User Interface design patterns and resources.

Smashing Magazine have a great column named  UI Developer’s Toolbox, where they collect and publish a lot of nice resources for web developers.

As a .NET developer I’am used to code design patterns, so I find it very satisfying that UI devlopers also organize their best practies as design patterns.

A design pattern refers to a reusable and applicable solution to general real-world problems. For example, a solution for navigating around a website is site navigation (a list of links that point to different sections of the site), a solution for displaying content in a compact space are module tabs.

Smashing Magazine has collected what they think is the best of the best, cream of the crop sites, galleries, online publications, and libraries devoted to sharing information and exploring concepts pertaining to User Interface design patterns.

Smashing Magazine: 40+ Helpful Resources On User Interface Design Patterns

Is this the best you can do Opera? - a Web server on the Web browser.

Today Opera Software announce their Opera Unite: a Web server on the Web browser. Thay claim that this tecknology will make you able to easily share you data, like photos, music and other files.  You can even run chat rooms and host a web server in you browser.

The first services announced on the Unite plattform is:

• File sharing
• Fridge – a place to share notes with you friends
• Media Player
• Photo Sharing
• The Lounge
• Web Server

When Opera claimed to re-invent the web, I really expected innovation. This is just boring. 

I have not created an account yet, and will probably never do.

I am disappointed!

But check it out yourself : http://unite.opera.com/

System.Data.OracleClient requires Oracle client software version 8.1.7 or greater

This blogpost was originally published on my old blog at dotnetjunkies in 2005.

Problem
When usign System.Data.OracleClient with Oracle9i client, i got the following message while connecting to the Oracle database from and ASP.NET application.

System.Data.OracleClient requires Oracle client software version 8.1.7 or greater.

Cause
Security permissions were not properly set when the Oracle 9i Release 2 client was installed on Windows with NTFS. The result of this is that content of the ORACLE_HOME directory is not visible to Authenticated Users on the machine; this again causes an error while the System.Data.OracleClient is communicating with the Oracle Connectivity software from an ASP.NET using Authenticated User privileges.

Solution
To fix the problem you have to give the Authenticated Users group privilege to the Oracle Home directory.

• Log on to Windwos as a user with Administrator privileges.
• Start Window Explorer and navigate to the ORACLE_HOME folder.
• Choose properties on the ORACLE_HOME folder.
• Click the “Security” tab of the “Properties” window.
• Click on “Authenticated Users” item in the “Name” list.
• Uncheck the “Read and Execute” box in the “Permissions” list under the “Allow” column.
• Re-check the “Read and Execute” box under the “Allow” column
• Click the “Advanced” button and in the “Permission Entries” verify that “Authenticated Users” are listed with permission = “Read & Execute”, and Apply To = “This folder, subfolders and files”. If not, edit that line and make sure that “Apply To” drop-down box is set to “This folder, subfolders and files”. This should already be set properly but it is important that you verify it.
• Click the “Ok” button until you close out all of the security properties windows. The cursor may present the hour glass for a few seconds as it applies the permissions you just changed to all subfolders and files.
• Reboot, to assure that the changes have taken effect.

Try your application again.

Silverlight challenges Adobe AIR

PCWorld published an intrested article on Silverlight 3 catching up to the capabilities of Adobe Flasj, Flex and AIR.

PCWorld.com : Microsoft Silverlight Challenges Adobe AIR

Opera Software claims to re-invent the Web

Opera Software invites press and choosen developers to a exclusive webcast on Tuesday, 16 June 2009. The Norwegian company promise to reveal their most significant innovations to date.

«...a glimpse of the future of Web computing and one of Opera's most significant innovations to date.»

Opera posted this messege on Twitter:
“This will be big: http://www.opera.com/freedom/ #reinvent”

What can this innovation be? Will Opera try to pick up the competition with Microsoft and Adobe, and release their own “Silverlight/Flash” techonlogy? Or is this someting else?

What can we learn from Flash designers?

Smashing Magazine posted 3 days ago an article about 50 Beautiful Flash Websities. As an Silverlight enthusiast I ask myself the question: When would there be a list like this for Silverlight websites?

