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Visual Studio 2015 Update 2, released during //BUILD/2016 developer conference, provides an easy way to execute code directly on the Interactive Window inside the Visual Studio IDE. Along with that, the interactive window is now also capable of color highlighting.

 

Today in this blog post, we will learn how to execute code directly in the interactive window, in just a single click. Continue reading and let us know, how much you like this enhanced feature.

Published by on under DZone | Tips

A new cumulative update for Windows 10 users just now rolled out by Microsoft. If you have version 1511, checkout Windows Update once, if you didn’t yet receive the upgrade notification. It’s a cumulative update for April 2016 and the build no. is 10586.218.

 

This update includes quality improvements and security fixes. No new operating system features are being introduced in this update. Continue reading to know details.

Published by on under News | Windows

Along with Windows 10 insider preview build 14316, Microsoft added many new enhancements for the Windows Insiders to try first before it comes to general public along with the Windows 10 Anniversary Update coming in this summer.

 

In this build, they have added the ability to select which app notifications are more important to you in Action Center. Continue reading to learn more about it.

Published by on under Tips | Win10Tips

You might already know that, Windows 10 insiders build 14316 is already available for fast ring Windows Insiders. Along with the other new features and improvements, Microsoft also improved the upgrade experience and update settings.

 

Today, let’s see in this small post, what are the improvements that the giant company has made in update settings. The other improvements will follow in new posts.

Published by on under DZone | Tips

Microsoft recently released Windows 10 Insiders Preview build: 14316 to it’s fast ring users. In this build, Microsoft added support to switch between dark and light themes universally. If you have installed this build or above, you will be able to change the theme of apps which responds to theme changes in the OS.

 

Continue reading to know about it with a easy to navigate video demonstration and at the end, share your feedback with Microsoft.

Published by on under Tips | Win10Tips

Microsoft gone one step ahead in order to release their Windows 10 Anniversary Update. This time they announced new insider preview build 14316 with many new exciting features. If you are a Windows Insider and configured your system to get fast ring updates, checkout for the new build.

 

If you want to know what has been newly introduced, what has been fixed and the known issues currently there in this preview build, continue reading while it downloads the updates.

Published by on under News | Windows

Visual Studio "15" is an early preview build of the next major release of Visual Studio, which has been released by Microsoft on 30th March 2016, during //BUILD/2016 developer conference at San Fransisco. It provides early adopters to try out the new features and provide continuous feedback.

 

To know more about the preview release and to get the links of the web installer and/or the ISO image for offline installation, continue reading the post.

Published by on under News | VisualStudio

On 30th March, during Build Developer Conference 2016, Microsoft released Visual Studio 2015 Update 2. This release focuses on stability and more on the users feedback received on RTM and Update 1. Along with these, it also includes performance improvements and responsiveness to our favorite IDE.

 

This build also has some known issues, which will be fixed in subsequent builds. In this post, sharing the links to download the web installer, ISO image for offline installation.

Published by on under News | Visual Studio 2015

Microsoft's annual Build Developer Conference 2016 is going to happen in San Francisco from 30th March - 1st April. Microsoft has planned to live stream the Day 1 and Day 2 keynotes on it's Build site. All other sessions will be available for playback later next week.

 

Apart from the Microsoft Build site, you can also watch the same on my blog, streamed directly from Microsoft's server. Don't forget to watch it live from 8:30 AM - 11:30 AM (Pacific Time).

Published by on under Build Conference | Build Conference 2016

Microsoft recently released Windows 10 version 1511 build: 14291 to the fast ring Windows Insiders. This build features some new improvements. It includes support of extensions to Microsoft Edge browser too. Now you will be able to add extensions to the Edge browser and extend it’s functionalities.

 

In this post, we will discuss on this new feature and guide you to install extensions from Microsoft site. Continue reading and share your feedback to improve Windows 10.

Published by on under Microsoft Edge | Tips

If you have registered for the Windows insiders program and you are unable to receive the Windows 10 preview bits, this could be due to few issues related to configuration settings on your desktop. If you have configured your system properly but still the bits not shown in your available updates, you might have to change some settings manually.

