile application is to let users view even wall-sized displays on a mobile device, regardless of the amount of bandwidth on the network. But the viewer could also be used to browse e-mail or other content. "If you can think of a data type, this can be applied to it," said Microsoft developer Ben Vanik, in a short video.

Seadragon mobile can be used in conjunction with Microsoft's Photosynth application, which takes batches of digital photos and stitches them together. In order to create a Deep Zoom image, Microsoft offers a tool that will prepare the photo or document.