Latest News from SilverLight Developer's Journal
Latest News from Silverlight Developer's Journal
Updated: 10 hours 28 min ago
In Silverlight Application Change Your Namespace and Assembly Name
The first thing I do when creating a new project in Visual Studio (regardless of type) is change the project name, assembly name, and default namespace. I like for the names of all these to be consistent. However, I have noticed in Silverlight, you must make changes in five different places for everything to work alright otherwise you will get errors. I’m no Silverlight expert, but I thought this post would be useful for people like me who only dabble in it from time to time. When you create your new Silverlight project, right click on the project name and bring up its properties. Go ahead and change the default namespace and assembly name just like you would in any other project.
Microsoft Money Machine Grinds On
Microsoft’s stock price may stink but its P&L numbers are pretty much sweet perfume. In the June quarter, Microsoft’s fiscal fourth quarter and the end of its fiscal year it made $4.52 billion, 51 cents a share, up 48% on record revenues of $16.04 billion, up 22%.
Office Web Apps Inch Out
Ahead of general release June 15 and following release to the corporate world last month, Microsoft Monday said its browser-based Office Web Apps on SkyDrive are now available to everyone in the US, UK, Canada and Ireland, SkyDrive being its free browser-based storage and document sharing service. The lightweight versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote are accessible through OfficeLive.com and require an Office Live account.
Office Web Apps Inch Out
Ahead of general release June 15 and following release to the corporate world last month, Microsoft Monday said its browser-based Office Web Apps on SkyDrive are now available to everyone in the US, UK, Canada and Ireland, SkyDrive being its free browser-based storage and document sharing service. The lightweight versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote are accessible through OfficeLive.com and require an Office Live account.
Ballmer Gets His Two Cents in at D8
On Steve Jobs’ contention that this is now a post-PC world: “I think that people are going to be using PCs in greater and greater numbers for years to come.” But PCs will look different. They’ll evolve. They’ll get smaller, get touch, get different interfaces, their insides will change. “The real question is what is a PC? Nothing done on a PC today will get less relevant tomorrow. I think there will exist a general-purpose device that does anything you want, because people don’t want multiple devices, or can’t afford them. I think the PC as we know it will continue to morph in form factor. So the real question is where do you push?” Addressing Job’s truck analogy he says, “Windows machines will not be trucks.”
The Next Chapter in the Virtualization Story Begins
Cloud Computing Journal recently caught up with Pete Malcolm, CEO of cloud management innovators Abiquo - a major new player in the fast-emerging Cloud ecosystem and Platinum Plus Sponsor of 6th Cloud Expo being held in Prague, the Czech Republic, 21-22 June 2010.
Malcolm is keynoting at the event. His theme will be "An Open Cloud Ecosystem - the Gathering Storm."
The Next Chapter in the Virtualization Story Begins
Cloud Computing Journal recently caught up with Pete Malcolm, CEO of cloud management innovators Abiquo - a major new player in the fast-emerging Cloud ecosystem and Platinum Plus Sponsor of 6th Cloud Expo being held in Prague, the Czech Republic, 21-22 June 2010.
Malcolm is keynoting at the event. His theme will be "An Open Cloud Ecosystem - the Gathering Storm."
Windows Phone 7 Session Line-Up for Tech-Ed 2010
Tech-Ed 2010 in New Orleans is just around the corner. While there are certainly a lot of really high quality sessions available there, of biggest interest to me are the Windows Phone 7 sessions. The following is a list of the sessions as they appeared on the Tech-Ed site this morning:
- TLC-92 | Windows Phone 7: Coding4Fun:
- TLC-93 | Windows Phone 7: Productivity and Collaboration
- TLC-94 | Windows Phone 7: Development Tools
- TLC-95 | Windows Phone 7: A Different Kind of Phone
- TLC-96 | Windows Phone Device Bar
- WPH01-HOL | Hello Windows Phone
- WPH01-INT | Prepare for Windows Phone 7 Development! Coding practices you should start using now in Windows Mobile.
- WPH02-HOL | Building Your First Windows Phone Application
- WPH03-HOL | Microsoft Silverlight for Windows Phone
- WPH03-INT | Windows Phone 7 Demo Only!
