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Monthly Archives: October 2010

  • Silverlight 4 in Action Source Code

    I realized I never posted the location of the source code for Silverlight 4 in Action. You can download the source code directly from Manning. Just click on the download link on that page.

    Published Thursday, October 28, 2010 | Tagged: , , | 12 comments

  • The Present and Future of WPF

    The last year has been busy for the developer division at Microsoft. We shipped Visual Studio 2010 and .NET 4 with WPF 4 as well as Silverlight 4, new versions of Expression Studio and WCF RIA Services. We recently shipped Windows Phone 7 and XNA Game Studio 4.0. We also put out betas of Visual Studio LightSwitch and WebMatrix. All of those products were either built using XAML-b...

    Published Thursday, October 28, 2010 | Tagged: , , , | 90 comments

  • Silverlight 4 in Action is doing Really well. Thanks!

    You folks are awesome. This book was a metric boatload of work (but the good kind of work, as opposed to like raking my yard), so it's really gratifying to see it doing so well. There are something like 8 million books on Amazon. To be in the top 2000 is pretty awesome. To be in the top 100 best selling computer books since pretty much Day 1 is also extremely cool. Thanks!

    Published Thursday, October 28, 2010 | Tagged: , , | 11 comments

  • Channel 9 Video: Joel Barsotti on CalMAN Calibration Software in WPF

    In September, I met up on campus with Joel Barsotti. Joel, and the company SpectraCal, have created an awesome WPF application used for analyzing and calibrating various types of displays (computer screens, LCDs in stores etc.) When Joel first told me about the application, I was really excited about how he leveraged WPF and the power of desktop integration to create something tha...

    Published Wednesday, October 27, 2010 | Tagged: , , , , | Leave comment

  • Windows Client Developer Roundup 047 for 10/25/2010

    This is Windows Client Developer roundup #47. 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, Visual Studio, WCF RIA Services, sometimes even a little jQuery and HTML5. I also include fun non-Windows client tech like th...

    Published Monday, October 25, 2010 | Tagged: , , , , , | Leave comment

  • WPF Ribbon October Release

    The WPF Ribbon team has been busy since the first release in August. Today we released an update to the ribbon that addresses a number of issues with the first release, and enables support for the ribbon under the Visual Studio Express SKUs. Your feedback on my blog, the forums, and other places was critical to determining what would go into this release. Thank you! Download the ...

    Published Friday, October 22, 2010 | Tagged: , , | 15 comments

  • Windows Client Developer Roundup 046 for 10/18/2010

    This is Windows Client Developer roundup #46. 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, Visual Studio, WCF RIA Services, sometimes even a little jQuery and HTML5. I also include fun non-Windows client tech like th...

    Published Monday, October 18, 2010 | Tagged: , , , , , , , | 2 comments

  • Creating an Office Communicator Application for Do Not Disturb

    When meeting with other people at Microsoft, my computer is also my phone. I rely on Office Communicator 2007 R2 more than many other applications. Family members wandering into my home office can't really tell I'm on a call unless I happen to be talking right then. I normally have my headphones on anyway, and I use my Samson mic for voice. Usually my wife stands out of camera range a...

    Published Sunday, October 17, 2010 | Tagged: , , , , | 10 comments

  • Windows Client Developer Roundup 045 for 10/11/2010

    This is Windows Client Developer roundup #45. 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, Visual Studio, WCF RIA Services, sometimes even a little jQuery and HTML5. I also include fun non-Windows client tech like th...

    Published Monday, October 11, 2010 | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | Leave comment

  • My First Couple Weeks with the Amazon Kindle 3

    Melissa recently purchased an Amazon Kindle 3 (WiFi). After messing with it for a few minutes, I just had to have one myself. My wife and I are both avid readers, mostly of sci-fi, fantasy, and other fiction. We have so many shelves and boxes of books we've read, that we bring a box or two of books to the big yard sale every October. My tech books end up hitting the recycle bin ev...

    Published Thursday, October 7, 2010 | Tagged: , | 10 comments

  • Speaking at Tech Ed Europe 2010: Berlin

    Next month, I'll be speaking at Tech Ed Europe 2010 in Berlin. I'm really excited, as I haven't been further east than Lille, France. I've always heard Germany was a great place to visit. I'm presenting three sessions, covering WPF and Silverlight, plus some time on the Silverlight Experts Roundtable: DEV205 - 10 Things Every Silverlight and WPF Developer Must Know If you're a c...

    Published Wednesday, October 6, 2010 | Tagged: , , , , , | Leave comment

  • My Team in Developer Guidance at Microsoft

    It's hard to believe, but I'm 6 days away from having been at Microsoft a full year. Time flies! I had a great first year at Microsoft, thanks in no small part to the mentoring and guidance from great folks like Scott Hanselman and Cyra Richardson. Check out the first half of this podcast to meet Cyra (and Scott, of course) As is the nature of things at Microsoft, we started off thi...

    Published Wednesday, October 6, 2010 | Tagged: , , , , | 1 comment

  • Prism v4 – Drop 9 Coming Wednesday Morning

    You'll find Prism v4 Drop 9 tomorrow morning (Wednesday). Prism is the composite application guidance for WPF and Silverlight. It provides guidance and samples which make architecting robust extensible applications easy. Shamelessly pasted from the Prism CodePlex site, here's what's included in v4: The Prism Library for Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) and Silverlight ...

    Published Tuesday, October 5, 2010 | Tagged: , , , , | 1 comment

  • Want a Windows Phone 7? Here’s your chance!

    You've heard the news by now: we're launching Windows Phone 7 on October 12th. We have a free full day MSDN Simulcast event you can sign up for; definitely worth it for developers interested in the platform. In the US, there are also a lot of live in-person Free Events to learn Windows Phone 7 Development listed at http://www.msdnevents.com/wp7devlaunch. I encourage you to register no...

    Published Monday, October 4, 2010 | Tagged: , , | Leave comment

  • Windows Client Developer Roundup 044 for 10/4/2010

    This is Windows Client Developer roundup #44. 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, Visual Studio, WCF RIA Services, sometimes even a little jQuery and HTML5. I also include fun non-Windows client tech like the ....

    Published Monday, October 4, 2010 | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Leave comment

  • Netduino, Netduino Plus, Fez Panda, Arduino Deumilanove

    We have tons of choices in the Arduino-pin-compatible market these days. Plus, if you're a .NET programmer like me, there are several Arduino-compatible options for you. Below are a couple pictures of the four boards I have. I no longer have a photo booth set up so what follows are two shots: one with flash and one without. From the top left, clockwise, we have the Fez Panda, the Netd...

    Published Sunday, October 3, 2010 | Tagged: , , , , | 5 comments

  • What were your top 5 Pain Points in Learning WP7 Development?

    For my readers who have built something in Windows Phone 7: what were the top 5 pain points you hit when learning WP7? We're planning some great content and samples for WP7 dev, and want to make sure we hit all the things you wish you had known when you were starting out. Let me know in the comments below, and also note if you were a Silverlight developer before you started working wi...

    Published Friday, October 1, 2010 | Tagged: , , | 18 comments