Check it out! 50 Beautiful Flash Websites

Silverlight Spy 3

Silverlight Spy is a very usefull and handy tools when developing, debugging and customizing Silverligth appearance. Koen Zwikstra and First Floor Software is announcing a a new version of their Silverligth Spy tool. This is what thay writes about Silverlight Spy 3 on their blog.

Silverlight Spy 3

In this new version Silverlight Spy gets a major (and with that I mean MAJOR) overhaul. What you can expect:

• A completely redesigned UI for easier access to all aspects of a Silverlight application. The current Windows Forms application is dropped. Various new UI features are simply too hard to implement in the current Windows Forms model.
• Immediate window for debugging, evaluating expressions, execute statements, and so forth.
• Improvements in all areas; enhanced event monitor, an updated XAML writer, property grid supporting both core and custom UI properties, custom attached property support, etc.
• UI Automation pattern invocation
• Support for spying applications running in and out of the browser. No need to fire up the Silverlight Spy standalone application.
• Databinding debugging
• Control Style inspectors
• Extensive use of new Silverlight 3 features
• Standalone setup package with auto-update.
• A new licensing model. Silverlight Spy 3 will be available in a free and a professional version. The professional version provides more features over the free version and comes with a licensing fee. More details on the licensing model will be supplied once the beta is available.

Next to this list there are a number of very exciting features that will be revealed in the near future.

Schedule: the first milestone will be delivered early Q3 2009.

First Floor blogpost: Silverlight Spy 3

.NET RIA Services roadmap update

Tim Heuer, program manager for Microsoft Silverlight posted an updated roadmap for RIA Services on his blog yesterday.

The roadmap

• July 2009: Updated CTP
• PDC 2009: Beta
• First part of 2010: RTW

The July CTP version is still considered a preview, but Microsoft are thinking about removing any production (go-live) restrictions. But it will be a “use at your own risk” product, not a tupical official “Go live” support license.

Read Tim’s blogpost: .NET RIA Services roadmap update

Silverlight 3: Improved Web Service performance

One of my developers are working on a Silverlight integration with Microsoft Dynamics CRM. One thing that we discoverd was really bad performance when initializing the CRM Web Service proxy in Silverlight.  We also discoverd that same code running on Silverlight 3 beta had mutch bether performance.

It seems that the Silverligth Web Service team has done some magic in the new beta.

See: Improving the performance of web services in SL3 Beta

Silverlight 3 to launch July 10.

Mary Jo at zdnet write in her blogpost that Microsoft will launch Silverlight 3 the 10. of July:

--

Earlier this year, Microsoft officials said they planned to deliver the final version of Silverlight 3 before the end of 2009. Looks like they meant months before…

Microsoft is planning to launch Silverlight 3 and its Expression Studio 3 family of designer tools on July 10 in San Francisco, company officials said on May 28.

Silverlight 3 adds 3D support, GPU acceleration, H.264 video support and out-of-the-browser capabilities to Silverlight, Microsoft’s competitor to Adobe Flash. The out-of-browser support will add to Silverlight capabilities that are available currently in Adobe AIR.

--

Read the entire blogpost at : http://blogs.zdnet.com/microsoft/?p=2912

Nice CowerFlow experience

Jose Fajardo at Cynergy has build a nice Cower Flow experience with Silverlight 3’s Projection feature. Have a look at his great blogpost.

http://www.cynergysystems.com/blogs/page/josefajardo?entry=coverflow_built_using_silverlight_3

Channel 9: Multi-touch .NET Library for Windows 7

Multi-touch is one of the exiting capabilities in Windows 7. Developers and Software venders will now be able build applications and solutions that benefit from these new capabilities and build user experiences that far exceeds that we are used to on Windows plattform. Just look at what HP has done with their HP TouchSmart computers.

Channel 9 has published a series of videos that shows how Developers can start building for Multi-touch.

Windows 7 Mutli Touch Overview

Programming Windows 7 Multi Touch – Part 1

Programming Windows 7 Multi Touch Part-2

Multitouch Library Win7

See Microsoft SecondLight in action.

If you are think Microsoft Surface is amazing. Have a look at the video below. On this video the Microsoft Research Cambridge Lab presents the what they are working on now. The SecondLight. Enjoy!

