Just code - Tamir Khason : blogging general, Silverlight

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.

Programming for Windows 7

Tamir Khason — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 17:12:38 GMT

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Well, Windows 7 is going to be released by the end of next year. This is great news, because it seemed, that Microsoft finally understand how to get the best of Windows Vista and make it to work not only on monster machines.

It even works on new brandy my wife's pinky machine. And if it works there and my wife is happy with it, this OS going to be very impressive.

But from the other hand, we, as developers should be ready today to developer Windows 7 ready application (by the way, Vista Battery Saver works for Windows 7 as well as for Windows Vista, in spite of the fact, that power management in Windows 7 was improved dramatically). So let's start!

First thing we need is to read big Windows 7 Developer Guide. This document will explain most of new features for developers to build applications right. What is includes?

Windows Driver Kit (WDK) 3.0

Basically, Windows 7 works with Vista drivers, however, hibernation, power management, networking, PREfast will work much better. You also will have new WMI access for reliability monitors and ACPI.

Management and deployment

By default Windows 7 uses PowerShell 2.0 and Windows Installer. For PowerShell it includes enhanced cmdlets to manage Active Directory, IIS, etc. For Windows Installer, you finally can build "chainers" by yourself (the same approach, used for latest deployment of Microsoft products such as Silverlight, Visual Studio 2008 SP1 etc.) Also, you can get advantage by using Windows Filtering Platform (Firewall) and User Account Control (UAC) from inside your application by using new APIs.

Performance

The most significant change in Windows 7 for end-user point of view is improved performance. Windows 7 kernel is much smaller, that kernel of Windows Vista. Also it uses specific patterns to decrease background activities on low power, based on system triggers. New user-mode and kernel-mode APIs are used by Windows Drivers Foundation much more efficiently. Also system services are much smarter. For example, DCIA starts only when you connect new hardware. After drivers were installed the service shuts down. The same approach used by domain join, GP changes, new IP fetching etc. Windows 7 knows to run and stop services, based on system events, which decreases average work load and enhances whole system performance.

Multi-touch gestures and Interia API and used interface in general

Yes, you can use this API for your applications. Finally we can have more, then just mouse. And it is not only about multiple mouse devices. We can use single finder panning, raw touch input data, internal multitouch ink recognition, which is also supports math. Also it uses build-in MathML export feature.

There are a lot of other enhancements, such as smart bars, windows' stacking, gadget desktop (it does not eat battery as external process anymore), system ribbon menu integration. etc

Graphics

Direct 11, new Direct2D, DirectWrite (we can turn text anti-aliasing for small fonts, hurrah!), improved WIC, DX/GDI interoperability on system level with automatic fallback for weak hardware (yes, you should not be worry about it anymore). Also new video and audio format support with human readable interfaces. Yes, no more DirectDraw hacks. We can use new high level interfaces such as MFPlay to manage playbacks, Source Reader for decoding, Sink Writer for transcoders and re-coding compressions.

Web and communication

WCF is inside, as well as distributed routing table for peer-to-peer operations. BranchCache - new technology to reduce WAN traffic and latency.

Also Windows 7 is compatible with OpenSearch (I told, that Microsoft does not know to build search engines). Sharepoint integration and environment sensors platform, that can be used either for desktop and web applications.

There are much more features, that makes Windows 7 to pretend to be very good operation system. If you want to learn more about all those Windows 7 new features, I highly advice you to download and read this document. It includes most of new features of new OS with explanations and screenshots to make your learn and understand what can your future application do with all those new features.

Have a nice day and be good people.

BTW, if you have PDC version of Windows 7 and want to unlock it for using of some cool features, introduced during keynotes, it worth to visit here and learn how to :)

Download Windows 7 Developer Guide and start programming.

Printouts of the slides, presented on Silverlight 2.0 open house today

Tamir Khason — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 20:26:45 GMT

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Thank you all, who participated today in Silverlight 2.0 for building Rich Internet Applications event. I uploaded printouts of the slides, presented during the session here. So, you can download it for reference.

I’m really interesting within your feedback (leave comments) in order for me to be able to enhance it for future events.

