Abstract:

Download “Smart Shopping”  from the Windows Store

• [2:20] What does the Smart Shopping app do?
• [3:40] Why did you decide to build a Windows Store app when you already have a Windows Phone version?
• [4:10] What was your experience in building the app? How was it different than the Windows Phone version?
• [9:15] Why did you choose Windows Azure as your backend cloud service platform?
• [15:08] How has your experience been in using Azure Mobile Services?
• [21:46] What brought you to building an app for Windows Phone?  
• [30:17] How has your experience been so far working with Microsoft?

Next Steps:
Step #1 – Download the Tools for Windows 8 App Development
Step #2 – Start building your Windows 8 app
Step #3 – Publish an app – Keep the Cash (up to $2,000)!

Subscribe to our podcast via iTunes, Windows Phone Marketplace,  or RSS

__________________

App Builder Virtual Summit, May 2^nd There’s never been a better time to build for Windows!  Attend the Virtual Summit and learn about the Windows ecosystem opportunity, design and monetization tips, partner development frameworks, and even reviews from iOS and Android developers. Don’t miss this FREE online event, REGISTER today!

__________________

If you're interested in learning more about the products or solutions discussed in this episode, click on any of the below links for free, in-depth information:

Websites:

• Getting started with Windows 8 Apps
• How to Sell Your Apps and Make Money in the Windows Store
• Attend a Windows 8 Developer Camp and Hackathon in your area!

Videos:

• Using Windows Azure to Build Back-End Services for Windows 8 apps:  Parts 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5
• Microsoft DevRadio: How I’ve Made OVER $100k with My Windows 8 Apps
• Microsoft DevRadio: How to Include Advertising in Your Windows 8 apps

Virtual Labs:

• Windows 8  Virtual Labs

Yeah, I know it feels like I've been doing allot frameworks recently, but in my weird world, playing with new frameworks and seeing how they work is "fun". Why? They let you focus on building your apps, and not worrying about the goo. Or they let you see how the library author dealt with the goo. Or you LIKE goo and want to create your own goo buster. So many opportunities for fun.

Anyway...

Cimbalino Windows Phone Toolkit

Cimbalino Windows Phone Toolkit is a set of useful and powerful items that will help you build your Silverlight applications for Windows Phone.

The Toolkit is divided in projects, regarding different Windows Phone application required capabilities:

• Cimbalino.Phone.Toolkit - the base project of the toolkit, containing base MVVM services, some very useful converters, helper classes and extension methods, and the bindable Application Bar behavior
• Cimbalino.Phone.Toolkit.Camera - MVVM compatible services for camera access
• Cimbalino.Phone.Toolkit.Controls - Controls library (requires Silverlight for Windows Phone Toolkit)
• Cimbalino.Phone.Toolkit.DeviceInfo - MVVM compatible services for device information access
• Cimbalino.Phone.Toolkit.Location - MVVM compatible services for location access
• Cimbalino.Phone.Toolkit.PhoneDialer - MVVM compatible services for phone dialer access
• Cimbalino.Phone.Toolkit.UserInfo - MVVM compatible services for user information access

Note: this toolkit is only compatible with the Windows Phone SDK 7.1.x and Windows Phone 8.0!

Nuget

The packages are available thru NuGet here, with the same handles as the project names (e.g., the main package is "Cimbalino.Phone.Toolkit")

Download

Please visit the download section on GitHub to download the latest release of the toolkit.

I thought one of the cool things was that it supports both Windows Phone 7.1 and 8...

While you can easily grab the binaries from NuGut, since source is part of the fun, I grabbed the latest drop. Which compiled with no problems or errors.

How do you use it? There's a couple samples in the repository... Here's the Location sample.

So okay, what else is there of interest? Just check out snaps of the main library;

That enough to wet your appetite?

Cimbalino, you ask? Here's Pedro's answer.

"Cimbalino" is the word people from Porto (my home town!) use for expresso coffee!

The name Cimbalino is a reference to La Cimbali, a popular brand for expresso machines a few years ago in Portugal.

If you'd like you can hear how it is correctly read in Portuguese.