 

In this post, I will show you the trick which will enable you to receive the bits. Do this changes with precautions. Continue reading more to learn about it.

Published by on under DZone | Tips

Bing Rewards program can help you to earn credits for searching on Bing or trying new features from Bing or other Microsoft products and services, which can be redeemable for a variety of gifts and other rewards. If you are in India, now you can register for it (which is free) and start rewarding yourself by just searching on Bing.com.

 

If you are new to this, checkout the blog posts and register for this free program. Start searching on Bing, start earning some rewards just for your searches.

Published by on under Bing | Bing Rewards

On 8th March 2016, Microsoft aired a new cumulative update (OS build: 10586.164) for #Windows 10 version 1511. Now they have published the ISO/Offline installer for the said build. This means, you will now be able to download the ISO of the security update once and install it in multiple devices.

 

Continue reading more to find out the link to download the ISO file of the March 2016 security updates for Window 10. It’s around 846 MB only.

Published by on under News | Win10Tips

Along with Windows 10 Mobile Insider Preview build 14283, Microsoft also released a new update for Outlook Mail and Calendar app, having some new improvements. Among those, one cool new enhancement is the ability to turn ON/OFF the message preview in the message pane.

 

Though it is by default set to ON, but in case you want to hide it or make it visible in future, this small post will help you to configure the same, step-by-step. Continue reading.

Published by on under Outlook | Tips

Gabe Aul, the Corporate Vice President of Microsoft Engineering Systems team, announced the availability of Windows 10 Mobile Insider Preview build: 14283 for the fast ring Windows Insiders. Though this build is now limited to few devices, but will later expand to other devices.

 

This build focuses some new improvements and fixes. As it is an insider build, it also has some known issues. Continue reading the post to know what has been changed, along with the issues currently present.

Published by on under News | WinDev

Microsoft has released a new cumulative update (OS build: 10586.164) for Windows 10 version 1511 on 8th March 2016. If you are not part of Windows Insiders program and in the public release ring, you will get this update through the Windows 10 update service.

 

This updates includes improvements and security fixes only. No new features were introduced. This post will give you a basic overview of the key changes.

Published by on under News | Win10Tips

If you are building a custom installer of your own, you might want to compress the files inside a ZIP and extract them on need basis. You can easily do this by using some 3rd party libraries, among which some are free and some are paid versions. Why to use additional libraries if the .NET framework provides you the set of APIs?

 

You might be aware of this, but if you are unaware of it, let me tell you that, it was present since .NET 2.0. Let’s explore it in today’s quick blog tips & tricks. Continue reading and share the link in your network.

Published by on under .Net | C#

If you are using Outlook 2016 (version: 16.0.6568.2025) and configured the email client to download mails using POP3, you might face some issues which will delete all the emails from server inbox after outlook downloads those and/or create duplicate items of the downloaded messages.

 

Microsoft has shared an workaround to resolve this issue. If you are using that specific version of Outlook 2016, continue reading to know more details of the same and fix the issue temporarily while Microsoft is working on a permanent fix.

Published by on under News | Outlook

The giant company released the RC build (Release Candidate) of Visual Studio 2015 Update 2, focusing mainly on stability and user's feedback received via the Update 1 RTM channel. Microsoft marked this as "Go Live", though it is still under prerelease and has few known issues.

 

If you want to explore the new changes, read more to find the download links as well as the link towards release notes and a list of bug fixes, known issues.

Published by on under .Net | News

If you are working with XML serialization in .NET/C#, you might have already encountered this and might have analyzed a lot why your data is not serializing though you have written proper code. The reason/solution might be simple but in case you are not aware of such common mistakes, you will definitely break your head finding the root cause.

 

In this quick post, we will learn about the common mistakes that may happen while declaring the properties of data class that you are going to serialize. Continue reading and let me know, if you find more points to be added here.