Also, I want to remind you, that due to lack of space we were unable to handle all those who want to attend, thus we decided to make another session within two weeks, so can register here. Remember, only registered attendees, who with confirmation received will allow to enter. So, hurry up.

If you want to learn more about Silverlight, you can register to attend Expert Days “Mastering Microsoft Silverlight 2.0 – 020” full day course, 13-August, were we’ll have Silverlight 2.0 deep dive training day. You can also review another two courses, I’ll have there:

12-Aug “Windows Presentation Foundation for fellow developers – 027”
14-Aug “Advanced .NET 3.5 SP1 – Windows Presentation Foundation – 011”

Download slides from today session >>

Register to attend next event at 23 July >>

Thank you and leave a comment…

Silverlight 2.0 for building Rich Internet Applications (Local Event) – Take 2

Tamir Khason — Sun, 29 Jun 2008 22:42:31 GMT

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As promised earlier, the next session of Silverlight 2.0 for building Rich Internet Applications will take place at 23 July, 8:30 AM-12:30 PM in ILDC. This is exactly the same session for those, who unable to attend tomorrow due to lack of place.

Please, this time, try to register as soon as possible to assure seat assignment.

Please do not ask me. We cannot handle more…

Tamir Khason — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 17:34:00 GMT

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Monday next week, I’m making half day session about building rich internet applications with Silverlight 2.0 in ILDC. The registration is over a while ago, but during this week, I got very large amount of email, IMs and phones calls with appeal to attend.

Sorry, we’re fully booked (currently about twice of available seats and it's about 200) and cannot handle any more. Only those who registered and got confirmations will allow to enter. It is for your own convenience!

I promise, that within next two weeks I’ll make the same session again for all those, who want to come, but unable to register and attend (after a small arrangement, I’ll publish here next date).

Thank you again for understanding and see you soon.

Presenting at TechEd Developers South Africa 2008, Durban

Tamir Khason — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 17:23:27 GMT

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Save the date. TechEd Developers South Africa is around the corner (August 3rd through 6th). This year it will take place in Durban, the third most populous city in South Africa.

This TechEd, there are four sessions assigned to me:

Creating Rich Applications with Windows Presentation Foundation (300)

Completely new session about how to enrich user experience, by decreasing development efforts with WPF. In order to do this, we’ll try to take some application and completely recreate it, by using XAML only without any single code line.

Target audience: Developers and decide makers, who what to understand what can be done with WPF and how easy you can do it.

Understanding Reflection (400)

This is also new session for lazy developers. It’s not only about what reflection is or what’s new about reflection in latest frameworks (including .NET 3.5 and Silverlight), but also how to use it to make developer’s life easier. We’ll enter a bit into IL to understand what’s going on under the hoods, but most of session is about appliance of this technology for everyday developers’ tasks and challenges.

Target audience: Developers, have an experience with .NET programming

WPF Performance (400)

Session very similar to one, I had in Dev Academy 2. However this time it will focus on performance enhancements in .NET framework 3.5 SP1. I’ll speak about virtualization, parallel processing, DX surface direct access and more…

Target audience: Developers, have an experience with WPF development.

Game Development Using Microsoft’s Latest Technologies (300)

Fun session, I had in TechEd Israel with very complicated setup. Here the sneak preview of how it looks like. It listed as a 300 level, because the fact, that except this session’s fun, you can learn a lot of new there.

Target audience: Everyone, who love technology and want to have fun hour in the morning before advanced sessions will begin.

If you’re reading my blog, and you’re going TechEd Africa. Come and say me hello, ‘cos it would be really nice to see the faces of the people I’m writing to in this blog :)

More information about other sessions in this TechEd can be found in Ahmed Salijee blog, who is developer evangelist in Microsoft Africa and arranges this event.

See you there.

Action required: Smart client users group

Tamir Khason — Fri, 23 May 2008 01:44:00 GMT

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Recently I browsed INETA to seek for some group and was really surprising. There is no Smart Client user group registered there. Maybe there is a reason? Let’s understand what Smart Client is?

