Great apps have a special ingredient to them that make them great – the experience of the app itself. Paul Laberge comes back to D³: LIVE & INTERACTiVE for a chat on what it takes to create great, but more importantly, consistent, app experiences.

Watch the new from this episode >>

D³: LIVE & INTERACTiVE    
Developers, Developers, Developers: LIVE & INTERACTIVE (D³) is a monthly show hosted by Jonathan Rozenblit. The show airs live every first Wednesday of the month at 12:00 PM ET and features the latest updates on what's new and exciting in the world of development; featured presentations; and guests. LIVE and INTERACTIVE means that you'll be part of the show – You're invited to interact with us; ask questions and get them answered; and share your thoughts and opinions.

Join the Canadian Developer Connection LinkedIn group  
Follow @devsdevdevs
Like D³ on Facebook
Subscribe to podcasts via iTunes, Zune, or RSS
Download the Canadian Developer Connection Windows Phone app

More D³: LIVE & INTERACTIVE >>

Today's project mixes Metro style app development, Portable Libraries, C#, F# and the always fun to play PacMan!

Pacman Tiles

Back in January I built a sample Pacman maze script in F# to use at a Pacman Kata evening with the F#unctional Londoners group. Coincidentally there’s another Coding Kata this Thursday 26th July at Skills Matter. Anyway a couple of weeks ago I started playing with the sample again on the train to and from work, filling in some of the gameplay.

You can play the latest version with your cursor keys and 9 lives below:

Windows 8

As the sample runs in Silverlight I thought I’d also try it out on it’s cousin WinRT. WinRT lets you build Metro apps on Windows 8. The transition code wise has been pretty straight forward and I now have a tile for the game appearing on my Windows 8 start page:

Multi-targeting

Multi-targeting Silverlight and WinRT is the route I decided to go down which allowed me to develop the game on my laptop running Windows 7 with Visual Studio 2010. Then I periodically tested it out on a desktop box running the Windows 8 Preview Release using Visual Studio 2012. Visual Studio 2012 does run on Windows 7, however WinRT does not.

The WinRT version of the app is implemented in F# and C#. The game part is written in F# as a portable library and the plumbing in C#. There’s a great walkthrough on Creating a Portable F# Library over on MSDN which describes this direction in some detail.

...

Full Source

The full source code to the game is publicly available on BitBucket:

• https://bitbucket.org/ptrelford/pacman

A single file playable script version is also available on F# Snippets:

• http://fssnip.net/cZ

One interesting thing was how it scaled. For example, here's the app snapped, where it remained fully playable;

Here's a snap of the Solution, showing off how F# and C# were mixed, using a Portable Library project.

One of the meta items in the project was how F# was used to generate the PacMan logo's/images.

#if INTERACTIVE
#r "System.Drawing.dll"
#endif

open System
open System.IO
open System.Drawing
open System.Drawing.Imaging

let drawPacman (bitmap:Bitmap, x:int, y:int, size:int) =
    let width, height = bitmap.Width, bitmap.Height
    let graphics = Graphics.FromImage(bitmap)
    do  graphics.Clear(Color.Black)
    graphics.FillEllipse(Brushes.Yellow,x,y,size,size)
    let points = 
        let right = x + size
        [|right,y + size/2 - size/4;right,y + size/2 + size/4; x + size/2, y + size/2|]
        |> Array.map (fun (x,y) -> PointF(float32 x,float32 y))
    graphics.FillPolygon(Brushes.Black,points)

open System.Windows.Forms

let show (bitmap:Bitmap) =
    let form = new Form()
    let box = new PictureBox(Image = bitmap)
    box.Width <- bitmap.Width
    box.Height <- bitmap.Height
    form.Width <- bitmap.Width
    form.Height <- bitmap.Height + 32
    form.Controls.Add(box)
    form.Show()