Published by on under .Net | C#

In most cases, we use XML files to serialize/de-serialize data from/to the app. To do this, we expose properties of known types and pass them to the serializer for the automatic serialization process. Sometimes, we don’t need to serialize all the properties and manually need to mark them from the serialization process.

 

In this small blog post, we are going to see the way, by which you can prevent a property from the XML serialization process. Continue reading to know more.

Published by on under .Net | C#

Not every system has the right folder permission set to all user account and hence, sometime we need special access to specific folder during installation or while executing the application. It is not possible to manually set it up by browsing the folder and hence an automation is mandatory.

 

If you are looking for a way to set the right permission to specific folder(s) using C# code, this post will help you. Continue reading to learn more about it and grab the code.

Published by on under .Net | C#

Whenever you create a new code file in Visual Studio, it adds a default set of using namespaces automatically to faster the development process in common name resolution. Not all of them are mandatory to use and can be remove at later point of time or before code check-in.

 

Visual Studio 2015 provides us an easy way to organize the using namespaces within the active code file, project and/or solution. You will really love this new feature. Continue reading to learn more about it.

Published by on under Tips | Visual Studio 2015

Apart from the other cool new features, the giant company also added a feature in Microsoft Visual Studio named “Layout Management”. This is a nice feature for people working on multiple devices with Visual Studio 2015. Using this you will be able to save and sync your IDE layout across devices.

 

Today in this post, we are going to discuss this and will learn how to save and sync the Window Layout. Continue reading and let us know, how this can benefit you.

Published by on under Tips | Visual Studio 2015

For some people, it is sometimes irritating when the "Output" window automatically opens up on the screen when building a project or solution in Visual Studio. For some people, it's the reverse case and they want to check the entire log while the build is running or the console application is running in debug mode.

 

In Visual Studio, you can control this behavior and ask the IDE whether to open it into view or not. It’s not specific to Visual Studio 2015 and is available since VS 2013. Let's see how to enable/disable it.

Published by on under MVB | Tips

It happens many times (during the coding or code review process) when we need a bigger space in our favorite Visual Studio IDE to check/read the code completely. Closing all the other docked windows/panels, toolbars and then adding them one by one is really very difficult and time-consuming.

 

Visual Studio 2015 provides us an easy way to switch between a full screen and normal mode. This way, you don’t have to do extra work to create a bigger space. Continue reading to learn more on this topic.

Published by on under Tips | Visual Studio 2015

If you are working in Visual Studio 2015 IDE, you might have noticed the “Quick Launch” search bar, which allows you to quickly navigate to common menus and settings. This is a handy tool that you will need while searching for some options or features within the popular IDE.

 

Today this post will cover how to enable/disable this “Quick Launch” bar. Continue reading to know these quick tips & tricks on Visual Studio 2015. Pass it on to your friends/colleagues.

Published by on under Tips | Visual Studio 2015

Registry is the heart of Windows Operating System and all/most of the apps and games associates various values/data into the registry, which can be accessed at different point of time. Playing with Windows registry is very dangerous and hence general people should avoid or take special care while working with it.

 

In case you are a developer, you want to read/write/delete entries to/fro Windows Registry. This post will cover details and code snippets to delete an entire key tree from it. Continue reading to learn how to do it.

Published by on under .Net | C#

Sometime we need to find out details of running process which is external to your current process, might be a third party one. If you are currently looking for some code to find out details of a process, this post will definitely help you. Here we will learn, how to get the process description using C#.

 

Continue reading to learn about it. Also, sample code has been shared for you to understand it better. If you have specific query, drop a line in the comment section.

Published by on under .Net | C#

Microsoft now stepped one step forward to push Windows 10 to a major set of devices who are still using Windows 7 or Windows 8.x by marking the OS as “Recommended Update”. It’s still your decision whether to opt-in or opt-out. If you opt-in, you will of course get it as free.

 

It is still a right time to upgrade to Windows 10, but not mandatory. To know more about it and the upgrade process, continue reading this post.

Published by on under DZone | News

I hope you read my previous post on “Building a Toast Notification with text for apps targeting Universal Windows Platform”. There we learned how to create a very basic toast notification. Continuing the series of posts, today we will learn how to add buttons within the notification.

