Archive for March, 2010

Did you get to attend MIX 2010?  If so, I know you found it to be full of great information about our latest and greatest web technologies, and gave you some great insight into where some of our tools and technologies are headed.

But what if you didn�t get to go?  You could navigate your way through 141+ hours of content on the http://live.vistmix.com web site and try to pull out some of the more important nuggets (and I think you ultimately should) but that would take at least 90 hours (presuming you watch all the video on 1.5 speed in Windows Media Player having downloaded all the content the weekend before you started watching).

Another option is to attend a ugMIX event in your area.  Popular all across Microsoft�s Central Region, ugMIX is a highlight-reel of the top stories to come from MIX 2010 focusing on the key messages for developers.  Each district, and potentially each speaker, is doing something different, but all of us agree that MIX was a really important conference this year and one you should definitely catch up on.

For my part, I�ve just completed 2 of my 4 currently scheduled ugMIX talks, one at the Dallas ASP.NET user group and one at the Fort Worth .NET User Group.  I�ll be in Tulsa on Monday to bring MIX to them, and if you�re interested, we can make arrangements for me to bring it to you (see note at bottom of post).

Here�s the outline of what my version of ugMIX showcases:

• OData � a uniform way for sharing your data across organizational boundaries, the OData is your data over REST.  We�ll show what OData is, how you use it, and write some code to consume it.
• Windows Phone 7 Series � A new phone, designed for a life in motion. Calling all Silverlight developers – we�ll look at the phone design, specs and philosophy while writing some code using the free development environment (which includes a FREE express version of the Blend 4 Beta with Windows Phone 7 Series support)!
• Silverlight 4 � Overview of what�s new in the Silverlight 4 RC and show some cool code demos of those new features in action.
• Internet Explorer 9 Platform Preview � interested in where IE9 is heading? I�ll show you the IE9 Platform Preview, released at MIX 2010, as we discuss the team�s plans for supporting HTML5, CSS3, in-line SVG graphics and hardware-acceleration in the browser.

I�ve shared a copy of my slide deck if you want to get a head start, but I can�t share all my demos at this time, unfortunately�  I can provide other links, though, to help you get started on this amazing new platform!

• My ugMIX deck
• Mix Session List
• OData.org
• Download Silverlight 4 RC and Silverlight Developer Tools RC
• Download the Windows Phone 7 Series developer tools preview
• Expression Blend 4 Beta
• Expression Blend 4 Beta SDK for Windows Phone

I look forward to seeing you at the next ugMIX!

Note: this offer good only in Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Louisiana, UK, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Canada and Japan.