//let root = @"C:\Users\Moon\Documents\Visual Studio 2010\Projects\pacman\PacMan.Xaml\Assets\"
let root = @"C:\Users\Phil\Documents\Visual Studio 2012\Projects\pacman\PacMan.Xaml\Assets\"

do  // Logo
    
    let path =root + "Logo.png"
    let bitmap = new Bitmap(path)
    drawPacman(bitmap, 42, 38, 64)
    bitmap.Save("PacMan_Logo.png", ImageFormat.Png)

do  // SmallLogo
    let path = root + "SmallLogo.png"
    let bitmap = new Bitmap(path)
    drawPacman(bitmap, 3, 3, 24)
    bitmap.Save("PacMan_SmallLogo.png", ImageFormat.Png)

do  // StoreLogo
    let path = root + "StoreLogo.png"
    let bitmap = new Bitmap(path)
    drawPacman(bitmap, 5, 5, 40)
    bitmap.Save("PacMan_StoreLogo.png", ImageFormat.Png)

do  // SplashScreen
    let path = root + "SplashScreen.png"
    let bitmap = new Bitmap(path)
    drawPacman(bitmap, 200, 42, 214)
    bitmap.Save("PacMan_SplashScreen.png", ImageFormat.Png)

do  // Icon 16x16
    let bitmap = new Bitmap(16,16)
    drawPacman(bitmap, 1, 1, 14)
    bitmap.Save("Icon16x16.png", ImageFormat.Png)

do  // Icon 32x32
    let bitmap = new Bitmap(32,32)
    drawPacman(bitmap, 2, 2, 28)
    bitmap.Save("Icon32x32.png", ImageFormat.Png)

do  // Icon 48x48
    let bitmap = new Bitmap(48,48)
    drawPacman(bitmap, 3, 3, 42)
    bitmap.Save("Icon48x48.png", ImageFormat.Png)

do  // Icon 128x128
    let bitmap = new Bitmap(128,128)
    drawPacman(bitmap, 8, 8, 112)
    bitmap.Save("Icon128x128.png", ImageFormat.Png)
    show bitmap

Okay, what about for the non-Metro dev's? Well there's VS2010/SilverLight, Windows Phone and XAML fun for you too!

If you're looking to expand your development language repertoire and looking for fun way to do it, looking for examples of how to mix and match C# and F#, looking for examples of F# and SilverLight or finally F# in a Metro world, this project has all that and more...

ZDNet's All About Microsoft blog editor and frequent commentator on all things Microsoft, Mary Jo Foley, gives an industry take on the Developer Opportunity made possible with the recent announcements for Windows, Windows Phone, Windows Azure, and Visual Studio 2012. Plus: Mary Jo answers questions from the live chat and discussion on the Canadian Developer Connection LinkedIn group.

Watch the start of this conversation with Richard Campbell >>

Mary Jo Foley
Mary Jo Foley has been a tech journalist for more than 25 years. She has worked for a variety of tech publications and Web sites, including PCWeek/eWeek, CRN and ZDNet. She is the editor of the "All About Microsoft" blog on ZDNet, and the author of the book "Microsoft 2.0: How Microsoft Plans to Stay Relevant in the Post-Gates Era" (John Wiley & Sons). She also is the co-host of the Windows Weekly show on the TWiT network and a frequent commentator and speaker on all things Microsoft-related on TV, radio, podcasts and at industry events.

D³: LIVE & INTERACTiVE    
Developers, Developers, Developers: LIVE & INTERACTIVE (D³) is a monthly show hosted by Jonathan Rozenblit. The show airs live every first Wednesday of the month at 12:00 PM ET and features the latest updates on what's new and exciting in the world of development; featured presentations; and guests. LIVE and INTERACTIVE means that you'll be part of the show – You're invited to interact with us; ask questions and get them answered; and share your thoughts and opinions.

Join the Canadian Developer Connection LinkedIn group  
Follow @devsdevdevs
Like D³ on Facebook
Subscribe to podcasts via iTunes, Zune, or RSS
Download the Canadian Developer Connection Windows Phone app

More D³: LIVE & INTERACTIVE >>

Windows 8 HTML5 Metro Style App: How to create a small RSS reader in 30min (part 1/2)

Starting from scratch, we’re going to learn through these 2 tutorials how to build a small RSS reader with HTML5, CSS3 and WinJS, the Microsoft JavaScript framework for Windows 8 Metro Style Apps. We’ll try also to follow the Metro design guidelines by using Expression Blend 5. If everything goes fine, you should be able to follow these 2 articles in 30 minutes.

