Windows Phone 8 SDK preview applications open on September 12

Yesterday when Nokia and Microsoft announced the Lumia 920 and Lumia 820 Windows Phone 8 (WP8) smartphones, the biggest disappointment was the lack of information regarding the Windows Phone 8 operating system itself.
This of course happened due to the fact that Microsoft was yet to release a SDK preview of the OS in spite of a gargantuan leak of the SDK earlier in the year. As the company was not yet ready to go public with the new feature set, literally nothing was shown, but now Microsoft is preparing to go public with the Windows Phone 8 SDK preview. And you know what? The applications for the preview of the SDK open on September 12, the very day Apple is scheduled to unveil the next iPhone.
Microsoft says that certain key partners and developers have already seen early builds of the SDK. We can bet our money that Nokia is one of them, but then again that was already quite obvious. Also, next Wednesday, September 12, Microsoft will reveal how current Windows Phone developers with published apps will be able to apply for the WP8 SDK preview.
Microsoft insists on a SDK preview and says that it will only reveal the full SDK when Windows Phone 8 is officially unveiled. This should happen sometime in late October, perhaps on the same day as the Windows 8 launch, which is on October 26. This is quite astonishing on Microsoft’s part as currently there are zero Windows Phone 8 specific applications out there. The apps that will be available at WP8 launch may only come from close partners like Nokia, and some key developers, which restricts the scope of the platform at launch.
One should keep in mind, WP 8 apps are on a whole new development platform. While WP 8 devices will continue to support WP 7.5 apps, these apps will not take advantage of the new hardware capabilities of WP 8 devices.
While the company literally showed off nothing at the launch, it said that the camera Lenses feature is part of the SDK preview. While this is true, we already knew that thanks to the SDK leak earlier in the year.