 

Let’s begin with building toast notification with text and buttons. Stay tuned to learn creating more complex notifications in next blog posts of this series.

Published by on under CodeProject | Tips

Microsoft started rolling out a configuration update to Windows 10 Mobile users who are in fast ring. This might be a step towards rolling out the Redstone update to the Windows 10 Mobile users. If you are already in the fast ring, you might have already got the notifications.

 

Windows Insiders chief, Gabriel Aul, in a tweet announced the availability of this update which will prepare your device for the next big update and improve all over the upgrade experience.

Published by on under News | Windows

When downloading from a remote location, many time we need to know whether the file downloaded properly or not. There are many techniques to know about it but among them, one of the approach is to check the hash value of the file. The Cryptography APIs of .NET can help you to calculate the same.

 

Today in this post, we will learn how to calculate the hash value of file stored in local resource. Continue reading to learn more about the steps. Code has been shared.

Published by on under .Net | C#

If you are a developer and building apps or games for Windows 10, targetting Universal Windows Platform (aka. UWP), you might want to show toast notifications to the user of your app/game. You might also want to provide some additional content like textbox, button etc. to get specific inputs.

 

As part of this tutorial series, we are going to learn how to show custom toast notifications. Today let’s begin with building simple toast notification with text. Stay tuned to learn complex notifications in next blog posts.

Published by on under CodeProject | Tips

You might have already hear about Clippy. Yea, that’s the Office Assistant that we had in those days. In earlier office versions it helped us with many quick tips to complete the job easily, having some nice animations. If you are fond of it and want to use it in your development environment, there is a cool ReSharper extension for Visual Studio.

 

Recently I came across it and thought to share with you more details about the extension as well as some snaps and the process to install it. The extension is also available as opensource project on GitHub. Continue reading to know more.

Published by on under JetBrains | Office

If you are a developer and developing code using Visual Studio IDE, you might want to learn the shortcut keys that our facorite IDE exposes to use. Mads Kristensen developed a Visual Studio extension and exported all the keyboard shortcuts of Visual Studio 2012, 2013 and 2015.

 

In this post, I am not only bookmarking the tool and link to the site, but also sharing the same with you. I hope, it will be useful for you in day to day development life.

Published by on under Tips | Visual Studio 2013

Windows 10 SDK provides an easy to implement project template by which you can quickly create an app for Universal Windows Platform which you can use to run a hosted web app. You don’t have to create the whole app, if the site is already running. Just change few values in manifest file and your app will be running.

 

In this post, we will learn how to create a hosted web app targeting Windows 10 (without writing any code). Share your feedback and/or ask your queries, if any.

Published by on under CodeProject | Tips

Microsoft recently released Windows 10 Mobile build 10.0.10586.63 to Windows Insiders in the fast ring. There’s not such noticable changes in this build, but I have noticed one cool feature that allows you to select and copy a portion of text from SMS messages easily by just tapping.

 

In this post, I am going to share you details about this with proper screenshot for easy understanding. I hope that, you will like it. Let us know, what you discover more on this build.

Published by on under Tips | Win10Tips

Most of the developers in the Microsoft platform uses C# as their programming language. C# is now matured to version 6 and has come with new features in its different versions. As a programmer, we should know all these features. This will not only help you in cracking interviews but also help you decide whether you should upgrade your project to latest.

Published by on under .Net | C# 4.0

If you are building apps/game for Universal Windows Platform, you might want to retrieve the device information where the app/game is currently running. You might use this information to log details about any exception and/or to do specific action based on device details.

 

In this post, we will learn how to fetch the device information in UWP apps. Continue to read about the APIs exposed by Microsoft SDK. Don’t forget to read my other posts too and share your feedback.

Published by on under CodeProject | Tips

How many times we are in such a condition when our battery is going to die and we have to do some important calls or something else? If we poll for it, the count will be high. If you are a developer and building apps targeting Universal Windows Platform (aka. UWP), you might want to integrate the battery APIs already exposed.