This first article will help you to create the welcome screen that will use a WinJS ListView control. This control will display all the blog posts recently published via nice thumbnails. The 2nd one will work on the detail view displayed when you’ll click on one of the items. At last, you’ll find a video at the end of this article playing in real-time the following steps as well as the final solution to download. See them as useful complementary resources if you need to clarify some parts of this article.

Pre-requisites: to follow these tutorials, you need first to:

1 – Download & install Windows 8 Release Preview on your machine: http://preview.windows.com
2 – Download & install Visual Studio 2012 RC Express for Windows 8: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/apps/br229516

Note: If you’ve got a Mac, it works perfectly fine thanks to BootCamp or inside a virtual machine handled by Parallels for instance

Note 2: this article has been updated on 04/06/2012 to implement the changes in the UI & in the code between Windows 8 Consumer Preview and the Release Preview. In a general manner, if you need to migrate your application to RP, you should read this document: breaking changes document. In our case, the only impact where on the way to handle the XML elements returned by the XHR request. We’ve changed the selectors to switch from XPath via selectNodes to CSS selectors style via querySelectorAll.

Here is a brief summary of what we’re going to see in this article:

- Step 1: creating a blank application
- Step 2: creating the HTML & CSS base of our main page
- Step 3: first contact with Blend
- Step 4: loading the data with XHR and bind them to the ListView control
- Step 5: using a template and modifying the design with Blend
- Step 6: video demonstrating all the steps & source code to download

Note: these tutorials are based on the Tools for building Metro style apps session of the BUILD delivered by Chris Sell & Kieran Mockford. I’ve simply updated it for Windows 8 RP.

...

Windows 8 HTML5 Metro Style App: How to create a small RSS reader in 30min (part 2/2)

We’re now going to see how to display the details of each article. We will use for that a transition animation, we will play with the simulator and we will continue to discover Blend to use CSS3 Multi-columns for instance.

Like in the previous article, you’ll find a video as well as the source code to download at the end of the article.

This article is the second part of this one: Windows 8 HTML5 Metro Style App: How to create a small RSS reader in 30min (part 1/2)

During this article, we’ll see:

- Step 1: using the simulator
- Step 2: displaying the articles’ details
- Step 3: finishing the design of the detail view with Blend
- Step 4: video and source code to download

...

If you're thinking about Windows 8 HTML5 Metro app development this two part walk through might be the ticket to help you move from thinking to doing...

The Metro interface has the potential to change how a lot of people use computers. You've started seeing it in the Windows Phone. More if you have downloaded the Windows 8 consumer preview. In this session, we will demonstrate how the power exposed by Metro (through live tiles, push notifications, immersive user experiences, etc.) can be harnessed to provide a usable and intuitive application.

This Session's Experts

Atley Hunter (Twitter, LinkedIn, Blog)

This session was recorded live at ObjectSharp's annual "At The Movies" event - May 1, 2012, Scotiabank Theatre, Toronto, Ontario.

• [0:41] Announcing MSDN Profile Integration (Geoffrey, karstenj, Mike Sampson)
• [1:26] .NET 4.5 Improvements for Cloud and Server Applications (Soma Somasegar)
• [2:27] My Favorite Features: Improved Tooling in Visual Studio 11 for JavaScript Developers (Jason Zander)
• [5:29] Microsoft Visual Studio 11 Beta SDK
• [5:50] ASP.NET Web API: Introducing IApiExplorer/ApiExplorer (Yao)
• [7:23] Being productive when your Win8 Metro app is offscreen (Hari Pulapaka)
• [8:58] Windows 8 Camp in a Box, Consumer Preview Edition, http://devcamps.ms/windows 
• [10:12] Array Visualizer VS Extension (Amir Liberman)
• [11:39] Microsoft Research Face SDK Beta for Windows Phone [Found Via: Alvin Ashcraft's Morning Dew - Dew Drop – May 16, 2012 (#1,328)]

Picks of the Week!