According wikipedia, the term "Smart Client" is meant to refer to simultaneously capturing the benefits of a "thin client" (zero-install, auto-update) and a "fat client" (high performance, high productivity). However, I think, that this term is much wider. It is not only thin-fat client application, it’s also most of applications we’re using today.

Thick Client

We always want to provide our users with best experience and increase their performance. However we are (as developers) want to avoid complicated development and deployment. This why we should know as much as possible about user’s system, when users do not want to have real footprint in their systems. That’s dilemma. Is it possible to solve it? Let’s look deeper…

Are we really need installation? Most of old software installations put things in registry. It because you were never sure what client has in his system and were our application can put files or temporary data. Today, when we have local application or user isolated storage, so we not really need to use registry. Maybe only for our own ego – this is cool to have something like “HKLM/Software/MYNAME” in 1,000,000 user’s computers…

No installation is good, but what to me with maintenance. We want our system connected…

Thin Client

Could you imagine your user to visit product site twice a week to see what’s going on? I can not. However I know, that if I’ll ask him first about automatic updates and he’ll agree to forget about application maintenance, his experience will be much better.

So,we are connected. What now? I want to make time reporting system. Web service? Maybe some kind of distributed application. Maybe, even Twitter? This way we can be sure, that our data is safe and if user reinstall whole system, he do not really need to care about backups.

But users not always have internet access. Sometimes they are offline. How to solve the problem of occasionally connected users? I do not want him every lunch want for two minutes, until I realize, that there is no internet connection and will not even give him a chance to use the application?

So, we also want our system to be useful offline. But what’s up with Web 10.0? We want millions. We want very broad reach for our application. Also we want to be able to manage application updates remotely?

Let’s take a look into other pan of application development. Do you like JavaScript? I do not! I think it’s too complicated to develop things for web. We should invest into at least 50% of coverage and integration tests, while giving customers pretty poor user experience. What is we want to provide the same look and feel everywhere? In web, desktop, mobile and other devices? Our customers want the application everywhere?

Summary

This is exactly what Smart client designed for. Technologies such as .NET, WPF, Silverlight from Microsoft, Flex, Thermo from Adobe and others tries to make you to be there with your application. But how to do it? How to answer all those hard questions, I asked?

I want to announce new (currently virtual) user group, dedicated to Smart Client development. I do not want to restrict this group geographically, due to fact, that current infrastructures allows us to forget about distances and be together. Join today “Smart Client development” user group.

In order to join, just send me an email to tamir [at] khason.biz with information about you. I put the request to create this user group in INETA. Once it will be opened, I’ll send everyone email to register and connect them selves to this group.

Be in touch.

You can meet me face to face in TechEd

Tamir Khason — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 13:35:00 GMT

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Starting today, if you are attending TechEd '08 Israel, you can set an appointment with me, by using a meeting system in TechEd website. All attendees received an email with username and password to access the system. So enter, click Find and look for WPF, Silverlight or, just תמיר חסון. Then click Request to meet and that's it.

Note, my free slots will be closed very soon, so, if you want to see and ask me question, hurry to close your time slot.

Meet me at Teched '08 Israel >>

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

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

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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

Some new post-mix downloads

Tamir Khason — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 14:01:44 GMT

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Today is download day at MSDN. There are some very interesting things published.

New release of Windows SDK (new classes for WPF 3.5, bugs fixes, and enhanced support for Windows Server 2008, including speech, error reporting and UAC). Download it here. For more information, visit SDK blog
Windows XP SP3 RC2 (it's not final release), but if you want to try it (not in production environment) download it here. As well as if you are ready to harm your system. Give a try to Windows Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1 for XP (or for Vista/Home Server 2008, or Windows Server 2003 SP2).
There are some fixes for Microsoft XNA Game Studio 2.0 (make sure, that you know what is it. If not, come to see my TechEd session). Also, you can download Games for Windows - LIVE redistributable .
If you are lucky Zune owner, you can download PC software 2.3 for it
If you Virtual Earth fun, add realistic 3D capabilities to use online Live Search Maps.
If you still have no Silverlight Tools for VS2008, be sure to download it (this is not chained installer, tools only)

Enough for this morning. Warm up your download machines and start downloading.

Silverlight 2.0 beta 1 is alive - how to use it now?