In this episode, Roberto Sonnino, a software developer on the Visual Studio team, walks through creating a dice rolling app with the Starter Kit, and shows that the same code can be recompiled for Windows RT and Windows Phone 8 devices.

The accompanying walkthrough is published on the Visual C++ team blog as a three part series:

• Part 1
• Part 2
• Part 3

• [0:52] How can developers capitalize on making apps for Windows 8 and Windows Phone?
• [6:37] How can developers get started making apps?
• [10:09] How do I sign up for the App Builder Program?
• [10:28] What is the App Builder Virtual Summit?
• [11:41] Who should attend the Summit? Is it just for developers?
• [14:32] How do I sign up? How much does it cost?

App Builder Virtual Summit, May 2^nd There’s never been a better time to build for Windows!  Attend the Virtual Summit and learn about the Windows ecosystem opportunity, design and monetization tips, partner development frameworks, and even reviews from iOS and Android developers. Don’t miss this FREE online event, REGISTER today!

______________

Need Convincing? Tune in to the latest Microsoft DevRadio episode: 
“ How I’ve Made OVER $100k with My Windows 8 Apps”
Michael Palermo welcomes Kevin Ashley to the show as they discuss how Kevin has made over $100k on his Windows 8 apps. Tune in as they discuss some tips and tricks for how you can improve your app revenue like  how to properly price your app and various monetization options that are available to you such as in-app purchase, pay-per download and advertising.

Resources:

• Download the Windows 8 Enterprise Evaluation
• Windows 8 Enterprise
• Windows 8 Licensing
• The Springboard Series Blog
• Windows 8 Resources for IT Pros on Springboard
• Resources for Developers to Build Windows 8 Apps
• Windows 8 resources for partners on Microsoft Partner Network

[00:30] - Build you app for the Web. 
[02:40] - Build your app for Windows 8.
[09:16] - Build your app for Windows Phone 8.

Abstract
Near-Field-Communication is a technology that has been around for a while but only recently started finding its way onto mobile phones. Microsoft introduced NFC support in Windows Phone allowing developers to leverage this impressive and cheap technology. In this session Nico Vermeir will explain you all about what makes NFC tags tick and how you leverage them in your Windows Phone 8 applications. Learn how to read and write tags, launch apps from a tag and pass parameters to your app.

Download the slides.

Extra
- Demo project presented by Nico during the webcast: http://sdrv.ms/139UV6U
- Download the Windows Phone SDK.
- Have a look at the next events we have planned for developers in Belgium: http://msdn-events.be 
- Belgian app builders: discover your new home: http://msdn.be/apps AKA the Apps on Windows portal.

Next Steps:

Subscribe to our podcast via iTunes or RSS

If you're interested in learning more about the products or solutions discussed in this episode, click on any of the below links for free, in-depth information:

Websites:

• Getting started with Windows 8 Apps
• How to Sell Your Apps and Make Money in the Windows Store
• Attend a Windows 8 Developer Camp and Hackathon in your area!

Videos:

• Microsoft DevRadio: Managing Your Windows 8 Enterprise Apps with Windows Intune
• Microsoft DevRadio: Your Top Windows Store Questions Answered

Virtual Labs:

• Windows 8 Virtual Labs

And there's just something about this project...

About Page Sample

The About Page example project demonstrates how to create an advanced "About" or "Information" page for your Windows Phone applications.

---

Almost all applications have an "About Page" which provides information about the app:

• Application name;
• Application version
• Copyright
• Brief details
• Website, Support and Privacy Policy

This project delivers an example template "About page" app which additionally includes features to:

• Rate the application
• Send feedback to the author
• Share application by email
• Share application by social networks

...

Beyond a simple About, I like how it includes the rating/feedback/email/sharing features.

Also of note is that there's both Windows Phone 7 AND Windows Phone 8 versions.So if you're in one camp or the other, they have you covered.

This project also provides a glimpse into the Cimbalino Windows Phone Toolkit and MVVM Light Toolkit projects, both of which we'll likely cover in the future too.