• Brian's Pick of the Week:[12:35] Pixar studio stories - The movie vanishes (full)
• Dan's Pick of the Week:[13:54] Building Battling Bots with DumbBots.Net

Live Q&A with Bruce Johnson and Atley Hunter.

WIN280 - Metro in Windows 8 and Windows Phone (Part 1)
The Metro interface has the potential to change how a lot of people use computers. You've already seen a little of it in the Windows Phone. More if you have downloaded the Windows 8 consumer preview. In this session, we will demonstrate how the power exposed by Metro (through live tiles, push notifications, immersive user experiences, etc.) can be harnessed to provide a usable and intuitive application.

Watch >>

This Session's Experts

Barry Gervin (Twitter, LinkedIn, Blog)
Bruce Johnson (Twitter, LinkedIn, Blog)
Atley Hunter (Twitter, LinkedIn, Blog)

This TechDays TV Q&A session was recorded live May 8, 2012.

The Metro interface has the potential to change how a lot of people use computers. You've already seen a little of it in the Windows Phone. More if you have downloaded the Windows 8 consumer preview. In this session, we will demonstrate how the power exposed by Metro (through live tiles, push notifications, immersive user experiences, etc.) can be harnessed to provide a usable and intuitive application.

Watch the Live Q&A interview with Bruce Johnson and Atley Hunter >>

This Session's Experts

Barry Gervin (Twitter, LinkedIn, Blog)
Bruce Johnson (Twitter, LinkedIn, Blog)
Atley Hunter (Twitter, LinkedIn, Blog)

This session was recorded live at ObjectSharp's annual "At The Movies" event - May 1, 2012, Scotiabank Theatre, Toronto, Ontario.

To learn more about the theme and download it, read the blog post.

This project had me at "... includes binaries of Ogre, FreeImage, Hydrax and SkyX for x64, x86 and ARM in both Debug and Release flavors and is configured to automatically link the right versions of those libraries"...

Ogre 1.8.0 RC1 for WinRT/Metro

...

Ogre 3D

Thanks to Eugene’s work on porting Ogre to WinRT/Metro all I had to do was pick up his changes, reapply them to my sources and generate projects via Visual C++ 11 Beta (CMake is great and all that, but I already had some projects from my Mogre builds and wanted to customize a few things). The ARM debug build was a bit tricky, I had to use LTCG just so the linker wouldn’t blow up from the size of the object files.

In the end I managed to build a working set of Ogre WinRT binaries:

You can download a minimal example application that will compile and run out-of-the-box as long as you have the Windows 8 Consumer Preview and Visual Studio 11 Beta installed. It includes binaries of Ogre, FreeImage, Hydrax and SkyX for x64, x86 and ARM in both Debug and Release flavors and is configured to automatically link the right versions of those libraries.

Download

Ogre-1.8.0-RC1-WinRT-VS11Beta-Demo.7z^{(29.6 MiB)}

Ogre-1.8.0-RC1-WinRT-VS11Beta-Sources-and-Patches.7z^{(82.6 MiB)}

Requires Windows 8 Consumer Preview and Visual Studio 11 Beta (I’m running the Express edition, but have Professional installed also, so it may or may not work with Express alone). The Demo package contains the example project and all compiled Ogre DLLs you need to get going. The Sources-and-Patches package contains the Ogre source code and is useful if you want to compile and debug Ogre yourself.

Status

As you probably already know if you’re interested in WinRT development, many of the Windows API methods are not accessible to WinRT applications. Visual C++ 11 Beta helps you by removing forbidden API methods if you compile a WinRT project, and to detect things such as linking to a non-WinRT DLL that uses forbidden API methods, the Windows App Certification Kit is used. If you submit anything to the Windows Store, Microsoft will do its own checks, which at the very least include running the Windows App Certification Kit. If that fails, your app will not be accepted.

...

The current Ogre WinRT build passes validation with these exceptions:

• PluginCgProgramManager uses NVidia’s CG toolkit. You can use it for development, but your final product must not load or use this plugin
• RenderSystemDirect3D11 relies on D3DCompiler_44.dll, which is not WinRT-clean. We have to see whether Microsoft provides an HLSL compiler that can be used from WinRT or if we need to compile all shaders ahead of time and only ship their compiled versions.