- WPH04-HOL | Microsoft XNA Framework 4.0 for Windows Phones
- WPH04-INT | Windows Phone 7 Performance
- WPH06-HOL | Using Push Notifications and Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) Services
- WPH06-INT | Microsoft’s Next Generation Mobile Enterprise Application Platform (MEAP)
- WPH201 | Windows Phone 7: A New Kind of Phone
- WPH202 | Deploying Windows Phone 7 with Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 and Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010
- WPH203 | Overview of the Windows Phone 7 Application Platform
- WPH301 | Windows Phone 7: Deploy Microsoft Forefront Unified Access Gateway for Access Control to SharePoint, Exchange, and More
- WPH303 | Understanding the Windows Phone 7 Development Tools
- WPH304 | An In-Depth View of Building Applications for Windows Phone 7 with Microsoft Silverlight (Part 1)
- WPH305 | An In-Depth View of Building Applications for Windows Phone 7 with Microsoft Silverlight (Part 2)
- WPH306 | Developing Occasionally Connected Applications for Windows Phone 7
- WPH307 | Building Windows Phone Games with Microsoft XNA Game Studio
- WPH308 | Building a High Performance 3D Game for Windows Phone
- WPH309 | Microsoft Silverlight Performance on Windows Phone
- WPH310 | Designing and Developing for the Rich Mobile Web
- WPH311 | Developing Mobile Code Today that will run on Windows Phone 7 Tomorrow
- WPH312 | Understanding Marketplace and Making Money with Windows Phone 7 Applications
- WPH313 | Windows Phone 7 Architecture Deep Dive
- WPH314 | Coding4Fun: Learn Windows Phone 7 Development by Creating a Robotic T-Shirt Cannon
I've bolded and italicised the sessions that I think are crucial for new Windows Phone 7 developers. Don't get me wrong - all of these sessions are valuable and the XNA sessions are of particular value to people currently building games using the XNA framework. My point is that for the vast majority of developers flocking to this new platform, these are the sessions that I think will be the most important. Developers need to understand how Silverlight works, how Silverlight functions on WP7 devices (including similarities as well as portions of Silverlight that do NOT exist on mobile devices). Also, knowing how to code applications so that they perform well is absolutely critical for mobile device development.
More than any other target platform, knowing how to make the most efficient use of resources and how to build things that respond as fast as possible to user needs and don't suck battery power will make you more effective at building WP7 apps and, ultimately, make you more money selling your app in the Marketplace.
We saw a lot of this at MIX, but I'm hoping that at Tech-Ed we'll get a new Beta release of the SDK and tools and get more definition and clarity around the exact set of features and functionality planned for 1.0 as well as the release immediately following that. Developers need to know what they can do now, and what they can start planning for next year.
Either way, if you're attending Tech-Ed or not, there will undoubtedly be a flood of valuable information coming out of that conference and I for one can't wait to get even further into WP7 development.
Windows Phone 7 Session Line-Up for Tech-Ed 2010
Tech-Ed 2010 in New Orleans is just around the corner. While there are certainly a lot of really high quality sessions available there, of biggest interest to me are the Windows Phone 7 sessions. The following is a list of the sessions as they appeared on the Tech-Ed site this morning:
- TLC-92 | Windows Phone 7: Coding4Fun:
- TLC-93 | Windows Phone 7: Productivity and Collaboration
- TLC-94 | Windows Phone 7: Development Tools
- TLC-95 | Windows Phone 7: A Different Kind of Phone
- TLC-96 | Windows Phone Device Bar
- WPH01-HOL | Hello Windows Phone
- WPH01-INT | Prepare for Windows Phone 7 Development! Coding practices you should start using now in Windows Mobile.
- WPH02-HOL | Building Your First Windows Phone Application
- WPH03-HOL | Microsoft Silverlight for Windows Phone
- WPH03-INT | Windows Phone 7 Demo Only!
- WPH04-HOL | Microsoft XNA Framework 4.0 for Windows Phones
- WPH04-INT | Windows Phone 7 Performance
- WPH06-HOL | Using Push Notifications and Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) Services
- WPH06-INT | Microsoft’s Next Generation Mobile Enterprise Application Platform (MEAP)
- WPH201 | Windows Phone 7: A New Kind of Phone
- WPH202 | Deploying Windows Phone 7 with Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 and Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010
- WPH203 | Overview of the Windows Phone 7 Application Platform
- WPH301 | Windows Phone 7: Deploy Microsoft Forefront Unified Access Gateway for Access Control to SharePoint, Exchange, and More
- WPH303 | Understanding the Windows Phone 7 Development Tools
- WPH304 | An In-Depth View of Building Applications for Windows Phone 7 with Microsoft Silverlight (Part 1)
- WPH305 | An In-Depth View of Building Applications for Windows Phone 7 with Microsoft Silverlight (Part 2)
- WPH306 | Developing Occasionally Connected Applications for Windows Phone 7
- WPH307 | Building Windows Phone Games with Microsoft XNA Game Studio
- WPH308 | Building a High Performance 3D Game for Windows Phone
- WPH309 | Microsoft Silverlight Performance on Windows Phone
- WPH310 | Designing and Developing for the Rich Mobile Web
- WPH311 | Developing Mobile Code Today that will run on Windows Phone 7 Tomorrow
- WPH312 | Understanding Marketplace and Making Money with Windows Phone 7 Applications
- WPH313 | Windows Phone 7 Architecture Deep Dive
- WPH314 | Coding4Fun: Learn Windows Phone 7 Development by Creating a Robotic T-Shirt Cannon
I've bolded and italicised the sessions that I think are crucial for new Windows Phone 7 developers. Don't get me wrong - all of these sessions are valuable and the XNA sessions are of particular value to people currently building games using the XNA framework. My point is that for the vast majority of developers flocking to this new platform, these are the sessions that I think will be the most important. Developers need to understand how Silverlight works, how Silverlight functions on WP7 devices (including similarities as well as portions of Silverlight that do NOT exist on mobile devices). Also, knowing how to code applications so that they perform well is absolutely critical for mobile device development.