Tamir Khason — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 17:13:00 GMT

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As you, probably, know, Silverlight 2.0 got "non-commercial" go-live and how you can start using it for real. But how to do it? Let try to understand.

First of all, you have to remove all previous versions of Silverlight as well as remove Silverlight Alpha tools for Visual Studio. Then, install Runtime andm using chain installer, get Visual Studio 2008 tools for Silverlight 2.0 beta 1. I installs SDK, but does not install documentation. You can get it offline here. If everything went well, you'll have version 2.0.30226.2 installed. As well as inside Visual Studio 2008, you'll get new project type, named Silverlight.

Now, when we have the installation, our next step will be to understand changes in syntax and build one sample program.

First thing, we'll do will be creation of DependencyObject.

public class MyObject : DependencyObject    {
    public string Title        {
        get { return (string)GetValue(TitleProperty); }
        set { SetValue(TitleProperty, value); }        }

    public static readonly DependencyProperty TitleProperty =            DependencyProperty.Register("Title", typeof(string), typeof(MyObject), OnTitlePropertyChanged);

    static void OnTitlePropertyChanged(DependencyObject s, DependencyPropertyChangedEventArgs e)        { }
}

So far so good, but if you'll try to compile it, you'll get following error: "Error    1    The type 'System.Windows.DependencyObject' has no constructors defined". What is it? This is beta! In Silverlight 2.0 beta 1, the only object you may directly derrive from is UserControl. So, let's change out MyObject class to inherit from UserControl. Not very nice, but we have no chance.

Now the turn of collection. We can derrive from IList<T> or ICollection<T>, so let's write some code.

public class MyCollection : ObservableCollection<MyObject>
    {
        public MyCollection()
        {
            for (int i = 0; i < 10; i++)
            {
                MyObject o = new MyObject();
                o.Title = string.Format("Item {0}", i);
                base.Add(o);
            }
        }
    }

You should also put it into resources, so inside you Page1.xaml, we'll add following lines.

...

xmlns:l="clr-namespace:SilverlightApplication1"
    Width="400" Height="300">
    <UserControl.Resources>
        <l:MyCollection x:Key="collection"/>
    </UserControl.Resources>

Dont't it looks like WPF? It really is! Let's see if binding works the same way as in WPF

Compile and run - see nothing? There is a reason for it. If you'll change the collection to well-known type collection (e.g. string), you'll see the result. Now you see nothing, 'cos you have no DataTemplate (for some reason reflected type does not appear as well - nu, shojn, beta :) ). So, now we know, that we need DataTemplate. Let's do it

<UserControl.Resources>
        <l:MyCollection x:Key="collection"/>
        <DataTemplate x:Key="template">
            <TextBlock Text="{Binding Title}"/>
        </DataTemplate>
    </UserControl.Resources>
    <Grid x:Name="LayoutRoot" Background="White">
        <ListBox
            ItemTemplate="{StaticResource template}"
            ItemsSource="{Binding Source={StaticResource collection}}"/>
    </Grid>

Very well. We have simple ListBox, binded to underlying data source. As alternative, you can use DisplayMemberPath="Title" (in our case) to visualize simple data item

So far, so good. Let's add buttons and handlers to our sample program.
First let's create markup for the root grid

Next, put StackPanel and two buttons inside it.

And at the end, handlers for those buttons

private void Button_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
        {
            MyCollection coll = Resources["collection"] as MyCollection;
            Button b = sender as Button;
            if (b.Name == "addButton")
            {
                MyObject o = new MyObject();
                o.Title = string.Format("Item {0}", coll.Count);
                coll.Insert(0,o);
            }
            else if (b.Name == "removeButton")
            {
                if (coll.Count > 0)
                {
                    coll.RemoveAt(0);
                }
            }
        }

Well, it's absolutely WPF stuff, in spite of the fact, that we are in Silverlight. However, it's not 100% right. We're still missing DataTriggers, some of layout controls, style trigger etc. But it's still in beta, and by now it's looking like in very near future we'll be able to develop the same code and just compile it for different platforms: WPF, WPF XBAP, Silverlight (as for me WPF/E is better name for this version, due to fact, that it's tool close to WPF)

Thank you and be good people. Stay tuned for upcoming articles...

