Tuesday, May 25, 2010

Woo Themes

Woo Themes

Woo Themes

Posted: 25 May 2010 01:16 PM PDT

As you might know I am currently using WordPress for my blog engine. Recently, when browsing the web for a high-end professional looking theme, I came across a company called "Woo Themes". Overall, I am very impressed with how professional and easy to...( read more )...(read more)

Announcing Hilo

Posted: 25 May 2010 01:41 PM PDT

What is Hilo?

Project "Hilo" is an effort to tell the story of building high performing, responsive rich Windows applications using C++. We will do this by walking you through our own experience of building some sample applications which we believe provide differentiated user experiences. We will tell you everything from setting up the development environment to taking advantage of the feature set of Windows 7.

The Samples

The first of these sample applications is a photo browser that implements a touch-enabled user interface for browsing photos on your computer. We call it the Hilo Browser.  Below is a screenshot:

hilo_vcblog_screenshot

This application illustrates how to take advantage of the following Windows functionalities:

  • Direct2D: For high performance and high-quality rendering of graphics.
  • Windows Animation Manager: To give the application a unique personality and to improve the user experience.
  • Windows Touch: To provide a more natural user interface through which the user can just "point" and "do".
  • Libraries: To enable the application to provide users with a single, coherent view of their files.
  • Shell API: To navigate the images, to optimize by using the pre-built thumbnail cache and also to provide folder icons from their actual content.

You can download the source code for this application from the Hilo Code Gallery Page.

Over the coming weeks, we'll be publishing a series of articles on MSDN Library (here) that will provide the walkthrough promised above. The introductory article is already up.

If you have questions or comments about the sample code, the usage of technologies or anything in general, please feel free to let us know through the Hilo Discussions Page.

You can also follow Hilo updates on Twitter @projecthilo.

We'll soon be publishing the next article in the series, which will describe in detail how to prepare your development environment for Windows development. Stay tuned for more updates soon!

RIA Services Demo from PDX Code Camp

Posted: 25 May 2010 09:17 AM PDT

The demo I presented at the Portland Code Camp on Saturday was a modified version of Brad Abrams' multi-part RIA Services walkthrough. You can find a full index to the series on Brad's old blog . The completed application is also available from that page...( read more )...(read more)

Silverlight Cream for May 25, 2010 -- #869

Posted: 25 May 2010 09:30 AM PDT

In this Issue: Miroslav Miroslavov , Victor Gaudioso , Phil Middlemiss , Jonathan van de Veen , Lee , and Domagoj Pavlešic . From SilverlightCream.com : Book Folding effect using Pixel Shader On the new CompleteIT site, did you know the page-folding was...( read more )...(read more)

RIA Services Demo from PDX Code Camp

Posted: 25 May 2010 09:17 AM PDT

The demo I presented at the Portland Code Camp on Saturday was a modified version of Brad Abrams' multi-part RIA Services walkthrough. You can find a full index to the series on Brad's old blog . The completed application is also available from that page...( read more )...(read more)

Book Folding effect using Pixel Shader

Posted: 24 May 2010 02:00 PM PDT

This is part 6 of the series "Silverlight in Action": Visuals staring at the mouse cursor. Floating Visual Elements . Flipping Panels . Flying objects against you. Smoke effect Book Folding effect using Pixel Shader. Here we're sharing our experience...( read more )...(read more)

Silverlight Cream for May 24, 2010 -- #868

Posted: 24 May 2010 09:18 PM PDT

In this Issue: Victor Gaudioso , Weidong Shen , SilverLaw , Alnur Ismail , Damon Payne , and Karl Erickson . Shoutout: Tim Greenfield posted his slides and materials (not the padlock yet) from Portland Code Camp: Rx for Silverlight at Portland CodeCamp...( read more )...(read more)

Windows Client Developer Roundup for 5/24/2010

Posted: 24 May 2010 07:56 PM PDT

This is Windows Client Developer roundup #25. The Windows Client Developer Roundup aggregates information of interest to Windows Client Developers, including WPF , Surface, Windows 7, XNA, Windows Forms , Silverlight , Windows Phone and Visual Studio...( read more )...(read more)