 

This post will cover about the API today and we will learn how more about the API with proper demonstration. Continue to read more on this topic and don’t forget to check other posts on the same topic.

Published by on under CodeProject | Tips

If you are a developer building apps for Universal Windows Platform, you might have noticed that, at the time of debugging there are some strings of digit getting display just under the title bar of the application. This is called as Frame Rate Counter, which displays frame rate and per frame CPU usage.

 

Today in this small blog post, we will learn how to enable/disable the Frame Rate Counter in your Universal Windows apps. Countinue reading to know more about it.

Published by on under CodeProject | Tips

If you are a developer and building apps for Universal Windows apps, you might like to customize your app title bar to match your app theme. You can also change various colors of the buttons. Windows 10 SDK provides you to customize the title bar of Universal apps.

 

Today in this blog post, we will learn how to apply custom colors in apps built for Universal Windows Platform along with different other APIs exposed for it.

Published by on under CodeProject | Tips

Let’s come to basics of programming today. It’s a common interview question asked during an interview and many time candidates become confused with the difference between using directive and using statement/block. Today we will cover this topic and discuss various difference among those.

 

To learn or brush up the basic concepts, continue reading more. I hope, this will clarify all your doubts. If any feedback, do share below in the comments section.

Published by on under .Net | CSharp

Many time we need to programmatically retrieve the size of a file before downloading it from a web location or a network path. This is require to calculate the progress and/or the estimated time to download and display it to the user. For a local file it is easy, but to retrieve this information from a remote location, the implementation is little different.

 

Today in this small blog post, we will learn how to retrieve it dynamically using C# code. Continue reading to know about it. Code snippet has been shared in the post.

Published by on under .Net | CSharp
Everyone cares about his/her system's security and cares more when its related to virus. Here comes one new enhancement in security perspective in Windows 10 November updates and that's about Windows Defender. Its now more integrated with Windows Operating system.

We all know Windows defender is already present from Windows 7 on wards. Lets see what Windows November update has added more to Windows Defender.
Published by on under Manika-Chowdhury | Tips
You might be aware that, Microsoft planned to downgrade all OneDrive personal accounts from 15GB free space to 5GB and that will hit all of your account soon. Now they came with an offer which will allow you to keep your base storage quota and camera roll bonus, even after the changes rolls out.

If you want to keep your 15GB free OneDrive space, just follow the steps mentioned in this post and your account will not be affected when the amount of free storage changes.
Published by on under News | OneDrive

If you are running Microsoft Office 2010 and a regular user to it’s Outlook product, you might have recently observed that, many buttons, menus changed their state to disabled mode. If you are using any add-ins, those became disabled. This is because your Outlook switched into Safe Mode.

 

This is quite obvious and actual reason behind this is a little bit different. In this post, we will discuss more about the issue and a quick fix to resolve it. Continue reading.

Published by on under Office | Outlook

This could be one of the issue you might face while using service call or HTTP Post to server. Though this issue rarely happens but in case you encounter such error in your production, possibility is your client application is facing issue connecting to the server due to proxy server.

 

If you come across such issue, this quick blog post will help you to resolve it. You don’t need to do much, but just a configuration settings will help you.

Published by on under .Net | CSharp

Serialization and deserialization of .NET objects made easy using various serializer classes that it provides. But serialization of Dictionary object is not that much easy. For this, you have to create a special Dictionary class which is able to serialize itself. The serialization technique might be different in different business cases.

 

Today, let’s discuss how to implement the same with a sample. Code is shared in the post, which you can use in your application. Continue reading and let me know if you have any other approaches.

Published by on under .Net | CodeProject

“Linked Inbox” feature is now available again in Outlook Mail for Windows 10 Mobile. After a new build pushed recently, Microsoft pulled the same and replaced with an older version of the Outlook Mail due to some issues. The issue was causing the app to crash and close.

 

Good news is that, the app is again available in store with linked inbox feature, which will enable you to merge multiple mail boxes into one inbox. Continue reading to know about it.

