New year – new blog or how to migrate Community Server to any other engine, supports XML-RPC

Tamir Khason — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 02:33:04 GMT

Please update your bookmarks, because the new url of this blog is http://khason.net/ (you have not update RSS feeds, it will be done automatically). Why I did it? Why I decided to go to “stand-alone”… Well. there are some reasons. Generally, I do not want to explain all those here, but trust me, there are some. The main reason is, that there is no responsible person in charge for this blog platform in Microsoft Israel. This why, if your blog is popular and you have a respect to your blog visitors, you cannot host it here… Take a look into new comments notifications in my inbox. Would you answer your readers with such “small amount” of SPAM and capcha, that cannot be fixed already for three years in this platform? This how my inbox looks like for last three years. So now, you should not ask me, why I not answered your email or comments. Aren’t you? :)

Currently, all comments in this blog are disabled, so if you want to comment, please use new url of posts (this will appear shortly in the beginning of each post). Also, this post will not be syndicated in RSS.

So, this post is the last. I loved this platform, and loved people started it. But, unfortunately, it seemed, that bloggers community is not important enough for new platform managers.

Also, If you want to learn how to use C# and XML-RCP to migrate from CS2007, used in this platform, visit my new home :)

Have a great year and, as always, be good people. This post marked with all possible tags automatically. Sorry.

Running WPF on gas pump (or other Windows CE devices)?

Tamir Khason — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 20:06:07 GMT

[This blog was migrated. You will not be able to comment here.
The new URL of this post is http://khason.net/blog/running-wpf-on-gas-pump-or-other-windows-ce-devices/]

What do you think, is it possible to run WPF on Windows CE enabled devices (e.g. gas pumps, GPS systems, robots, game or automatic teller machines or, even, scientific calculators)? Let's see following code:

StackPanel panel = new StackPanel(Orientation.Horizontal);
            Ellipse ellipse = new Ellipse(10, 10);
            ellipse.Fill = new SolidColorBrush(Colors.Red);
            ellipse.Stroke = new Pen(Color.Black);
            Rectangle rect = new Rectangle();
            rect.Width = 40;
            rect.Height = 40;
            Line l = new Line(20, 20);
            Polygon polygon = new Polygon(new int[] { 0, 0, 20, 0, 20, 20, 0, 20 });
            panel.Children.Add(ellipse);
            panel.Children.Add(rect);
            panel.Children.Add(l);
            panel.Children.Add(polygon);

            panel.AddHandler(Buttons.ButtonUpEvent, (ButtonEventHandler)delegate
            {
                panel.Orientation = panel.Orientation == Orientation.Horizontal ? Orientation.Vertical : Orientation.Horizontal;
            }, false);

Or even this code

void OnButtonHeld(object o)
{
    Button b = (Button)o;
    Dispatcher.Invoke(TimeSpan.FromTicks(10), (ButtonHeldDelegate)delegate(Button btn)
    {
        while (Buttons.IsButtonDown(btn))
        {
            switch (btn)
            {
                case Button.Left: p.X--; break;
                case Button.Up: p.Y--; break;
                case Button.Right: p.X++; break;
                case Button.Down: p.Y++; break;
                case Button.Select: p.X = mainWindow.Width / 2; p.Y = mainWindow.Height / 2; break;
            }
        }

        moveMouse();
    }, b);
}

void moveMouse()
{
    host.DrawRectangle(Colors.Black,2,p.X,p.Y, 100, 100,0,0,Colors.Red,0,0,Colors.Blue,100,100,255);
    host.Flush();
}

This code will run on any Windows CE device. And it is not WPF :) It's .NET Micro Framework. Actually, when we're looking for it's syntax, it looks like WPF/Silverlight and .NET Micro Framework have the same architect. However, it cannot use hardware acceleration and has very limited number of objects. All this because of it's purpose "platform to devices that do not need the fuller functionality available in the .NET Framework and the .NET Compact Framework". I would add Windows Presentation Foundation as well.

The application model of .NET Micro Framework is very similar to WPF. It has native CLR/PAL and HAL and managed libraries.

Sufficient number of components in CLR - types, threads and timers, reflection, serialization, GC, networking, other connectivities etc., enables you to create, even games, that will run on even Heart Device.

Other words, cool technology and possible cool appliance for your programming skills.

How to start? First of all, download .NET Micro Framework v2.5 (VS2005, you can also add Microsoft.SPOT assemblies into your regular VS2008 project) and start programming. It's really simple (I build snake game for less, then hour)

See your applications, running on embedded devices. BTW, I'll probably present something, developed with this framework in my TechEd session aside with WPF, Silverlight and XNA... Keep tuned and have a nice day

Just code - Tamir Khason : Micro Framework

New year – new blog or how to migrate Community Server to any other engine, supports XML-RPC

Running WPF on gas pump (or other Windows CE devices)?

[This blog was migrated. You will not be able to comment here.The new URL of this post is http://khason.net/blog/running-wpf-on-gas-pump-or-other-windows-ce-devices/]

[This blog was migrated. You will not be able to comment here.
The new URL of this post is http://khason.net/blog/running-wpf-on-gas-pump-or-other-windows-ce-devices/]