Ajax Talk at .NET Developers Association

Posted: 24 May 2010 09:20 PM PDT

Thanks everyone who came to my Ajax talk tonight at the .NET Developers Association ! The slides and demos from the talk can be downloaded by clicking the following link: ASP.NET Ajax: What's New? You need Visual Studio 2010 to view the code samples. The first project, named Demos, contains the following samples: ASPAjax4 1_CompositeScripts.aspx – Demonstrates how to use the ScriptManger to combine, compress, and cache JavaScript files automatically. 2_EnableCdn.aspx – Demonstrates how to retrieve ASP.NET Ajax framework scripts from the Microsoft Ajax CDN automatically. jQuery 1_Selectors.aspx – Demonstrates how to use jQuery selectors 2_WebForms.aspx – Demonstrates how to use the client tablesorter plugin with ASP.NET Web Forms. 3_MVC.aspx...(read more)

Windows Client Developer Roundup for 5/24/2010

Posted: 24 May 2010 07:56 PM PDT

This is Windows Client Developer roundup #25. The Windows Client Developer Roundup aggregates information of interest to Windows Client Developers, including WPF , Surface, Windows 7, XNA, Windows Forms , Silverlight , Windows Phone and Visual Studio...( read more )...(read more)

A Distributable (.exe) Silverlight OOB Application

Posted: 24 May 2010 06:14 PM PDT

I've seen a few questions regarding how to deploy a Silverlight Out of Browser application in an .exe over the past couple days. This post will show you one way of doing that. Create your Silverlight OOB app Open up a new .txt file and add: "%ProgramFiles...( read more )...(read more)

Test Your Windows 7 Knowledge: Play "Are You Certifiable?"

Posted: 24 May 2010 07:14 PM PDT

Test your technical prowess against other IT professionals and developers from around the world. Show them who's in command and fight for your right to stay in the coveted top spot on the leaderboard. Don't delay... hundreds of questions await you on the new Windows 7 track!

Project 2010 Tailored Tools for Workflow Creation

Posted: 24 May 2010 07:14 PM PDT

In this webcast, we discuss the different approaches customers and partners can take to create Microsoft Project Server 2010 workflows. We also cover some of the tools and partnerships that have been developed for Project 2010 workflow creation.

20 Silverlight 4 demos in one zip file

Posted: 24 May 2010 03:43 PM PDT

Last week I gave a 3 hour "What's new in Silverlight 4" talk to the Hungarian Silverlight UG, the Silverlight Klub . I had a LOT of demos, – most of which I prepared, and some I borrowed. The aim of the demos was to give a small code sample to most new...( read more )...(read more)

RIA Services V1.0 and Beyond

Posted: 24 May 2010 03:39 PM PDT

I came to Microsoft 2 years ago to join project Alexandria, which had the goal of making Silverlight an approachable framework for building business applications. The domain really excited me and it's been an honor to work on this product. In case you Read More......(read more)
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Monday, May 24, 2010

Back from Russia

Back from Russia

Back from Russia

Posted: 24 May 2010 07:42 AM PDT

Thanks everyone who came to my talks on ASP.NET Web Forms and MVC in Moscow last week! Here are the slide decks and demo code for the two talks (You need Visual Studio 2010): What's New in ASP.NET MVC 2? What's New in ASP.NET 4 Web Forms? I had a great time in Russia. On the second day, I had an opportunity to walk around Moscow. Here's a picture of me standing in Red Square: Here's a picture of me eating Chicken Kiev with Microsoft evangelist James Senior. James has just started his worldwide Web Camp tour to promote ASP.NET 4. He is traveling non-stop country to country. After Russia, he is off to China and Australia. You can find out more about the Web Camps here: http://www.webcamps.ms/ Read More......(read more)

Changing URLs

Posted: 23 May 2010 11:59 PM PDT

I've decided to move my blog to my own site, so you can find me at... http://PeteLePage.com/blog PEte Read More......(read more)

throw new System.DumbDevException(“Vishal”);

Posted: 23 May 2010 11:42 PM PDT

Funny enough but I am here to confess that I did not realize that I had set "Comments Auto-Approve" to off on my blog since I don't know when…  And as I use Windows Live Writer to write my blogs I never care to go to the blog dashboard for nearly anything… Anyways, for whatever reason I thought I will go and check if I was missing out on some new features of blogger so I logged in and realized that I had several hundreds of comments piling up waiting for moderation… So first of all sorry for the dumbness and secondly I ask you to be patient while I weed through all the comments that are accumulated so far… I am hoping that over this next week or two I will be able to get through them all but if you need anything urgently then do not hesitate...(read more)

