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Browsing posts in: Windows 10

Getting Started with Windows Template Studio

Microsoft has for a long time been pioneering developer tooling with Visual Studio as the main backbone of the effort. The investment continues and is not likely to ever stop. For this reason, change is necessary and some tools will disappear as their use becomes less, and new ones will appear. This article was first published on gooroo.io

Developers are always looking for shortcuts to make their programming more efficient and let them focus on the fun bits. Deep down inside developers are lazy people that don’t want to do boring work. Repetitive work. About a year ago I finished a Pluralsight course on building your first Universal Windows App, which aimed to give developers a great shortcut for building apps for Windows 10. It took me three goes to finish the course (Microsoft kept moving the goal posts), but I was happy with the result. The course focused on using App Studio, which essentially is a code completion tool. A tool that generated really well structured and usable code, meant to be extended and built on top of. And now App Studio has received the death sentence. Slowly being moved to the drawer of broken dreams.

Instead we now have Windows Template Studio

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Holographic Programming: a HoloLens How-to in a Mixed Reality World

Most people are aware of virtual reality (VR) and to a lesser extent augmented reality (AR). I the last couple of years a new digital reality, mixed reality (MR), has emerged with Microsoft and their HoloLens as the front runner. I have been absolutely blown away by the capabilities and promise of the technology, hence the activity in the form of blog posts, conference talks, workshops and Pluralsight courses. This article explains the various digital realities and was first published by Pluralsight.

In the last couple of years, digital realities have become a more and more stable part of the software landscape. While these technologies aren’t as mainstream as apps for your iPhone or a website for your favorite pizza place, they certainly are pushing their way forward and popping up their digitally distorted face in all kinds of places. Companies like Oculus, Facebook, Google and Microsoft are all heavily involved in developing digital realities for the future of computing. We are talking billions of dollars invested in these projects, which mean as developers and consumers, we should take these products and technologies seriously. They aren’t going anywhere.

However, they aren’t all created equal. In particular, there are three main areas of digital reality.

 Digital Realities

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Microsoft Ignite AU 2017 – A Recap

I have just returned from a 3,200km round trip to the Gold Coast to attend the yearly Microsoft Ignite conference (formerly known as Tech Ed). I had only done that drive once before, in the opposite direction, and this time I took the family along. Normally you would fly this distance, so it was a great opportunity to see a tiny bit of the enormous country I live in.

Route to Ignite

It is a long drive up there, but at least we had some great places to stop on the way. It took us two and a bit days to do the drive, but the breaks were just bearable.

Razorback

Enough about the journey. This is a recap of the return of Microsoft Ignite after more than a year off the events calendar. If you aren’t familiar with Microsoft Ignite Australia, it is the premier Australian Microsoft event of the year, traditionally held on the Gold Coast in Australia. It is of course a very corporate event, but it does showcase all the latest and greatest in the world of Microsoft. Most of the great Aussie speakers in the space are there and the content and quality is always top notch. I do enjoy going there. Continue Reading



Lenovo Yoga 900 – A Truly Mobile Workhorse

I am not a hardware guy. I appreciated a great graphics card when I played games on a regular basis, but with an Xbox One and PlayStation 3, this need quickly went away. As long as the machine will do the job and let me use Visual Studio, Chrome, Camtasia, Snagit, video editing software and other developer tools I am happy. I was using my “Dellasaurus”, a 6 year old Dell XPS 1645, which was top of the line when it came out. I even bought it secondhand of a good friend when he upgraded and I still used it for about 2.5 years. However, in the last couple of years I have been travelling a lot, presenting at various conferences and combined with being a freelance consultant I carry my laptop around everywhere. And the Dell was heavy! It was also starting to slow down considerably and I was constantly running out of storage. It was time to upgrade my mobile office.

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Windows 10 for Mobile – The Full Experience

[This article was first posted on gooroo.io]

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Recently Microsoft announced they intended to cut some 7800 jobs, mainly from their acquired Nokia division. While these are real jobs and I have full sympathy for the people that are about to lose their position, it was also a necessary step for Microsoft to not get stuck in the past and continue to move forward. Unfortunately, the way it was announced by the tech giant was unfortunate and quite poorly handled. If you think that Windows Phone is dead and there will be no Microsoft mobile experience, you couldn’t be more wrong. Pure and simple.

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Pluralsight Webinar – Building Apps for Windows 10

You might be aware that Windows 10 has launched to the world and that Microsoft’s servers are being hammered from millions of people wanting to get the best Windows ever. Yes, I am biased because I have seen the development of the OS over the last 9 months, and I think Microsoft has got most things right (don’t get me started on setting default applications though).

With Windows 10 they are launching the Universal Windows Platform, allowing developers to target all Windows devices with a single app. This means you can target anything from phones to desktop to Xbox, even HoloLens with the same app.

UWP

I proposed to Pluralsight to do a Windows 10 webinar a few months back, and what do you know! Microsoft decided to launch Windows 10 on the date we had already set. It is a sign! I have done a few talks on the topic already, but I am hugely excited about Universal Apps and the promise they give, not the least the Universal App Bridges, which lets iOS and Android developers bring their code to the platform too.

The full length webinar is posted below for your enjoyment. Please post any questions in the comments below and I will answer each and every one of them.

 


Pluralsight Webinar – Building Windows Apps for Windows 10

It comes as no surprise to those who now me and read this blog that I have a soft spot for all things Windows development (well, most things at least). I have teed up with Pluralsight to present an online live webinar of all the ways you and build Windows apps. It will be an overview of how easy it is and how varied a skill set is now catered for. You will be surprised how much Microsoft loves everyone now.

webinar-poster

 

The webinar takes place at 1 p.m., July 28th USA Pacific/ 6 a.m., July 29th AEST (yep, I am getting up early for you guys).

 

The event is completely free and you can sign up here now.

 


NDC Oslo Talk – Universal Windows Apps [VIDEO]

Last week I presented in Oslo on the new backbone of Windows 10 app development – Universal Windows Apps. The talk touched on all of the new initiatives coming out of Microsoft relating to building apps that run on anything from phones to IoT devices to HoloLens. You can even use your iOS objective C code and Android java code to create apps for the Windows eco-system.

The video is below. I hope you enjoy the session and the free bad jokes.

Universal Windows Apps – Develop for all Sizes – Lars Klint from NDC Conferences on Vimeo.