Published by on under Windows | Windows 10

Microsoft has announced availability of Visual Studio 2015 Update 1. There are plenty of new changes in this final build apart from CTP release and RC release. Apart from our favorite IDE, the final release of Team Foundation Server Update 1 is also available. Download and checkout the new features.

 

In this post, sharing the download link as well as features list and release notes shared by the giant company. Go thru them while the download is in progress.

Published by on under DZone | News

You might have been heard about the product JIRA. It is a bug tracking product, developed by Atlassian. It can be used as general "issue tracker", “new feature request tracker” and more, rather than solely a bug tracker. It’s more customizable than BugZilla and queries also can be modifiable.

 

Today in this small blog post, we will learn how to create a query to list down all the issues “Resolved by” a particular user or you. Continue reading to know more about it.

Published by on under Atlassian | DZone

Microsoft brought a new set of enhancements along with Windows 10 November Update. Among them, one is lock screen enhancements which will allow you to set background image of lock screen from the Windows Spotlight and set/remove the login screen background image.

 

Today in this post, we are going to discuss on the same and will see how to set those various options in Windows 10 November update (aka. Threshold 2).

Published by on under DZone | Manika-Chowdhury

Microsoft restores the availability of Windows 10 November Update, which was pulled just after release. The giant company also explained why it was pulled. If you have the RTM build 10240, check out Windows Update. You might have got the notification to install version 1511 by that time.

 

If you have already installed the November Update (version 1511, build 10586), there’s a patch for you. To know more about this, continue reading the post.

Published by on under DZone | News

If you are building add-ins for Microsoft Word, at the time of add-in installation you might want to check whether user has installed MS Word on his system or not. Based on that, you might want to show a message to the user or take proper action as per your business need.

 

In this small blog post, we will learn what needs to be done using C# to find out whether the said Microsoft Office product is installed or not. Continue reading to know about this coding tricks.

Published by on under CSharp | DZone

On various scenarios, especially when you are building and shipping Add-Ins for outlook, at the time of add-in installation you might want to check whether user has installed outlook on his system or not. Based on that, you might want to show a message to the user.

 

In this small blog post, we will learn what needs to be done using C# to find out whether outlook is installed or not. Continue reading to know about this coding tricks.

Published by on under CSharp | DZone

The giant company brought a set of new features in Windows 10 November update. It’s the first big update after Windows 10 gone RTM. Along with other features and enhancements, it brought Start Screen/Menu enhancements. This includes more tiles and occasionally showing suggestions.

 

Today in this small blog post, we will discuss about these enhancements along with it’s settings to enable/disable the same. Continue reading to know more about it.

Published by on under Tips | Win10Tips

I hope many of you have already installed the Windows 10 November Update on your system. This new build includes bug fixes, product improvements along with many new features. Among those new feature, one is to show or hide the background image in the sign-in screen.

 

Microsoft provided an option in the settings app. In this small blog post, I will show you how to do this. Continue reading to know about this new feature.

Published by on under Tips | Win10Tips

Windows 10 November update features a new settings, which when enabled, let you receive fun facts, tips, tricks and more on your Lock Screen. This is a new feature, you will get in Windows 10 version 1511 (build: 10586.3) and above. If you didn’t receive this update yet, check the Windows Update service.

 

In this small blog post, I will show you how to enable or disable this option from the Windows 10 settings app. Continue reading to know more about it.

Published by on under Tips | Win10Tips

Few days ago, I wrote a blog post about Windows 10 Start Screen image programmatically using C# code. Today in this blog post, we will discuss about changing Lock Screen background image of Windows 10 using C# code. Microsoft Windows SDK provides the API sets to call.

 

Let’s start learning about the API with a small piece of code. Continue reading. Code has been shared at the end of the post. If you have any comments, drop a line.

Published by on under Tips | UWP

Outlook and other office applications provides an easy way to restart itself. Though there are no directly exposed APIs to restart it, but you can easily write code to do the same operation. Today in this small blog post, we are going to discuss on the code to be implemented.

