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The Easiest Path to Windows 8: HTML + CSS + JavaScript
Last updated: Monday, June 6, 2022
Published in: CODE Magazine: 2013 - March/April
Sometimes it happens that a new version of an operating system introduces a new type of application completely incompatible with older versions of the same system. The last time it happened I think it was with Windows 95. More than 15 years later, Windows 8 comes with support for a completely new segment of applications named Windows Store apps.
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The Skeptical Coder: Fixing Windows 8 and WinRT
Last updated: Wednesday, June 8, 2022
Published in: CODE Magazine: 2013 - March/April
Here’s a bit of news for you: Despite all the criticism and despite all the naysayers, Windows 8 is actually a very good operating system. Improvements to the desktop are good and welcome. A lot of the underlying tech for WinRT is quite impressive. Microsoft should be applauded for their willingness to invent and change. However, because of a long list of puzzling decisions, and due to a lack of polish and packaging, Windows 8 just doesn’t add up to a good product that serves all the market segments it aims to serve. That’s a tall order, of course, but anything less has to be seen as a dramatic failure for any version of the Windows operating system.
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A Windows 8 Look and Feel for WPF, Part 2
Last updated: Thursday, June 9, 2022
Published in: CODE Magazine: 2013 - January/February
In part 1 of this article, you learned how to create a Windows 8 look and feel for your WPF applications. You were shown a high-level overview of the various components that made up the shell for navigating. In part 2 of this article you will learn to create a WPF Button user control, a Message Box you can style, and a simple Message Broker System. All of these components are used to create the “Windows 8 Style” WPF shell you learned about in part 1.
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Converting XAML-Based Applications to Windows 8
Last updated: Tuesday, February 19, 2019
Published in: VFP Conversion Papers, Markus Egger Talks Tech, CODE Magazine: 2012 - July/August
The big news about Windows 8 is its new mode based on the Metro design language and UI paradigm. Metro apps are based on the new WinRT (Windows Runtime) and can be built in two distinct ways. One utilizes HTML5 and JavaScript, while the other uses XAML for the user interface definition and C#, Visual Basic, or native C++ as the language behind the scenes. Not surprisingly, the later has often been compared to other XAML-based setups, in particular Silverlight, but also WPF. After all, “XAML is XAML,” the reasoning goes, so it should not be difficult to move both WPF/Silverlight skills as well as actual applications into the new world of WinRT. But is that really so?
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Intro to Metro
Last updated: Wednesday, February 20, 2019
Published in: CODE Magazine: 2012 - July/August
Ten years after the release of the .NET Framework, Microsoft is stirring the pot again with a new development platform that set’s to focus your talents on what everyone is betting is the next big thing, mobile devices; specifically in this case, tablets. The Windows Runtime, or WinRT, is the foundation for the development of applications designed to target Windows 8-driven touch-enabled devices, but what does that mean for .NET developers and their existing skill sets?
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An Overview of Go in Five Examples - Chapter 1
Last updated: Thursday, February 21, 2019
Published in: Book Excerpts
By Mark Summerfield, Published May 4, 2012 by Addison-Wesley Professional. Part of the Developer's Library series. Copyright 2012 Book ISBN-10: 0-321-77463-9 ISBN-13: 978-0-321-77463-7. Mark Summerfield provides a series of five explained examples of the Go programming language. Although the examples are tiny, each of them (apart from "hello who?") does something useful, and between them they provide a rapid overview of Go's key features and some of its key packages.