I’m glad to see some attention being applied to WPF/XAML. Looking forward to all of the new tooling improvements and whatever else they release. Keep it coming!
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/dotnet/archive/2014/11/12/the-roadmap-for-wpf.aspx
Tag: XAML
Windows Store apps–App features, start to finish
Came across an excellent resource for Windows Store app development that goes over the app features from start to finish.
This start-to-finish series helps you add features to your app to engage your customers and to create the kind of experiences that draws people in and delight them. Each guide walks you through building an app from scratch to app certification. Start with a basic flat or hierarchical app and add features from there!
List of app features lists on the site are:
- Flat navigation
- Hierarchical navigation
- App UI basics
- App state
- File handling
- User interaction
- User interaction customization
- Media playback
- Geofencing
Each of these features includes both an HTML and XAML guide. Check it out.
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/apps/dn263202.aspx
Enjoy!
Idea books for commercial and enterprise app design (including sample code)
Came across a great post on the Windows App Builder Blog for creating Windows Store apps.
Create great Windows Store apps that provide elegant, engaging, consistent and compelling user experiences in Windows. Idea books are a great starting point to inspire you when designing your Windows Store app. Idea books target different app categories and show what’s possible as well as how to create best-in-class experiences in your app.
From the blog post, you can see the current list of idea books that have an accompanying code sample:
- Shopping apps – See how you can create a great shopping experience in your app. Sample code provided by Tallan Inc.
- Enterprise administration apps – See how businesses can use apps for enterprise administration. This idea book even has an app already in the Windows Store. Sample code provided by Citrix Systems Inc..
- Financial apps: SunGard – See how financial institutions can use apps for retirement portfolio planning. Sample code provided by Ratio Interactive.
- Medical apps: In-patient – See how hospitals can use apps to cater to patients during extended hospital stays. Sample code provided by Ratio Interactive.
- Medical apps: Manipal Hospital – See how medical professionals can use apps to plan their patient visits during medical rounds. Sample code provided by Ratio Interactive.
- Retail apps: Social CRM – See how retail managers can use apps to analyze market data, evaluate and monitor customer social activities, and provide direct engagement with customers to promote a positive brand image. Sample code provided by Ratio Interactive.
Enjoy!
References
Article Links for Using Expression Design for Windows Store and Windows Phone Logo Assets
2 great articles on how to use Microsoft Expression Design for creating Windows Store and Windows Phone logo assets for every resolution.
Generating Windows Store Logo Assets At Every Resolution by Kyle Anthony Mitofsky
Windows 8 apps need 28 logo varietals; enter Expression Design by Jerry Nixon
Enjoy!
Expression Design is Now Available for Free
Microsoft Expression Design is now available as a free download from the Microsoft Download Center and as stated by Microsoft, no new versions will be developed.
It’s unfortunate that these tools will no longer be developed, however it looks like Microsoft will shift their focus to help improve the tooling in Visual Studio and Blend for Visual Studio for creating new applications.
Expression Design is a tool for creative professionals and developers who want to build graphics for application user interfaces, the web, or any other medium.The convenience and ease of editing vector graphics in Expression Design can be a cornerstone of your Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF), Microsoft Silverlight, and web images. Whether you’re a veteran professional illustrator, a designer building a dazzling website, or a budding artist eagerly experimenting with various styles and techniques, you will find Expression Design an indispensable tool for your creative tasks.
You can download Expression Design here.
Related
Microsoft Expression Web is also available for Free and can be downloaded from here.
For more information on Microsoft’s Expression product line, please see the Expression Website.
Enjoy!
XAML UI Responsiveness tool in Visual Studio 2013
Interesting article about a new XAML UI Responsiveness tool included in Visual Studio 2013…
From the perspective of interaction-performance applications need to be “fast” and “fluid” – fast to launch, to navigate between pages, to react to changes in orientation, and fluid in scrolling, in panning and in animations. This post introduces the XAML UI Responsiveness tool, a new tool in the Visual Studio Performance and Diagnostics hub that lets you analyze such interaction-performance of your XAML-based Windows Store applications.
Reference
Visual Studio 2012 Now Available
Today Microsoft has made Visual Studio 2012 and all it’s related products available to download. You should note that with the 2012 edition, Team Foundation Server Express is available. Sweet!
Custom Chrome Window Glyphs
If your looking to create a custom chrome window in Winform or WPF, you should take a look at the ‘Marlett’ font that is available on your system.
This font contains the actual glyphs used in Windows for the Minimize, Maximize, Restore and Close buttons.
Using this font makes it really easy to reuse these glyphs in a custom chrome window, instead of custom images that is typically used.
To get started, assign your buttons the Marlett font.
Next, assign the text value for each of the buttons the following…
- Close button, use the text r (lowercase R)
- Minimize button, use 0 (zero)
- Maximize button, use 1 (one)
- Restore button, use 2 (two)
You can take a look at the Marlett font in the Windows Character Map or here for more details.
Here is an example of what the Windows buttons would look like using this font…
The Flying Maverick 