Finding Serenity at Lake Serene

Posted: 23 May 2010 11:07 PM PDT

The last time I wrote about one of my hiking adventures, it started off great, but really didn't end well . But I survived, so on that scale, yes it did end well! It's a matter of perspective. On Saturday, I went on my first hike of the spring to Lake Serene and Bridal Veil Falls . This hike is really two hikes in one. The main destination is Lake Serene, but there's an absolutely wonderful half mile (1 mile round trip) side trip to the Bridal Veil Falls on the way to Lake Serene. The trail starts in the small town of Index in the county of HomeController ( sorry, I couldn't resist ). The entire trail is lush with greenery as you would expect in the pacific northwest. All along the trail are many little waterfalls and river crossings like the...(read more)

Creating a Custom Out-of-Browser Window in Silverlight 4

Posted: 23 May 2010 06:13 PM PDT

Silverlight 4 extends the out-of-browser feature to include support for window customization through the Window class . What this means is that you can turn this: into this: Okay, so that's not necessarily much of an improvement, but you get the idea...( read more )...(read more)
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Sunday, May 23, 2010

Silver Spot Light - Silverlight 4

Silver Spot Light - Silverlight 4

Silver Spot Light - Silverlight 4

Posted: 23 May 2010 06:44 AM PDT

Currently I am working on the UI for a Silverlight app and while playing around I came to this. A Silverlight spot light. You can view the example, turn it on and off and download the sourcecode at the Expression Gallery . It is 100 % built with Expression...( read more )...(read more)

Silverlight Cream for May 22, 2010 -- #867

Posted: 22 May 2010 04:19 PM PDT

In this Issue: Michael Washington , Xianzhong Zhu , Jim Lynn , Laurent Bugnion , and Kyle McClellan . A ton of Shoutouts this time: Cigdem Patlak (CrocusGirl) is interviewed about Silverlight 4 on Channel 9: Silverlight discussion with Cigdem Patlak Timmy...( read more )...(read more)
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Saturday, May 22, 2010

Microsoft Silverlight 4 Data and Services Cookbook By PACKT Publishing – Unique Book for Silverlight LOB Applications

Microsoft Silverlight 4 Data and Services Cookbook By PACKT Publishing – Unique Book for Silverlight LOB Applications

Microsoft Silverlight 4 Data and Services Cookbook By PACKT Publishing – Unique Book for Silverlight LOB Applications

Posted: 22 May 2010 05:30 AM PDT

While interacting with few Decision makers and Architects last week,suddenly they raise concern over training their resources and have some Silverlight Knowledge base with them, In this discussion we also started exploring books on Silverlight especially...( read more )...(read more)

A Week in the Life of a Community PM at Microsoft

Posted: 21 May 2010 10:53 PM PDT

I spent this week on campus up in Redmond, Washington. While it is always hard on my wife to be a single mom for a week, the time I spend on campus is vital to my role. It's also time I really enjoy. With Tim Heuer having moved over to the Silverlight...( read more )...(read more)

A Week in the Life of a Community PM at Microsoft

Posted: 21 May 2010 10:53 PM PDT

I spent this week on campus up in Redmond, Washington. While it is always hard on my wife to be a single mom for a week, the time I spend on campus is vital to my role. It's also time I really enjoy. With Tim Heuer having moved over to the Silverlight...( read more )...(read more)

Navigating Microsoft content on Silverlight and Expression Blend

Posted: 21 May 2010 02:50 PM PDT

I just returned from a speaking tour traveling to Chicago, New York City, Boston and back to New York City presenting at three .toolbox Blend workshops and three usergroups and attended one conference. The content for the workshops, covering Blend and...( read more )...(read more)

How about a Zune-style ChildWindow?

Posted: 21 May 2010 02:25 PM PDT

Today I am sharing my ChildWindow style that resembles the Zune software user interface and has a nice transition. Enjoy!...( read more )...(read more)
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Friday, May 21, 2010

Balder - Licensing

Balder - Licensing

Balder - Licensing

Posted: 21 May 2010 11:39 AM PDT

Today Balder is licensed under the Microsoft Permissive License. I am preparing these days to introduce more platforms, specifically the iPhone, iPad and Windows Phone 7 Series, but want to do a review of the license for the project. I would really love...( read more )...(read more)

Silverlight Connections – November 1-4, 2010

Posted: 21 May 2010 08:59 AM PDT

I am very excited to announce that this year I will be presenting three unique sessions at Silverlight Connections in Las Vegas, Nevada Nov 1-4, 2010. I have never got the pleasure of attending this conference and look forward to being a part of three...( read more )...(read more)

Customizing the Appearance of an Existing Control by Creating a ControlTemplate

Posted: 21 May 2010 09:45 AM PDT

The Visual State Manager was introduced in WPF 4 to enable you to specify the appearance of a control when it is in a certain state. Creating custom control templates by using the visual state manager is discussed in this topic.

