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Pete Brown's Blog (POKE 53280,0)

Pete Brown writes on a variety of topics from .NET programming using WPF, Silverlight, XNA, and Windows Phone, to raising two children in the suburbs of Maryland, to woodworking, CNC and generally "making real stuff". Oh, and Pete loves retro technology, especially Commodore (C64 and C128). If the content interests you, please subscribe using the subscription link to the right of every page.

  • First Experiences with Netduino and the .NET Micro Framework

    I like gadgets. Some of the coolest gadgets are add-on boards like the Freescale board that works with the Win7 Sensor and Location API. Recently, Arduino and Netduino caught my eye. Arduino is an open source hardware platform / microcontroller with a long history. The specification for the board is completely open, allowing anyone to build one themselves, or purchase a pre-built one. Coding i...

    Published Thursday, September 02, 2010 | Tagged: , | Leave comment

  • Should Developers also be UX Professionals and Graphics Designers?

    I've received some interesting commentary on Item 0 in my 10 Things for Silverlight and WPF Developers post. That item says to know your limitations, including when to call in a "designer". (I'm using designer loosely here, it's a graphics designer or ux pro. Often, those are the same people, or highly related people working for the same org) I contend that 99% of developers make terrible gra...

    Published Wednesday, September 01, 2010 | Tagged: | 15 comments

  • Windows Client Developer Roundup 039 for 8/30/2010

    This is Windows Client Developer roundup #39. The Windows Client Developer Roundup aggregates information of interest to Windows Client Developers, including WPF, Silverlight, Visual C++, XNA, Expression Blend, Surface, Windows 7, Windows Forms, Windows Phone and Visual Studio, WCF RIA Services, sometimes even a little jQuery and HTML5. If you have something interesting you've done or have ru...

    Published Monday, August 30, 2010 | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | Leave comment

  • 10 things Beginning Silverlight and WPF Developers Need to Know

    Another talk I really enjoy doing is the "10 things" talk. I recently gave this talk at DevLink 2010 in Nashville. This covers 10 things that every Silverlight and WPF developer should have in their core skillset. It's a semi-beginner topic for accomplished developers who don't yet know Silverlight or WPF. The slide deck itself is pretty much empty. I tell the audience that that's it for s...

    Published Thursday, August 26, 2010 | Tagged: , , , , , | 18 comments

  • Dual Targeting WPF and Silverlight (and Windows Phone 7)

    Prior to working at Microsoft, I had some customers who wanted to dual target both WPF and Silverlight. Since then, Windows Phone 7 has been added into the mix. With all these similar technologies, all using xaml, multi-targeting applications can be a reality. It's not without its challenges, however. At DevLink 2010, I presented my "Dual Targeting" talk. I've presented this talk at a few con...

    Published Thursday, August 26, 2010 | Tagged: , , , , , , | Leave comment

  • Windows Client Developer Roundup 038 for 8/23/2010

    This is Windows Client Developer roundup #38. The Windows Client Developer Roundup aggregates information of interest to Windows Client Developers, including WPF, Silverlight, Visual C++, XNA, Expression Blend, Surface, Windows 7, Windows Forms, Windows Phone and Visual Studio, WCF RIA Services, sometimes even a little jQuery and HTML5. If you have something interesting you've done or have ru...

    Published Monday, August 23, 2010 | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | 1 comment

  • Windows Client Developer Roundup 037 for 8/16/2010

    This is Windows Client Developer roundup #37. The Windows Client Developer Roundup aggregates information of interest to Windows Client Developers, including WPF, Silverlight, Visual C++, XNA, Expression Blend, Surface, Windows 7, Windows Forms, Windows Phone and Visual Studio, WCF RIA Services, sometimes even a little jQuery and HTML5. If you have something interesting you've done or have ru...

    Published Monday, August 16, 2010 | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | Leave comment

  • Adventures with Water Cooling the Ultimate Dev PC 2.0: the Equipment

    While I was away at DevLink 2010 (an awesome event. You really need to go next year) my water cooling equipment for the Ultimate Developer PC 2.0 arrived. Here's a virtual unboxing. CPU Block I picked up the Swiftech Apogee-XT Extreme Performance CPU Waterblock. This is considered to be one of the best i7 waterblocks out there. There is one complaint about it, though: if you tinker with it...

