This forum is for you to discuss anything related to the Build conference. Build is going to be awesome and we're excited to put on a great event for you!

Download the SDK and Toolkit -  Note: Some demos require additional software to be installed, like if you're using the XNA Avatar demo, you need to install XNA. Just follow the instructions for each demo and you'll be good.

Hope this helps,

-Dan

4 days ago, TLapworth93 wrote

hey, im currently going through the proccess of learning C sharp (it being my first language) and was wondering if anyone new any good beginner videos. ive already gone through Bob Tabor's lessons. (http://channel9.msdn.com/Series/C-Sharp-Fundamentals-Development-for-Absolute-Beginners#tab_sortBy_sequential) and am now looking for something new. all help is greatly appreciated.

If you like Bob's content, you may want to consider his Windows Phone for Absolute Beginner's videos or the recent Windows Store apps for Absolute Beginners series which both build on the content from the C# videos.

We also built two other series for Windows Store apps, the Build your first Windows Store app series in C# and the Build a Blog Reader Windows Store app video series.

5 hours ago, Chrissteven​81 wrote

so quick question. When they say coding from scratch do they also mean no api like Telerik or phone fx or the sdk? if so we are really limiting our ability lol

The point we wanted to make in the "build from scratch" comment was that participants don't think this is something where you bring an app you've partially or fully completed. We'll have the exact rules listed for attendees, but using 3rd party controls or open source libraries in an app is fine.

20 hours ago, ESgarbi wrote

4 out of the 10 people I know have already signed up. I don't remember in past PDCs or even last year Build having this type of format (only computers loaded with hands on labs stuff). I think its going to be interesting.

The only problem is that I don't think i want to miss out the attendee party to code until 2am on Thursday. 

I'm coordinating the Hackathon for Build, and yeah, this is definitely new. The reason we're doing this is because we think people learn better when they're actually writing code. Our hands-on labs have previously been copy/paste here and see that it works, and this in a sense is an evolution of our hands-on labs.

Also, just to be clear at least for judging, final apps are due at 8PM on Thursday at the latest. That means all Hackathon attendees should go to the attendee party

8 hours ago, Bas wrote

*snip*...but what's this about recording changes automatically? Is there a tutorial or video somewhere?

No, but I'm recording some videos and I want to make sure to show this feature!

• First, start with a Basic Page template (since it includes states like the snapped state)
• In the Basic page template, add, say, a StackPanel with Orientation = Horizontal and three images.
• Turn on Device, and simulate the snapped view. Images 2 & 3 should be cut off because of the orientation is set to Horizontal
• Now click the checkbox to record changes. The border around the designer changes to red (similar to Blend) to let you know that whatever properties you change now will only happen in Snapped View.
• Select the Stackpanel (use Document Outline if it's a pain to select), go to properties and change the orientation to Vertical. All of the images should now show since they are vertical.
• Turn off recording and run the app. Notice how switching to Snapped view auto-magically changed the StackPanel orientation and you were able to do this all in a GUI! Underneath the covers, you'll find the code to do it in the Visual State Manager if you need to tweak it.

Very cool stuff

Good feedback

We're working on adding more content for beginners, including a video series by Bob Tabor as well as video versions of the Getting started videos already available.

Cheers,

-Dan 

2 hours ago, Richard.Hein wrote

Check out this interactive Turing Machine:  http://www.khanacademy.org/cs/turing-machine/938201372 

Some of the lessons/code samples have videos, like this Hilbert Curve one. 

@JohnAskew Where do we rally?  The internet?   I don't know, but Khan Academy has a good reputation and excellent funding (i.e. Bill Gates).  I hope MSDN and C9 take a look at these ideas.

@MasterPie Also cool, and targeting additional needs; I can imagine the best of both worlds combining in the future.

 

Agree, I love Khan Academy and their new tools are great. We've been working on building developer content for Absolute Beginner series on Channel 9, and we'll continue to do so for Windows 8 and other topics. If there was a way to get an online IDE "for free" that could do interactive tutorials like Khan, that would definitely be something we would look at for things like the HTML5/CSS and JavaScript tutorials.

To break it down

1. All data is on one PC, all other PCs have access to that library using a GB Ethernet connection. When Windows 8 is out, we'll setup replicating disks on this.

2. CrashPlan+ is used to replicate #1. The cost is $3 per month for one PC, $6 per month for a household for unlimited data.

3. The most important data is also replicated to SkyDrive

4. Home Server backs up all of the machines, but it may be dying so I'm looking to switch options here for PC backup...

-Dan

The 1.5 Kinect SDK includes several features not available in OpenNI/NITE, like seated skeletal tracking, face tracking and support for Kinect for Windows near mode. The SDK also includes lots of samples and helper classes to get you started, like UI controls for camera, depth, skeletal data, audio, and Kinect sensor management. With OpenNI/NITE, you have to do all of these things, like wire up the raw camera data, or skeletal joints yourself.

I'd want something a little less painful than a paintball gun shooting me, primarily since I suck at FPS games