Building Windows 8 Apps with C# and XAML

by Jeremy Likness

Overview

“Jeremy builds real apps for real customers. That’s why I can heartily recommend this book. Go out and write some great apps…and keep this book handy.”
—From the Foreword by Jeff Prosise

Build Exceptionally Immersive and Responsive Touch-Based Windows Store Apps for Windows 8 with C# and XAML

This is the first practical guide to building breakthrough applications for Windows 8 from project templates through publication to the new Windows Store. Microsoft “MVP of the Year” Jeremy Likness helps you combine your existing developer skills with new Visual Studio 2012 tools and best practices to create apps that are intuitive and innovative. His guidance and insight will help you dive into Windows 8 development—and gain a powerful competitive advantage for years to come.

Likness illuminates the entire apps lifecycle, from planning and Model-View-View Model (MVVM) based design through coding, testing, packaging, and deployment. He covers both business and consumer apps, showing how Windows 8/WinRT development builds upon and contrasts with older WPF and Silverlight approaches.

Using carefully crafted downloadable code examples and sample projects, Likness shows how to make the most of new platform features, including integrated social networking, search, contracts, charms, and tiles. Throughout, he addresses crucial development challenges that have only been discussed on MSDN, blog posts, and Twitter feeds—and never with this depth and clarity before.

Coverage includes
• Mastering real-world Windows 8 development for all devices and form factors • Understanding the new WinRT framework and the unique characteristics of Windows 8 apps
• Designing apps that are faster, more responsive, do more with less, and maximize battery life
• Creating exceptionally fluid interfaces with VS 2012 templates, built-in animations, and XAML
• Building apps that respond consistently to multiple forms of input, including complex touch manipulations
• Using contracts and charms to expose services or enable users to do so
• Providing information to users through Live Tiles even when your app isn’t running
• Connecting your app seamlessly to multiple data sources, including social networks and cloud storage
• Syndicating rich, network-based content
• Using Model-View-ViewModel (MVVM)
• Securing Windows 8 apps through authentication and authorization
• Efficiently testing, debugging, packaging, and deploying apps

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780132982450
Publisher:	Pearson Education
Publication date:	10/25/2012
Series:	Microsoft Windows Development Series
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	384
File size:	39 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Jeremy Likness is a principal consultant at Wintellect, LLC. He has worked with enterprise applications for more than 20 years, 15 of those focused on web-based applications using the Microsoft stack. An early adopter of Silverlight 3.0, he worked on countless enterprise Silverlight solutions, including the back-end health monitoring system for the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics and Microsoft’s own social network monitoring product called “Looking Glass.” He is both a consultant and project manager at Wintellect and works closely with Fortune 500 companies, including Microsoft. He is a three-year Microsoft MVP and was declared MVP of the Year in 2010. He has also received Microsoft’s Community Contributor award for his work with Silverlight. Jeremy is the author of Designing Silverlight Business Applications: Best Practices for Using Silverlight Effectively in the Enterprise (Addison-Wesley). Jeremy regularly speaks, contributes articles, and blogs on topics of interest to the Microsoft developer community. His blog can be found at http://csharperimage.jeremylikness.com.

Table of Contents

   Foreword     xv
   Preface     xix
Chapter 1  The New Windows Runtime     1
Looking Back: Win32 and .NET     2
Looking Forward: Rise of the NUI     8
Introducing the Windows Store Application     12
   Windows 8 Design     14
   Fast and Fluid     15
   Snap and Scale     15
   Use of Right Contracts     16
   Great Tiles     17
   Connected and Alive     19
   Embrace Windows 8 Design Principles     19
Windows 8 Tools of the Trade     19
   Blend for Visual Studio     20
   HTML5 and JavaScript     21
   C++ and XAML     23
   VB/C# and XAML     24
Behind the Scenes of WinRT     25
WPF, Silverlight, and the Blue Stack     26
Summary     28
Chapter 2  Getting Started     29
Setting Up Your Environment     30
   Windows 8     30
   Visual Studio 2012     35
   Blend     36
Hello, Windows 8     37
   Creating Your First Windows 8 Application     37
   Templates     37
The ImageHelper Application     42
   Under the Covers     53
Summary     60
Chapter 3  Extensible Application Markup Language (XAML)     61
Declaring the UI     62
   The Visual Tree     64
   Dependency Properties     67
   Attached Properties     70
Data-Binding     73
   Value Converters     78
Storyboards     80
Styles and Resources     85
Layout     88
   Canvas     88
   Grid     89
   StackPanel     91
   VirtualizingPanel and VirtualizingStackPanel     93
   WrapGrid     94
   VariableSizedWrapGrid     96
   ContentControl     97
   ItemsControl     99
   ScrollViewer     99
   ViewBox     100
   GridView     102
   ListView     105
   FlipView     106
   ListBox     106
Common Controls     107
Summary     109
Chapter 4  Windows 8 Applications     111
Layouts and Views     111
   The Simulator     112
   The Visual State Manager     115
   Semantic Zoom     119
Handling User Input     122
   Pointer Events     124
   Manipulation Events     126
   Mouse Support     128
   Keyboard Support     129
   Visual Feedback     131
   Targeting     132
   Context Menus     134
The Application Bar     136
Icons and Splash Screens     143
About Page     145
Sensors     148
   Accelerometer     149
   Compass     149
   Geolocation     150
   Gyrometer     151
   Inclinometer     151
   Light Sensor     152
   Orientation Sensor     153
Summary     154
Chapter 5  Application Lifecycle     157
Process Lifetime Management     160
   Activation     161
   Suspension     163
   Termination     166
   Resume     166
   Navigation     168
   Application Data API     172
Connected and Alive     176
Custom Splash Screen     177
Summary     179
Chapter 6  Data     181
Application Settings     181
Accessing and Saving Data     183
   The Need for Speed and Threading     189
   Understanding async and await     191
   Lambda Expressions     194
   IO Helpers     195
   Embedded Resources     196
Collections     199
   Language Integrated Query (LINQ)     200
Web Content     203
Syndicated Content     205
Streams, Buffers, and Byte Arrays     207
Compressing Data     208
Encrypting and Signing Data     211
Web Services     214
   OData Support     217
Summary     219
Chapter 7  Tiles and Toasts     221
Basic Tiles     221
Live Tiles     222
Badges     229
Secondary Tiles     231
Toast Notifications     236
Windows Notification Service     242
Summary     250
Chapter 8  Giving Your Application Charm     253
Searching     256
Sharing     266
   Sourcing Content for Sharing     267
   Receiving Content as a Share Target     274
Settings     280
Summary     283
Chapter 9  MVVM and Testing     285
UI Design Patterns     286
   The Model     292
   The View     293
   The View Model     295
The Portable Class Library     296
Why Test?     301
   Testing Eliminates Assumptions     302
   Testing Kills Bugs at the Source     302
   Testing Helps Document Code     303
   Testing Makes Extending and Maintaining Applications Easier     304
   Testing Improves Architecture and Design     305
   Testing Makes Better Developers     305
   Conclusion: Write Those Unit Tests!     306
Unit Tests     306
   Windows Store Unit Testing Framework     307
   Mocks and Stubs     311
Summary     315
Chapter 10  Packaging and Deploying     317
The Windows Store     317
   Discovery     318
   Reach     322
   Business Models     323
   Advertising     328
   Preparing Your App for the Store     329
   The Process     331
   The App Certification Kit     332
   What to Expect     335
Side-Loading     337
Summary     339
Index     341