Finally, make sure you checkout the other samples on the Nokia Developer Portal. These are not just for Nokia phones, you know... (well you do now!)

• [00:20] Android Developers Welcome to Azure Mobile Services (Joel Citizen)
• [01:57] Azure Mobile Services managed client – now also from NuGet (Carlos Figueira)
• [02:39] Do you understand how your app is being used? (Lee Stott)
• [03:47] Three Essential Tips For Async - Introduction (Charles, Lucian Wischik)
• [05:07] Building a Simple REST Controller with Microsoft Visual Studio 2012 and WebAPI (Peter Kellner)
• [05:45] HTML Game Dev with Construct 2
• [06:49] Using Phone Resources in Windows Phone 8 (Rob Tiffany, Andy Wigley)
• [07:47] Web Development Goodies in Visual Studio 2012 (Adil Mughal)
• [08:47] A new resource for your icons… (ROUSSEAU Michel )
• [09:07] JavaScript API for Office (wall poster)
• [10:13] New Unit Test functionality in VS2012 Update 2: Test Playlist (Ricci Gian Maria)

Picks of the Week!

• Brian's Pick of the Week:[11:42] Tech Fails in film (Scott Hanselman)
• Dan's Pick of the Week:[12:57] Battery powered Kinect on wheels!

• [1:58] What has improved in System Center 2012 Configuration Manager to support new devices running Windows 8?
• [3:38] Can Configuration Manager manage non-Windows based devices as well?
• [4:25] How does System Center 2012 better support the mobile user?

Download the Windows 8 Enterprise Evaluation today and test your applications, hardware and deployment strategies with Windows 8.

Resources:

• Windows 8 Enterprise
• Windows 8 Licensing
• The Springboard Series Blog
• Windows 8 Resources for IT Pros on Springboard
• Resources for Developers to Build Windows 8 Apps
• Windows 8 resources for partners on Microsoft Partner Network

• [01:54] - Portable Library
• [10:17] - Shared source code
• [18:50] - Inheritance
• [22:36] - Partial classes

Full course outline:

• Mod 01a: Comparing Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8, Part 1
• Mod 01b: Comparing Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8, Part 2
• Mod 02: Basics of View Models
• Mod 03: Model-View-ViewModel
• Mod 04: Sharing Code Between Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8

• [03:29] - Architecture overview of MVVM
• [08:06] - MVVM and code sharing
• [22:48] - Messages
• [28:14] - Best practices

Full course outline:

• Mod 01a: Comparing Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8, Part 1
• Mod 01b: Comparing Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8, Part 2
• Mod 02: Basics of View Models
• Mod 03: Model-View-ViewModel
• Mod 04: Sharing Code Between Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8

• [01:53] - Data binding basics
• [11:02] - Demo - data binding
• [18:31] - View models
• [22:07] - Commands

Full course outline:

• Mod 01a: Comparing Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8, Part 1
• Mod 01b: Comparing Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8, Part 2
• Mod 02: Basics of View Models
• Mod 03: Model-View-ViewModel
• Mod 04: Sharing Code Between Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8

• [12:05] - Demo - reminders
• [20:00] - App settings
• [31:03] - Media capture
• [39:31] - App bar

Full course outline:

• Mod 01a: Comparing Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8, Part 1
• Mod 01b: Comparing Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8, Part 2
• Mod 02: Basics of View Models
• Mod 03: Model-View-ViewModel
• Mod 04: Sharing Code Between Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8

• [06:15] - Windows and Windows Phone convergence
• [13:25] - UI and XAML
• [23:13] - Data model and supporting code
• [27:50] - Demo - Local Storage
• [36:08] - Platofrm-specific features

Full course outline:

• Mod 01a: Comparing Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8, Part 1
• Mod 01b: Comparing Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8, Part 2
• Mod 02: Basics of View Models
• Mod 03: Model-View-ViewModel
• Mod 04: Sharing Code Between Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8

Now with more Cow Bell!

For those of you who haven’t been following the antics of the Yeti, we’ve been using this demo game and content around the world to instruct and inspire developers to produce games in HTML5.  Today I’m happy to announce the release of the Yeti Triple Play (Window 8 App, Web and Windows Phone 8) codebase on CodePlex.