Weird: Russians think different...

Tamir Khason — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 14:37:00 GMT

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Just in case. Following the poll, appears in main page of russian version of Silverlight Challenge (MS official???)

Let me translate you options:

Have you Silverlight installed?

Yes
No
Still not (planning)
I do not like Flash

WTF? Is it legit option to ask? There is no such poll on english version of the same web site. The only poll there is

and there are no other, even archived polls.

So, I want to ask you the simple question: WTF?

http://***.ru/?p=446

For some reason "i*n*j*u*n #576871" was filtered. Use your favorite search engine to fine it (remove stars)

Some Gold Partners ARE respecting copyrighted materials

Tamir Khason — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 21:03:14 GMT

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6 hours after my last post about the imaginary used by Microsoft Gold Partner, I got a phone call from one of it's representatives, who proves me, that the image, used in the promo is bought from Image Bank. They did a couple of changes, however, that is not me! I was wrong! Following the original image, purchased by the partner (low resolution - this is copyrighted imaginary)

I want to apologize for my doubts in honesty of Hi-Tech college and invite all of you to attend their eight hour session of Silverlight introduction. They promised warm soup, chocolate, cider, sachlav (salep/orchid drink) and crembo (not hot) for all attendees.

I'm really happy, that I was wrong about Hi Tech college. I'm much happier, that they are counting our opinion and it's really important for them to be right!

Following my image, which I thought was used - side view (low resolution - photo by Yossi)

Thank you, Michal, Sharon and Shimrit for your work! Keep doing!

Why some of Gold Partners do not respect copyrighted materials?

Tamir Khason — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 14:41:07 GMT

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Two days ago, the friend of mine, sent me the invitation he got from one of Microsoft Gold Partners in learning field here in Israel. This invitation was to attend Silverlight course of one day. Pretty good, however I was shocked by the graphic material, they used to promote it. It seemed to be my picture from DevAcademy II. I do not teach this course and I even did not know, that it exists, however they, probably, used the copyrighted imaginary without any permission neither from my, nor from Microsoft side. What's the insolence!

I want to believe, that I'm wrong, that it is not my picture or, if it is, they got appropriate permissions, however I sent a request to legal department to shed light on this bad issue...

A couple of updates - mega update post

Tamir Khason — Fri, 07 Dec 2007 15:37:55 GMT

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Today, only updates

Yahoo finally releases Yahoo! Messenger for Vista - this was one of very first prototypes, shown in Mix last year. I did not install it, however, here a couple of review Erik Burke, Tim Sneath and Ryan Stewart. As for me, they lost "wow effect" last year

Microsoft Expression Blend 2 - December Preview. What's new? VS2008 integration, inheritance, no SL2.0 support (strange, maybe, because of breaking changes toward near beta)

Vista SP1 RC1 available for MSDN subscribers (via Nick Whites). Nothing special, 40 minutes of installation, profile information loss and performance fixes

Office 2007 SP1 is expected to ship 10-December week. This time it is not RC or Beta, but final product (via Mary Jo Foley). Great work.

Windows XP SP3 is very close to RC1, but nothing about public beta yet.

Starting today, you can configure Messenger presence. Some cool features become available (via Angus Logan). Here is how.

PDC 2008 (canceled last year) will be on October 27-30 in LA (hello, Peter). It promised to be great event about the company's emerging services platform efforts, .NET, Windows and Mobile technologies.

A little about mobile devices, while waiting for my new mega-device (more information soon): Dell is about to enter mobile phone industry in 2008, Opera compiled their browser for Brew platform (hello, Pelephone), while Google create their mobile version for IPhone. Windows Mobile 6.1 is going to be cool. Here screenshorts. Meanwhile, you can update your Mobile Office to version 6.1 for free or your Nokia (N-series) with Internet Radio application. As for me, 8 hours speak time and 30 days standby, quad-band. Those are features, that you need from your handy.

Well, that's it for now. Have a nice weekend.

Now I have a question for you. What do you think, about such format of posts? Should ?I go on with it or continue to write post-per-event?

Thank you