    Published Wednesday, August 11, 2010 | Tagged: , | 4 comments

  • Windows Client Developer Roundup 036 for 8/9/2010

    This is Windows Client Developer roundup #36. The Windows Client Developer Roundup aggregates information of interest to Windows Client Developers, including WPF, Silverlight, Visual C++, XNA, Expression Blend, Surface, Windows 7, Windows Forms, Windows Phone and Visual Studio, WCF RIA Services, sometimes even a little jQuery and HTML5. If you have something interesting you've done or have ru...

    Published Monday, August 09, 2010 | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , | 4 comments

  • Announcing: Microsoft Ribbon for WPF RTW

    I'm pleased to announce the July release of the Microsoft Ribbon for WPF! This is the RTW release of the Ribbon control! The new ribbon control is compatible with WPF 3.5sp1 and WPF 4. This is a 100% WPF implementation, not a wrapper around native code. That means you get all the great WPF styling capabilities for the new control. All screenshots below were taken from a .NET 4 Client Profil...

    Published Monday, August 02, 2010 | Tagged: , , | 68 comments

  • Windows Client Developer Roundup 035 for 8/2/2010

    This is Windows Client Developer roundup #35. The Windows Client Developer Roundup aggregates information of interest to Windows Client Developers, including WPF, Silverlight, Visual C++, XNA, Expression Blend, Surface, Windows 7, Windows Forms, Windows Phone and Visual Studio, sometimes even a little jQuery and HTML5. If you have something interesting you've done or have run across, or you b...

    Published Monday, August 02, 2010 | Tagged: , , , , , , | Leave comment

  • Installing Windows 7 from a USB thumb drive to an SSD is Wicked Fast

    I'm trying out various BIOS and clocking tweaks on my bench install of the Ultimate Developer PC 2.0. To keep things clean, I've reinstalled Windows 7 a number of times. Normally, this would be a deal killer. I mean, who wants to sit around and wait for a complete reinstall of Windows 7 Ultimate x64? Well, turns out it's really fast. I reinstalled 4 or 5 times yesterday and twice today. On th...

    Published Sunday, August 01, 2010 | Tagged: , , , | 2 comments

  • Last Night's Ultimate PC Live Bench Build

    Last night, I (with help from you all) did a prototype bench build of the Ultimate Dev Machine 2.0. I made some dumb mistakes (like forgetting to remove the plastic from the bottom of the heat sink; glad I remembered before I powered it up), but it went reasonably well. Highlights Bunch of interested folks on ustream, all watching progress and helping out. That was awesome. Thanks to ever...

    Published Friday, July 30, 2010 | Tagged: , | 3 comments

  • The Ultimate Developer Machine 2.0

    Scott Hanselman and I have been doing parallel builds of the ultimate developer machine. Here's the summary of the new bits I bought for this build. I already own the locally bought stuff. The NewEgg items will be here this week. Category Purchased Price OS Windows 7 x64 Prices vary Video Card Sapphire Toxic Radeon HD 5850 (NewEgg) $345 Processor Intel i7-980x 3.33ghz 6core Pr...

    Published Wednesday, July 28, 2010 | Tagged: , , | 4 comments

  • Silverlight in Action Book Update

    Silverlight 4 in Action, Revised Edition is almost complete. I've turned in all 25 chapters plus appendix, and had them go through editorial review, tech review, and copy editing. All the images are in-place. All that's left is for me to finish writing the front matter (About this Book, Acknowledgements, Preface) Though we haven't updated the page count on the Manning site and Amazon yet...

    Published Tuesday, July 27, 2010 | Tagged: , | 5 comments

  • Visual Studio Productivity Power Tools Walkthrough

    We recently released a new version of the Visual Studio Productivity Power Tools. If you spend most of your day in Visual Studio like most of us do, you'll really appreciate some of the features this kit offers. Installation To install the power tools, visit the Gallery Page and click download to grab the .vsix installer. Make sure Visual Studio instances are closed, then open the vsix. ...

    Published Monday, July 26, 2010 | Tagged: , , , , , | 8 comments