Check out the details below:

What is YetiBowl?

YetiBowl is a HTML5 game development workshop.  With Windows 8 HTML5 development, we have the opportunity to reach a whole new community of developers.  These web developers have been “left out” of the app market opportunities of the last few years, and windows 8 provides them an opportunity to get in the game.  With the most recent release of the code base, we now have a version ported to Windows Phone 8 as well!

How do you play the game?

Yeti bowl is a challenge oriented game where you play the Yeti.  Armed with snowballs you have to knock the hikers off the mountain before they reach the summit.  Once three hikers reach the top of the summit, game over.  Go ahead and try the web version of the game.  My high score is 126, good luck!

Why is Yeti Bowl special?

Yeti blow show the powerful portability of HTML5. With no changes to the code base, this web based game can easy be ported to both a Window 8 app and a Windows Phone 8 App.  You’ll see our Windows 8 App is also tricked out with additional features utilizing a handful with Windows 8 APIs to differentiate the App version from the web version of the game.  View our Code Base to see the examples.

 Who is this for?

 In this workshop, you’ll be able to gear it to a few different audiences, including the following.

Students:  We’ve geared this deck to take a developer from the basics of building an HTML5 app, to the advanced features that will set an app apart.  Any student with a basic understanding of web standards should be able to be successful in this workshop.  These sessions would actually go quite well in an event geared towards web standards.

Corporate partners:  Many companies have their development teams stacked with software engineers who have web development skills.  Where other platforms have forced them to “retool” developers (by teaching them an unfamiliar language) to build a native app, Windows 8 lets them build apps in the languages they already know and love. Some partners have reported development times up to 5X faster with HTML5/JS Windows 8 Apps, as compared to iOS apps using the same web services.

Web Developers:  Developers with asp, php, or even ruby skill sets will be comfortable with the constructs of an HTML page and JavaScript files.  Whether they are familiar with traditional Microsoft technologies or not, HTML5/JS app development often provides enough familiar grounds for them to build a great app.  If you are introducing the Windows Store App development environment to a group who haven’t worked in our ecosystems before, I’ve noted HTML5/JS has been the language they prefer.

JavaScript Developers: JavaScript developers have endless opportunities inside of a windows 8 app.  They can use their same skill set, and some of their same js libraries to build windows 8 apps.  Within the decks, some slides are hidden or whole sections tacked on to the end of the decks that can be pulled in for advanced users like JavaScript conferences or user groups.

HTML5 YetiBowl game: an HTML5 cross browser version of the game that works with keyboard or touch.  The game can be found in the “web” folder:

https://yetibowl.codeplex.com/SourceControl/changeset/view/1738d57d6e63#YetiBowl_web/game.html

Windows 8 game:  the windows 8 game requires you install the Microsoft Ad SDK first [GD: Which you can find via Microsoft Advertising SDK for Windows 8 - Getting Started - Prerequisites]. You should then be able to open the game and install it:

https://yetibowl.codeplex.com/SourceControl/changeset/view/1738d57d6e63#YetiBowl_Win8/YetiBowl/game.html

Windows Phone 8 game:  the web version of the game ported to windows phone 8.  See Matthias demonstrate how easy it was to convert this web based game into a Windows Phone 8 App. 

https://yetibowl.codeplex.com/SourceControl/changeset/view/1738d57d6e63#YetiBowl_WP8/Yeti/Html/game.html

Live coding version of talk:  From build 2012, Giorgio presented a session in which he live coded an HTML5 game then converted it to a Windows 8 Store app, all within the one hour session:

http://channel9.msdn.com/Events/Build/2012/3-110

Feedback

This is version 1.1, and I want to continue to develop this content.  For that to happen I need your feedback.  Feel free to change this content to fit your need.  I only ask that you share your additions or improvements back with me so I can incorporate them into the original version. Send feedback to jeffburt@microsoft.com.  Any events using this content or geared towards HTML5, I’ll be happy to retweet.  Find me at @boyofgreen on twitter.