Metro, like it or not, is the next frontier for many and while we'll be seeing a bunch of "normal" app's on it, I dig the thought of seeing app's built with Orge and the like... Talk about pushing the edges of Metro...

It's exciting times for software developers, with the beta release of Visual Studio 11 and the .NET Framework 4.5. In addition, the Windows 8 Consumer Preview and associated tools to create stunning new apps are here! There's so much new in the Visual Studio tooling, it's hard to know where to start! In this session, you'll walk through the new IDE, new application models and designers, and new language capabilities that give developers incredible productivity enhancements and let them quickly build the next generation of their applications.

This Session's Experts

Adam Gallant (Twitter, LinkedIn, Blog)

This session was recorded live on TechDays TV - March 27, 2012. Join host Jonathan Rozenblit every 2nd and 4th Tuesday at 12:00 PM EST for live TechDays presentations on the very latest in technical training topics.

• [1:03] Microsoft Visual Studio Team Foundation Server 11 Beta Power Tools, Microsoft Visual Studio Team Foundation Server 11 Beta Build Extensions, Microsoft Visual Studio Team Foundation Server 11 Beta MSSCCI Provider 32-bit, Microsoft Visual Studio Team Foundation Server 11 Beta MSSCCI Provider 64-bit
• [2:08] Visual Studio 11 Beta Performance Part #3 [Debugging] (Visual Studio Blog)
• [3:49] Features NO ONE NOTICED in Visual Studio 11 Express Beta for Web (Scott Hanselman
• [6:12] Channel 9 Highlight: Visual Studio Toolbox: Help Viewer Enhancements in Visual Studio 11 (Robert Green, Paul O'Rear)
• [7:30] Insider’s view: Authoring XAML-based Metro style apps in Blend Beta (Joanna)
• [8:05] Combining XAML and DirectX (Windows 8 app developer blog)
• [9:19] Keeping apps fast and fluid with asynchrony in the Windows Runtime (Windows 8 app developer blog
• [11:15] Metro Nuggets: Async is your friend (Jay Kimble)
• [11:51] WordPress.com for Windows 8 (Matt Thomas)
• [13:03] Mouse Fast Scroll & Mouse Navigation (Sam Harwell)
• [14:03] Model-View-ViewModel (MVVM) Applications: General Introduction (Ivo Manolov)
• [15:03] 30 Days to Learn jQuery (Jeffrey Way) [Found via: Free Online-Tutorial "30 Days to Learn jQuery"]
• [15:50] Techdays 2012 the Netherlands - Being Agile across Technology Borders (Martin Woodward)

Picks of the Week!

• Brian's Pick of the Week: [16:34] The Future of CodePlex is Bright
• Daniel's Pick of the Week: [17:47] [1:33] Watch “@home with Windows Azure” on Channel 9 and Learn About Windows Azure While Contributing to Scientific Research (Himanshu Singh), @home with Windows Azure - Part 1 (of 4) - Getting Your Windows Azure 90-day FREE Trial Account, @home with Windows Azure - Part 2 (of 4) - Setting Up The @home with Windows Azure App, @home with Windows Azure - Part 3 (of 4) - Configuring Windows Azure Storage, @home with Windows Azure - Part 4 (of 4) - Deploying To Windows Azure (Brian Hitney, Jim O'Neil, and Peter Laudati)

One of the promises of developing for Windows 8 is that you can build locally installed and executed HTML5/JavaScript based applications. These are not "web" pages morphed into an app somehow, or a link to a page running on a server somewhere, but a fully fledged app. One way to think about it is that HTML5 is the UI language (i.e. like XAML) and JavaScript is the programming language (like C++, C#, VB.Net, etc).

So what would such a game or app look like? Lets take a peek at a recently released "end to end" sample that's released by Windows SDK team...

Metro style JavaScript and HTML5 game sample

This sample shows how to design a basic casual game in HTML5, from end-to-end. The game included in the sample is deliberately simple to minimize distractions from game logic intended to be replaced.