Silverlight Cream for May 21, 2010 -- #866

Posted: 21 May 2010 08:22 AM PDT

In this Issue: Mike Snow , Victor Gaudioso , Ola Karlsson , Josh Twist ( -2- ), Yavor Georgiev , Jeff Wilcox , and Jesse Liberty . Shoutouts: Frank LaVigne has an interesting observation on his site: The Big Take-Away from MIX10 Rishi has updated all...( read more )...(read more)

SqlServerExtensions

Posted: 19 May 2010 12:45 PM PDT

This project provides some useful operations for files and directories.
Further development includes extended string operations, which aren't available in T-SQL or are very hard to implement.

Enabling Multi-touch gestures in WPF using Expression Blend 4 RC and the TranslateZoomRotate behavior

Posted: 21 May 2010 04:11 AM PDT

I've already blogged about adding multi-touch support to Silverlight applications using Blend behaviors (you can also read my italian language article). This is a powerful and simple approach which is now available in WPF using Expression Blend...( read more )...(read more)

ChildWindow and Accordion Styling Silverlight 4

Posted: 21 May 2010 03:08 AM PDT

Four month ago I contributed a ChildWindow and Accordion Styling for Silverlight 3 at the Expression Gallery. Since then it was downloaded nearly 17.000 times. Today I contributed the Silverlight 4 Version of this ChildWindow And Accordion Styling . You...( read more )...(read more)

May 20th Links: ASP.NET MVC, ASP.NET, .NET 4, VS 2010, Silverlight

Posted: 20 May 2010 10:51 PM PDT

Here is the latest in my link-listing series .  Also check out my VS 2010 and .NET 4 series and ASP.NET MVC 2 series for other on-going blog series I'm working on. [In addition to blogging, I am also now using Twitter for quick updates and to share links. Follow me at: twitter.com/scottgu ] ASP.NET MVC How to Localize an ASP.NET MVC Application : Michael Ceranski has a good blog post that describes how to localize ASP.NET MVC 2 applications. ASP.NET MVC with jTemplates Part 1 and Part 2 : Steve Gentile has a nice two-part set of blog posts that demonstrate how to use the jTemplate and DataTable jQuery libraries to implement client-side data binding with ASP.NET MVC. CascadingDropDown jQuery Plugin for ASP.NET MVC : Raj Kaimal has a nice...(read more)

MSDN Webcast: Creating Microsoft Office 2010 Add-ins Using SharePoint 2010 as a Data Source

Posted: 20 May 2010 10:41 PM PDT

A common request for developers is to surface internal Microsoft SharePoint data within the Microsoft Office client applications. Learn the recipe for creating these kinds of solutions and understand what kinds of benefits you can bring to users.

Silverlight 4 Developer Training

Posted: 20 May 2010 10:41 PM PDT

Key aspects in this course are working with numerous sandboxed and elevated out-of-browser features, the new RichTextBox control, implicit styling, webcam, drag and drop, multitouch, validation, authentication, MEF, WCF RIA Services, right mouse click, and more!

Silverlight Tip of the Day #23 – Working with Strokes and Shapes

Posted: 20 May 2010 01:21 PM PDT

When it comes to drawing shapes such as rectangles you are probably fully aware you can draw shapes specifying the Read the Rest......( read more )...(read more)
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Thursday, May 20, 2010

You Already Are A Windows Phone 7 Programmer

You Already Are A Windows Phone 7 Programmer

You Already Are A Windows Phone 7 Programmer

Posted: 20 May 2010 01:43 PM PDT

Windows Phone 7 Mini-Tutorial Series. Previous On This Topic John Papa invited me on to Silverlight TV to discuss a key premise of WP7: Silverlight Programmers are instant WP7 programmers. To demonstrate this,  I created two applications side by...( read more )...(read more)

RIA Services and Windows Live ID

Posted: 20 May 2010 09:59 AM PDT

There is a new Authentication Sample that shows how to use RIA Services with Windows Live ID (WLID). It's a little more complex than the others, so I thought it was worth discussing some of the interesting features. First, the sample opens another window Read More......(read more)