The source downloaded and all three projects ran for me the first time, with no problems (once I found and installed the Microsoft Ad SDK).

Some snaps of the Solutions. WP8;

Windows 8;

Web (no solution, just files...)

Running snaps? Yep, got those too...

Windows 8

Windows Phone 8

Web

All of which show that I stink on all the platforms...

What's nice is that each project is tweaked to utilize the features of the given platform (hence my "same'ish" note in the open line).

For example, in the Windows 8 app, it uses the Camera to make the Yeti all you...

There's other cool little features like customizing the Hikers, setting their name and even pictures too...

All in all this is a fun little game that shows how your HTML skills can be used to build real apps and games for the web, Windows Phone 8 and Windows 8...

Controlling a Netduino over Bluetooth with WP8

The last time I touched my Netduino was about 5 months ago (due to work-load), around the time of my wedding to make the wedding tank. So this weekend I decided to dust it off and introduce it to my Lumia 920.

Disclosure: I didn’t actually dust it off.

They are now lovers.

Here is a video of what this post aims to explain how to make. It’s hard to see the actual color of things in the video – so let’s just trust me that it works

I’m going to start by explaining the entire Netduino side of things then move to WP8. Also, I’ve pretty much explained it as simply as possible incase there is anyone on earth worse than me at electronic stuff...

First he covers the hardware...

First was to get the Netduino updated. Surprisingly, the Netduino didn’t update itself sitting in the cupboard. I’m running Windows 8 – but besides mistakenly flashing it with the Netduino Plus rom the drivers all work fine and there's nothing special you need to do.

Next I picked up this awesome little Bluetooth module from Pro-tecc:

...

 

... next Windows Phone 8

Onto Windows Phone 8.

Create a new WP8 application in VS2012. Yes, this is only possible in WP8, not 7.

I’ve made a simple UI which has 3 sliders, one for each color. By default, the color of the sliders on the left of the handle will be the phone’s accent color, so I overrode the style and changed that. Below that is a Rectangle that shows the color. Then there are 3 radio buttons: Still, Strobe, and Ambient. Still will just send the slider values and strobe will randomize the sliders every 100MS (essentially flickering the LED). Ambient is a bit more complicated. I am using the [back] camera on the device to get the average color of what the phone is looking at, and then it sends that color through to the Netduino. To force the camera to initialize I needed to put a hidden rectangle on the UI and bind it’s Brush to the camera.

Above all of that is a Grid with a ProgressBar to show that it’s connecting. If the connection fails (or the first time it connects), it will display this overlay until it’s successfully reconnected and has sent and received a test ping.

...

Source? Yes, he's made the source for both sides available, just Click through to the post, and scroll down to the bottom of the post.

This should help you get started and keep your WP8 from feeling blue...

Facebook Graph Search  [05:11]

Windows Phone nominated for Design Award  [14:43]

Nokia DRIVE  [11:25]

Microsoft loves the '90's  [16:28]

Thoughts on the MYTHLY site???

It's all about the cheevos...or is it?

• [0:34] Announcing Release of Windows Azure Media Services (Scott Guthrie)
• [1:42] Broadcast push notifications to millions of mobile devices using Windows Azure Notification Hubs (Scott Guthrie)
• [2:33] Now Available: Windows Phone SDK Update for 7.8 (Cliff Simpkins )
• [3:25] Fall Fury: Part 1 - Introduction (Den Delimarsky, Brian Peek, Clint Rutkas, Dan Fernandez, Rick Barraza )
• [5:16] Tile design guidelines for Windows Phone 8 (Shubhan Chemburkar)
• [6:08] Building the Bing apps for Windows 8 (Jigar Thakkar)
• [7:18] Building HTML5 Games for the Atari Arcade
• [8:36] Introducing SvcPerf - An End-to-End trace Analysis tool for WCF (Sajay Antony), http://svcperf.codeplex.com/
• [9:36] CODEMINE: Building a Software Analytics Platform for Collecting and Analyzing Engineering Process Data at Microsoft (Jacek Czerwonka, Nachi Nagappan, and Wolfram Schulte)
• [10:40] GoingNative 13: Visual Studio 3D Starter Kit, Meet Roberto Sonnino

Picks of the Week!

