Silverlight Toolkit March 2009 Release

http://TechnoArkay.blogspot.com | .NET 3.5 SP1, Silverlight, Visual Studio 2008 SP1, XAML, Vista 32/64 Build 6002 SP2 | You can see pictures depicting what I am talking about at my Base URI of my blog.

I have two environments. (Main PC: Vista 64 SP2, .NET 3.5 SP1, Visual Studio 2008 SP1 | VMWare: Windows 7 Build 7100, Visual Studio 2010 Beta 1, Silverlight Beta 1, and Expression Blend 3 Preview)

 

I have begun developing apps in Silverlight and WPF. I have done WCF (Microsoft's Web Service API) for a year now with asp.net. Now, I want to expand my WCF to mobile and portable entities like BlackBerry, Android, and Web none-html platforms.

I have just downloaded the March 2009 Silverlight Toolkit Release. Unlike the December release, it is in a *.msi form factor. I was wondering where the new toolkit was installed at. On CodePlex, it says nothing about its installation directory. Maybe, I missed it earlier on. On December release, it was on zip file where .dll can be referenced in my Expression Blend and Visual Studio. Anyway, the Silverlight March Kit is installed at "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SDKs\Silverlight\v2.0\Toolkit\March 2009" and apparently, it has this on my program list after I was looking all over for it.

In Expression Blend 2, you have to add references to Silverlight Dll.

 

On Expression Blend 3, you get these

 

 

You will see these.

On Visual Studio 2008 SP1, you will see this.

Windows 7, VMWare Graphic problem and solution

I have Vista X64 SP2 as my main machine {P8400, 6GB, 9800GT 1GB, 320GB x 2, 1 DVI Port}

Software In Question: Visual Studio 2010 B1 10.0.20506.1, VMWare Workstation 6.5.1.126130

I have Windows 7 Build 7100 from MSDN on my VMWare. There is some problem with graphics. The VMWare comes with SVGA II graphic driver but it does not seem like doing its job properly. Tools bars and some components cannot be seen when DirectX 9.0c acceleration is enabled on VMWare. I have turned off all graphic options for the best performance on Windows 7. However, it doesn't seem to improve even at 16bit graphic mode.

The solution I came up with is to open Windows 7 remote and access Widows 7 from Remote Desktop Connection.

On Windows 7 and IE8, JavaScript seems to work faster, almost as fast as on Chrome. I recently developed drag-and-drop elements on one of my aspx pages and on IE8, the elements seem to drag bit slower. However, on Chrome, the element moves flawlessly. I need to tune the UI element to move faster since most people still have IE7.

Anyway, accessing Windows 7 from the native window client's RDC seems to work well. I suspect this is because the RCD uses native graphic card driver instead of simulated driver on VMWARE. VMWARE should be updating its workstation soon.

Databind XML to Gridview

string location = @"somefilename";

System.Data.DataSet oDS = new System.Data.DataSet();

oDS.ReadXml(location);

gvIcons.DataSource = oDS;

gvIcons.DataBind();

BlackBerry 9530 Update

BlackBerry 9530 Update. [ .75 to .148 ] on Verizon Wireless

I have waited for months for some significant update that would ameliorate BlackBerry Storm. It is finally here.

I was not able to use OTA to update my device. The process kept warning me about the lack of memory. Therefore, I updated BlackBerry through the BlackBerry Update Site.

When I update the device, it wiped out everything. Que Lastima. So, I had to reload all my apps.

I’ve been using it for now 2 hours, UI is faster and smoother. On Portrait Mode, a QWERTY keyboard layout is available. However, due to my fat fingers, I cannot use it. It is for the stylish on a non-stylish phone, kinky indeed.

So far, I have downloaded two themes, google apps, and few others, I have 36.1MB memory available. I installed a cool KDE theme. Enjoy.