Specifically, this sample covers:

• Setting up draw and update loops
• Handling snapped view
• Suspend and resume behaviors
• Asset loading and audio playback
• Roaming application data and settings
• Handling touch events

This sample also demonstrates App Bar integration, accessed by swiping up with a touch gesture from the bottom edge of the screen. The main navigation elements of the sample are available there. Additionally, when on the game screen there are game-specific commands for starting a new game or pausing the game. It also demonstrates integration with the Share Contract, accessed via the Charms Bar when you select a score on the high scores table. Lastly, settings for the sample are available via integration with the Settings Contract via the Charms Bar.

This sample is written in Metro style JavaScript and HTML5.

For more information about the concepts and APIs demonstrated in this sample, see the following topics:

• Tutorial: create a basic JavaScript game
• Prepare your development environment for JavaScript game development
• Creating a Metro style JavaScript game

Note The Windows Samples Gallery contains a variety of code samples that exercise the various new programming models, platforms, features, and components available in Windows 8 Consumer Preview and/or Windows Server 8 Beta. These downloadable samples are provided as compressed ZIP files that contain a Visual Studio solution (SLN) file for the sample, along with the source files, assets, resources, and metadata necessary to successfully compile and run the sample. For more information about the programming models, platforms, languages, and APIs demonstrated in this sample, please refer to the guidance, tutorials, and reference topics provided in the Windows 8 documentation available in the Windows Developer Center. This sample is provided as-is in order to indicate or demonstrate the functionality of the programming models and feature APIs for Windows 8 and/or Windows Server 8 Beta. Please provide feedback on this sample!

To obtain an evaluation copy of Windows 8, go to Windows 8.

To obtain an evaluation copy of Microsoft Visual Studio 11 Beta, go to Visual Studio 11 Beta.

...

So lets see a few snaps of this Project. Here's the Solution;

The project the debugging capabilities you'd expect, break points, etc.

Here's a snap of the UI language (i.e. the HTML page).

One feature that's pretty neat is that you can run this app on the local machine, i.e. it installs and runs on the machine, using the resolution, etc. of that machine. Or the cool part is that you can run it in the simulator, where you can control much more of the runtime environment. For example, you can easily change the simulator screen to portrait;

You can tweak the simulator screen resolution, the location services, take screenshots, simulate touch, and more.

Here's some snaps of the game itself (remember it's supposed to be simple to allow the focusing on what was being shown in the sample and not on the game itself);

If you're looking for a functioning Metro game, a sample written with HTML5/JavaScript, something to check out the sharing contracts, looking to see how touch and drawing loops work, this sample is just a download away...

Join us on this special event with our guest speaker: Michael Platt, Senior Director in the Developer & Platform Evangelism Group based in Redmond, Washington.

Audience: Developers, Startups and entrepreneurs.

Agenda of this Camp:

Building Metro-style Apps for Windows 8

• The Windows 8 Platform for Metro Style App
• Designing Apps with Metro Principles and the Windows Personality
• Everything Web Developers Must Know to Build Metro Style Apps
• Building Metro Style Apps with XAML: What .NET Developers Need to Know
• Building Windows 8 Metro Style UIs

About this Video:

Michael Platt Introduce the Windows 8 Store and the Opportunity for the Developers.

Join us on this special event with our guest speaker: Michael Platt, Senior Director in the Developer & Platform Evangelism Group based in Redmond, Washington.

Audience: Developers, Startups and entrepreneurs.

Agenda of this Camp:

Building Metro-style Apps for Windows 8

• The Windows 8 Platform for Metro Style App
• Designing Apps with Metro Principles and the Windows Personality
• Everything Web Developers Must Know to Build Metro Style Apps
• Building Metro Style Apps with XAML: What .NET Developers Need to Know
• Building Windows 8 Metro Style UIs

About this Video:

Michael Platt Explains how to develop Windows 8 Metro-style apps using C#, XAML & WinRT

Join us on this special event with our guest speaker: Michael Platt, Senior Director in the Developer & Platform Evangelism Group based in Redmond, Washington.

Audience: Developers, Startups and entrepreneurs.