• Clint's Pick of the Week:[11:43] Everything you need to know about the Lumia 820 and 3D printing (Joel Willans)
• Dan's Pick of the Week:[13:00] Visual Studio ​Achievement​s; they're not Xbox live right? (Cheevos!)

Table of contents

[00:00] GoingNative(); //Ale and Charles talk about the status of the VC++ 2012 CTP and introduce the show's topic,  the 3D Starter kit written by our guest, C++ developer Roberto Sonnino.
[02:55] Ale and Charles interview Roberto Sonnino about his 3D Starter Kit.
[30:16] ~GoingNative();// Ale and Charles destruct the show.

• [7:46] What were some of the challenges your team encountered early-on with developing secure apps for Windows 8.   
• [14:50] How did Microsoft IT discover these challenges?
• [17:05] What steps did your team take to circumvent these challenges?
• [25:30] What are some best practices you can share with us?

After watching this video, follow these next steps:

Step #1 – Download Windows Server 2012
Step #2 – Download Your FREE Copy of Hyper-V Server 2012
Step #3 – Start Your Free 90 Day Trial of Windows Azure

If you're interested in learning more about the products or solutions discussed in this episode, click on any of the below links for free, in-depth information:

Resources:

• Microsoft Virtual Academy
• Download Microsoft Private Cloud Evaluation Software

Websites & Blogs:

• Bob Hunt’s Blog
• Microsoft IT Showcase

Virtual Labs:

• TechNet Virtual Labs: System Center 2012

Follow @technetradio
Become a Fan @ facebook.com/MicrosoftTechNetRadio
Subscribe to our podcast via iTunes, Stitcher, or RSS

Next Steps:
Step #1 – Begin Your Windows Phone 8 App Adventure here 
Step #2 – Download the Windows Phone SDK

Subscribe to our podcast via iTunes or RSS

If you're interested in learning more about the products or solutions discussed in this episode, click on any of the below links for free, in-depth information:

Websites:

• Windows Phone 8 Dev Center

Blogs & Articles:

• Jerry Nixon’s Blog
• Daniel Egan’s Blog
• Ryan Lowdermilk’s Blog

Videos:

• Microsoft DevRadio: Using appMobi to Build Windows 8 & Windows Phone Apps
• Microsoft DevRadio: Creating Games for Windows 8 and Windows Phone using GameMaker Studio from YoYo Games

WP8 Emulator Skin Switcher

Change the look of your Windows Phone 8 emulator by using the WP8 Emulator Skin Switcher to make it look like a Nokia Lumia 920, HTC 8X or Samsung Ativ S.

The Windows Phone 8 Emulator Skin Switcher currently has 17 skins

• WVGA
• WP8 Default
• HTC 8S Blue
• HTC 8S Orange
• Nokia Lumia 820 Black
• Nokia Lumia 820 Cyan
• Nokia Lumia 820 Red
• Nokia Lumia 820 White
• Nokia Lumia 820 Yellow

• WXGA
• WP8 Default
• Nokia Lumia 920 Black
• Nokia Lumia 920 Grey
• Nokia Lumia 920 Red
• Nokia Lumia 920 White
• Nokia Lumia 920 Yellow

• 720p
• WP8 Default
• HTC 8X Black
• HTC 8X Blue
• HTC 8X Neon
• HTC 8X Red
• Samsung Ativ S

...

So now you can very quickly and easily skin your WP8 emulator to match your phone of choice.

Best of all? He released the source for it too!

That said, the source may or may not compile for you without some tweaking. With a little work I was able to get the latest, as of Saturday, January 12th, 2013, check-in to run for me.

First I fixed up the references (Nuget is your friend). Both Elysium and MvvmLight were on Nuget (and Elysium was in the packages.config, so you can use Nuget's Get on Build functionally to automagically download it)

The other thing I had to do was tweak the app.xaml.

Once I nuked the highlighted lines, the app run.

Before the edit;

And after... (yeah, it runs!