More than any other target platform, knowing how to make the most efficient use of resources and how to build things that respond as fast as possible to user needs and don't suck battery power will make you more effective at building WP7 apps and, ultimately, make you more money selling your app in the Marketplace.
We saw a lot of this at MIX, but I'm hoping that at Tech-Ed we'll get a new Beta release of the SDK and tools and get more definition and clarity around the exact set of features and functionality planned for 1.0 as well as the release immediately following that. Developers need to know what they can do now, and what they can start planning for next year.
Either way, if you're attending Tech-Ed or not, there will undoubtedly be a flood of valuable information coming out of that conference and I for one can't wait to get even further into WP7 development.
Microsoft to Pay Troll $200m
Microsoft Monday agreed to pay VirnetX Holding Corporation $200 million and take a license to the outfit’s virtual private network widgetry to resolve a patent dispute that saw VirnetX win a $105.8 million jury verdict in March.
The company complained in early 2007 that Windows and Office Communicator products tread on two of its patents and the judge could have trebled the award.
VirnetX, which wanted to be acquired by Microsoft, then filed a second suit on St Patrick’s Day charging infringement by Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2.
Google Fires First Shot in Brewing Codec War
Google fired a shot across Apple’s bow Wednesday and considering the way things have been going Apple will probably seek to return fire in the not-too-distant future with an armor-piercing lawsuit.
The latest fray started when Google got up at the Google I/O developers conference – like it was widely expected to do – and open sourced VP8, the video codec it got when it acquired On2 Technologies, the video compression house, in February for about $125 million.
VP8 will try to displace H.264, the proprietary codec that Apple and Microsoft are invested in.
VP8 is now part of a thing called the WebM project, which also includes the open source Ogg Vorbis audio format, and a container format based on a subset of the open source Matroska multimedia container.
Azaleos Broadens Management Partnership with EMC
Azaleos Corporation on Wednesday announced that it has deepened its existing technical and business partnership with EMC Corporation. As part of the broader relationship, Azaleos has extended its patented ViewX monitoring system to provide advanced troubleshooting of EMC CLARiiON AX and CX networked storage systems in Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 environments. This complements ViewX’s existing capabilities for managing Microsoft Exchange Server and CLARiiON infrastructures.
In related news, Azaleos also announced Monday the newest version of its remotely managed service for SharePoint Server, Azaleos Managed SharePoint 2010 Services, and a new managed file transfer service for Microsoft Exchange file attachments called AttachIT.
Azaleos Broadens Management Partnership with EMC
Azaleos Corporation on Wednesday announced that it has deepened its existing technical and business partnership with EMC Corporation. As part of the broader relationship, Azaleos has extended its patented ViewX monitoring system to provide advanced troubleshooting of EMC CLARiiON AX and CX networked storage systems in Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 environments. This complements ViewX’s existing capabilities for managing Microsoft Exchange Server and CLARiiON infrastructures.
In related news, Azaleos also announced Monday the newest version of its remotely managed service for SharePoint Server, Azaleos Managed SharePoint 2010 Services, and a new managed file transfer service for Microsoft Exchange file attachments called AttachIT.
The Future of Software Development
As software developers, our mission is to deliver positive, technology-based solutions – software that provides both the means and the method for working faster, performing better, achieving more. There is little doubt that the technologies we create provide users with the control and functionality needed to be more efficient and productive. However, what happens when the tools we use to produce these solutions get out of control?
Evolution in the technology ecosystem has accelerated to the speed of light – blink and you may miss something important. The software development landscape has mushroomed with near-exponential growth; new products and innovations are flooding the market on a daily basis. It begs the question: does this swift evolutionary pace represent a positive stage in the maturation of software development or are we moving too quickly for our own good? What does the future of software hold for us? It is an open question that can only be answered with time.
Microsoft Outsources Its IT Management
Microsoft is outsourcing management of its internal IT services worldwide to Infosys under a three-year contract based on so-called “outcome pricing.” The Indian company expects to use what it learns to support shared customers. The deal includes Microsoft’s help desk, desk-side services (subcontracted to Unisys), IT infrastructure and application services and support for devices and databases at 450 locations. Infosys is supposed to streamline implementation processes, simplify support and lower costs.