Agenda of this Camp:

Building Metro-style Apps for Windows 8

• The Windows 8 Platform for Metro Style App
• Designing Apps with Metro Principles and the Windows Personality
• Everything Web Developers Must Know to Build Metro Style Apps
• Building Metro Style Apps with XAML: What .NET Developers Need to Know
• Building Windows 8 Metro Style UIs

About this Video:

Michael Platt Explains how to Design a Metro-style apps for Windows 8 using all the tools that the Windows 8  platform if offers to the developers.

Join us on this special event with our guest speaker: Michael Platt, Senior Director in the Developer & Platform Evangelism Group based in Redmond, Washington.

Audience: Developers, Startups and entrepreneurs.

Agenda of this Camp:

Building Metro-style Apps for Windows 8

• The Windows 8 Platform for Metro Style App
• Designing Apps with Metro Principles and the Windows Personality
• Everything Web Developers Must Know to Build Metro Style Apps
• Building Metro Style Apps with XAML: What .NET Developers Need to Know
• Building Windows 8 Metro Style UIs

About this Video:

Michael Platt  Introduce the Windows 8 Platform for Metro Style Apps Explains how to build Metro-style apps for Windows 8.

Join us on this special event with our guest speaker: Michael Platt, Senior Director in the Developer & Platform Evangelism Group based in Redmond, Washington.

Audience: Developers, Startups and entrepreneurs.

Agenda of this Camp:

Building Metro-style Apps for Windows 8

• The Windows 8 Platform for Metro Style App
• Designing Apps with Metro Principles and the Windows Personality
• Everything Web Developers Must Know to Build Metro Style Apps
• Building Metro Style Apps with XAML: What .NET Developers Need to Know
• Building Windows 8 Metro Style UIs

About this Video:

on this video you will meet Soluto, one of the most successful start-ups in Israel.
Soluto is a service for people who help others with their PCs and their Metro-Style version of thier application is great example of what can be done with Windows 8 Platform.

The Windows Phone 7 Jump Start video training is for all developers interested in developing applications or games for the new Windows Phone 7 Platform. The ~14 ½ hour course is based on the Microsoft Windows Phone 7 Developer Training Kit and taught by Microsoft MVP's and Microsoft Press Authors, Andy Wigley and Rob S. Miles. The Designing for Windows Phone 7 session is taught my Microsoft Design experts, Jon Harris and Bryan Agnetta. The training is wrapped up with an audio podcast with a panel of Microsoft experts answering the questions posed throughout the training.

Watch these entertaining sessions and complete the labs found on Channel 9 (http://channel9.msdn.com/learn/courses/WP7TrainingKit/) to gain development skills using both Microsoft XNA and Microsoft Silverlight.

For copies of the student files and links to demo code, you can go to the Windows Phone 7 Born To Learn Forum (http://borntolearn.mslearn.net/wp7/m/default.aspx).

Updated! Session 1: Introduction
Session 2: Building a Silverlight Application, Part 1
Session 3: Building a Silverlight Application, Part 2
Updated! Session 4: The Application Bar
Session 5: Building XNA Games for the Windows Phone 7 Platform, Part 1
Session 6: Building XNA Games for the Windows Phone 7 Platform, Part 2
Updated! Session 7: Isolation Storage
Updated! Session 8: The Application Lifecycle
Updated! Session 9: Launchers and Choosers
Updated! Session 10: Push Notifications
Session 11: Marketing your Windows Phone Applications
Session 12: Working with Media

New Sessions:
Session 13: Panorama and Pivots
Session 14: XNA Deep Dive, Part 1
Session 15: XNA Deep Dive, Part 2
Session 16: Location and Bing Maps
Session 17: Optimizing for Performance
Session 18: Designing Apps Using Expression Blend & Metro
Session 19: Ask the Experts podcast

Windows Phone 7 Design Principles

Windows Phone 7 brings a radically new approach to user interface to the phone. In this session we’ll discuss how you can utilize this approach in your application design, enabling the delivery of powerful user experiences that integrate tightly with the overall look and feel of “Metro,” the codename for the Windows Phone design system.

Speakers: Kat Holmes and Karen Davis