Jocelyn Villaraza

[slideshare id=3784514&doc=silverlight4-riaction-100420005059-phpapp02] I’ve also included the code for demo that we built during the session. You’ll need VS 2010 and/or Expression Blend 4 RC. Download the code here.

Visual Studio 2010 announcements and impact on MPN – This is a very good resource that describes the changes that this launch will bring to the Microsoft Partner Network, in terms of SKUs that Certified/Gold Certified ISVs (and other partners) will receive the the Microsoft Partner network. In summary: Download the deck for details: Visual Studio 2010 announcements and impact on MPN

Microsoft has just launched the new “Windows 7 Buyer’s Guide” at http://www.microsoft.com/licensing/about-licensing/windows7.aspx. This is a recommended tool for those of you guys in the ISV Royalty Program and all Volume Licensing customers as your first stop for Windows 7 questions related to basic licensing, product keys, activation, or configuration including XP Mode and virtualization. Benefits Designed to reduce CS costs through helping customers self-service their basic questions Streamline and speed the pre-sales experience for upgrading Windows customers Provides customer service agents with a single “how to buy” resource to support Volume Licensing customers with Windows 7 Check it out at http://www.microsoft.com/licensing/about-licensing/windows7.aspx

I was reading through the UI Design and Interaction Guide for Windows Phone 7 Series and found out that there is currently no panoramic application template or control provided as part of the standard application platform. Nothing stops us from creating our own though. To make things easier, I’ve made a behavior library for everyone to use that will handle flick gestures. I’ve also included a “GoToNextState” behavior which I based on http://gallery.expression.microsoft.com/en-us/MIXBehaviorPack. If you want to follow along, you’ll need to download my behavior library. Also, if you don’t know where to get the Blend bits, check out this post: http://electricbeach.org/?p=460 So, let’s start by creating a new Windows Phone Application project in Blend 4. ...

I’ve been starting to explore iPhone development lately. At first I was taking my time at learning at Objective C which went fine for a while but one of the guys on the project was asking if I could help build some apps for Project Nimbus, translation: build stuff fast. We talked about MonoTouch.NET which is basically a framework that will allow you to code apps with .NET. JOY!! First a quick intro about Project Nimbus: as Chewy would put it, it’s basically a supermarket for data here in Singapore. The team is hard at work at securing data from all sorts of providers. They currently have Hungry Go Where, Land Transport Authority, National Environment Agency, and National Library Board onboard as data providers, and i know they have quite a few more coming. What this means for developers is that if they have a great idea, they don’t have to go out by themselves with these big agencies and possibly spend tons of money on acquiring the data. If you want to find out more, check out http://projectnimbus.org/about/ for more information. They also very keen on getting input from developers as to what types of data they think would be useful, as well as feedback on the project as well. If you’re interested, the about page has a link to contact them :) So back to my application. Right now, I’m figuring out how to actually get the data from the service. Looking at this entry, they actually provide a link to the data that’s returned when you make a call to the service. Check out the post, and towards the end, you’ll find a few links that shows how the data looks like. First we create a webrequest to the URL that gives me the dataset we want. In this case, we want to get access to the NowcastSet i.e. current weather. The service actually gets authentication from the headers so we add these two keys & values. We then make the request and read it into a string for parsing later on. ...

Summary What: Microsoft sponsored certification for Managed ISVs in Singapore When: Promotion runs until June 30, 2010 Details In an effort to encourage skills upgrading, we’re launching the Get Trained and Get Certified promotion exclusively for developers in our Managed ISV program where we’ll pay for your certification. All you have to do is take any 3 trainings from the sources below, send me information on the trainings you’ve taken and we’ll send you your details on how to get certified for free. Online Sources: Partner Learning Center at the Microsoft Partner Network (formerly Microsoft Partner Program) https://training.partner.microsoft.com/learning/ Sign in with the live ID associated with your company and register for trainings online. We have a huge catalog of live webcasts as well as on demand webcasts that you can search through for topics that are relevant to your projects. Channel 9 Learning Center http://channel9.msdn.com/learn/courses/ A free for all resource for technical training on the latest products from Microsoft including : Windows Azure Platform, Office 2010, SharePoint 2010, Silverlight 4 and Visual Studio 2010 Hands On Labs: Microsoft Innovation Centre Hands-On Labs Keep an eye on this site for announcements on hands-on labs for Microsoft sponsored trainings for partners. Courses held at Certified Partner for Learning Solutions Partners http://www.microsoft.com/singapore/learning/cpls.mspx Trainings you attend on your own or with company support at any of our CPLS partners above will count to your credit as well. Do note that our CPLS partners such as Avantus Training participate in funding schemes through IDA’s CITREP (Critical Infocomm Technology Resource Programme) that will subsidize training fees for your developers as well. All you need to do is take 3 trainings from any of the sources above, send the following information to sgisv@microsoft.com and we’ll give you a voucher to take your next Microsoft Certification Exam for free. Training Title: Date Completed: Training details (url / source / venue): Training Title: Date Completed: Training details (url / source / venue): Training Title: Date Completed: Training details (url / source / venue): This offer is exclusive to developers in Managed ISVs so do send us the above information through your company email address.

I realize that not a lot of people have heard about the ISV Royalty Program here in Singapore. The program is available to ISVs and what this allows you to do is license Microsoft products as part of your unified solution, that way, you can be your customers one stop shop for getting your software as well as the Microsoft licenses required to run it. There are 2 license types offered: ...