Smashing Mag: Optimizing Conversion Rates: It’s All About Usability

I just found this very interesting article about how to optimize your conversion rate, at Smashing Mag. The author claims that eCommerce usability improvements usually have a huge impact on conversion rates.

http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2009/05/15/optimizing-conversion-rates-its-all-about-usability/

Silverlight now available within Windows Media Center

The Silverlight team just announced that Silverlight now is supported within Windows Vista Media Center aswell. The first Media Center application made available by Silverlight is the NetFlix Movie rental service.

Tim Harader writes this in his blogpost:

From a consumer’s standpoint the best thing about this implementation is that you get the same great Silverlight-based adaptive streaming experience transparently protected by PlayReady DRM that Netflix offers from their website, but it’s integrated into the Windows Media Center experience. That means you can easily navigate to a variety of content from different providers without having to jump around to various websites. In Windows 7, it gets even better with the addition of a new EPG that integrates both TV programming and Internet content. This furthers Windows Media Center’s goal of being the best place to watch TV on the PC.

You can read the entire announcement on the Silverlight Team Blog.

An exiting day!

Yesterday, Microsoft released the first public Beta of Visual Studio 2010.  VS2010 itself is exiting news, but especially Silverlight developers should have high expectations to this new Visual Studio. If the expectations be meet, is to early to tell. But hopefully this release will make us more independent from Blend and become a adequate IDE for us as well.

Tim Heuer presents som tricks and tips on his blogpost from yesterday. 

A Developers Silverlight Toolbox

When developing business application in Silverlight 2.0, you will soon discover that you toolbox is sadly empty. You have of course the basic tools you need with Visual Studio and Blend, but in addition you will have to invest heavily in building frameworks and custom controls, to actually build someting flashy enough to win out there. Microsoft is off course painfully aware of this and are releasing their Silverlight Toolkit and .NET RIA Services. But that isn’t enough.

My intention is to evaluate som of the tools and framework that’s out there and give a summary of what to use and what to avoid.

Silverlight Toolkit

To boost development of Silverlight applications, Microsoft found it necessary to supply developers and designers a larger toolbox with controls and utilities. Silverlight Toolkit can be downloaded from CodePlex.

http://www.codeplex.com/Silverlight

Microsoft Silverlight Unit Test Framework

Writing unit tests is a natural way to ensure that your code does what its is intended to do. Unit testing in Silverlight is not as easy as we are used to from ordinary .NET and Java development, but this toolkit is a important step in the right direction.

http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/silverlightut

Blacklight (Codeplex)

Blacklight is User Experience focused code sharing project hosted at Codeplex, and is a pleasant acquaintance. The toolkit itself is a collection of controls, samples and visual assets and ideas that I found very handy. Especially their DragDockPanel becomes useful when building a flashy User Experience. But there are also a collection of useful controls like the Clipping Boder, Drop Shadow Border and Drop Shadow Text Control to mention some. You can download both the source and the complied assemblies from CodePlex and view their online showcase her.

http://blacklight.codeplex.com/
http://blogs.msdn.com/mgrayson/archive/2009/03/06/blacklight-v3-0-mar09-released.aspx

Silverlight FX

Silverlight.FX is an application framework for building Rich Internet Applications with Silverlight 2. It focuses on providing building blocks and controls that allows applications to be naturally well-architected

http://projects.nikhilk.net/SilverlightFX/

Microsoft .NET RIA Services

The May 2009 Preview can now be downloaded. http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=76bb3a07-3846-4564-b0c3-27972bcaabce&displaylang=en

Microsoft has also published som usefull samples at msdn. http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/RiaServices

This was some usefull linkes. I will update this article with more useful stuff later.

My new blog

New technology that enables modern User Experience gets a lot of attention these days. I myself, find the way these technologies enables Rich Internet Applications especially interesting and think this trend will mean a considerably change in the way we build both Web and Client application in the future. As a former developer, software architect and now as a Business Manager for IT Consultants, I am both interested in the technology itself and in how this will change the way we do business.

I will try to use this blog to dig deep into some topics and to give a brief introduction to others. Since Microsoft technologies is what I know, Silverlight Watch became an exciting title for my blog, but might quickly become misleading. But the future will tell. I hope this will become as interesting for you, as i hope it will be for me.

Thank you!