WCF RIA Services V1 Released

Posted: 17 May 2010 11:19 AM PDT

It's a good day. RIA Services V1 is now roaming the internet. Hopefully in the name of truth and justice, but you never know ;). Silverlight.net is a good place to start today. Also, Dinesh has courteously posted a link to a page where anyone can propose Read More......(read more)

Extending NerdDinner: Exploring Different Database Options

Posted: 20 May 2010 05:57 AM PDT

The original NerdDinner Sample was very simple. Two samples, simple, in fact. Perhaps it's the new Northwind, as it's a good way to start working with ASP.NET MVC. However, it's not a perfect sample or an idealized example on how to do many things that users want to do. Fortunately, there's been lots of cool folks in the community who have "forked" NerdDinner and done interesting stuff with it. Each of these samples is usually focused on a specific scenario, so they won't necessarily be merged with the trunk, but they are educational nonetheless. Four Five NerdDinners - Each Accessing Data Differently When NerdDinner was originally done, I did it in Linq To SQL as L2S was fast, easy, had a 1:1 relationship between...(read more)

Extending NerdDinner: Adding MEF and plugins to ASP.NET MVC

Posted: 20 May 2010 01:28 AM PDT

The original NerdDinner Sample was very simple. Two samples, simple, in fact. Perhaps it's the new Northwind, as it's a good way to start working with ASP.NET MVC. However, it's not a perfect sample or an idealized example on how to do many things that users want to do. Fortunately, there's been lots of cool folks in the community who have "forked" NerdDinner and done interesting stuff with it. Each of these samples is usually focused on a specific scenario, so they won't necessarily be merged with the trunk, but they are educational nonetheless. Jon Galloway and I have also added a few things to NerdDinner, taking it in a more social direction, as Jon's MVC Music Store today is a better "getting started"...(read more)

Silverlight Cream for May 19, 2010 -- #865

Posted: 19 May 2010 10:35 PM PDT

In this Issue: Michael Washington , Mike Snow ( -2- ), Justin Angel ( -2- ), Jeremy Likness , and David Kelley . Shoutout: Erik Mork and crew have their latest up: Silverlight Week – Silverlight Android? From SilverlightCream.com : Simple Silverlight...( read more )...(read more)

Silverlight Enables Choice Today for Third-Party Codecs

Posted: 19 May 2010 04:58 PM PDT

From time to time we get asked about Silverlight support for various codecs. The codecs change (today we're getting some questions regarding WebM/VP8) but our answer is consistent regardless of the individual codec: We are strongly committed to...( read more )...(read more)

[Silverlight] Suggestion – Move INotifyCollectionChanged from System.Windows.dll to System.dll

Posted: 19 May 2010 01:22 PM PDT

I just submitted a suggestion on Microsoft Connect to move the INotifyCollectionChanged from System.Windows.dll to System.dll . You can review it here: https://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedback/details/560184/move-inotifycollectionchanged-from...( read more )...(read more)
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Wednesday, May 19, 2010

sqlserverextensions

sqlserverextensions

sqlserverextensions

Posted: 19 May 2010 12:45 PM PDT

This project will provide some use operations for files and directories.
Further development will include extended string operations.

Handling DataGrid.SelectedItems in an MVVM-friendly manner

Posted: 19 May 2010 12:17 PM PDT

An interesting question from one of the MVVM Light users today: Is there an MVVM-friendly way to get a DataGrid's SelectedItems into the ViewModel? The issue there is as old as the DataGrid (that's not very old but still): SelectedItem (singular) is a...( read more )...(read more)

Silverlight Tip of the Day #22 – Data Validation

Posted: 19 May 2010 10:27 AM PDT

Data validation is the process of ensuring the data a user has entered is valid. For example, if you prompt Read the Rest......( read more )...(read more)

Silverlight Cream for May 18, 2010 -- #864

Posted: 18 May 2010 10:47 PM PDT

In this Issue: Jesse Liberty , Chris Koenig , Kyle McClellan , Kunal Chowdhury ( -2- ), Tim Heuer , and Jonathan van de Veen . Shoutout: René Schulte has posted a SLARToolkit Beginner's Guide Erik Mork and the Sparkling Podcast crew posted Silverlight...( read more )...(read more)

Silverlight 4 Tools for Visual Studio released!

Posted: 18 May 2010 09:12 AM PDT

You can now download the RTM version of Silverlight 4 Tools for Visual Studio . These tools extend Visual Studio 2010 or Visual Web Developer 2010 Express with templates and support for Microsoft Silverlight 4 and RIA Services. If you don't already have...( read more )...(read more)
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