 

Just three simple steps and your code is ready. C# Code has been shared at the end of the post. Let me know if you have any queries. Would be happy to help.

Published by on under .Net | CSharp

Microsoft aired Windows 10 build 10586 for the fast ring Windows Insiders. If you are one of them, you can get it via Windows Update service. This build is mainly focused on bug fixes and improvements to move forward the final build of Threshold 2. As it is a developer preview build, has some known issues.

 

This post lists all the fixes and known issues in this build. Before installing, please go thru the lists. Windows Feedback app to report any problems that you might encounter with this build.

Published by on under News | WinDev

John Montgomery, Director of Program Management for Visual Studio, announced the availability of Visual Studio 2015 Update 1 RC (Release Candidate) stepping forward to release the final update of our favorite IDE. It has many new features to improve the productivity of the developers.

 

Find in this post the download link (ISO image for offline installation) and the features set. Try it, provide your feedback and report any bugs if you notice.

Published by on under News | Visual Studio 2015

Along with Windows 10 Mobile Insider Preview build 10581, the giant company also released Windows 10 Insider Preview build 10576 for PCs. This is the first time when Microsoft released Windows 10 for both the platform. This build features few new changes along with a bunch of bug fixes and improvements.

 

If you are a Windows Insider in fast ring, you might have already got the notification about this update. Sharing here the new features set, list of bug fixes and known issues.

Published by on under News | WinDev

Microsoft Windows Insiders head, Gabe Aul, in a blog post announced the availability of Windows 10 Mobile Insider preview build 10581 for the fast ring users. If you are one of the fast ring insiders to test Windows 10 Mobile build before it flights the final one, you might have already got the update notification.

 

This build doesn’t have significant new features but has a no. of fixes and performance improvements. As it is still under development release, it has some known issues too. Find them listed in this post.

Published by on under News | WinDev

Windows 10 SDK provides API, by which you can programmatically change the Start Screen background image for both Windows 10 PC and Windows 10 Mobile. The API is located under Windows.System.UserProfile namespace. Using the API you can build apps and provides user easy access to change the start screen.

 

In this post, we are going to discuss about the API and also going to build a small demo app. The code snippet has been shared at the end of the post.

Published by on under Tips | UWP

“Find my Device” – not a new thing on Windows Platform. It was already there in Windows Phone and now the giant company thought to include in Windows 10. If you are using any prior build of Windows 10 build 10565, you would not get this as it has been  recently added to build 10565 for Windows Insiders.

 

In this post, we are going to discuss on this new feature. Please note that, it’s still under development stage and introduced in latest build just to showcase what’s coming next.

Published by on under Tips | Win10Tips

Microsoft Virtual Academy is organizing a live event for the developers who has basic knowledge of JavaScript and looking forward to improve their JavaScript skill. Join Microsoft experts Christopher Harrison and Gabrielle Crevecoeur on 28th October and take your skills to the next level.

 

It’s a whole day event for experienced developers and yes, it’s completely free. So, don't miss! Read more to find out details and registration link for the event.

Published by on under Events | JavaScript

If you are using Microsoft Edge on Windows 10, you don’t need to separately install Adobe Flash Player. It comes along with Windows 10 and enabled by default. But in case you are facing issues or the plugin becomes disabled, you can easily enable it from Microsoft Edge settings.

 

In this post, I will share you the tricks to enable Flash Player in Microsoft Edge. In case you want to disable it, you can follow the same steps.

Published by on under Microsoft Edge | Tips

On 12th October, Microsoft started rolling out Windows 10 build 10565 to the fast ring Windows Insiders. The same build is now available to the slow ring users and also available as an offline ISO image. In this release, Microsoft released some new features and fixes along with Start Screen context menu improvements.

 

In this post, we are going to see the Start Screen context menu improvements that the giant company is going to make in forthcoming Windows 10 build.

Published by on under Tips | Win10Tips

Syncfusion is providing Enterprise Edition of their product worth $9,975  for free to the individual developers and up to five users at companies with annual gross revenue below $1 million USD. If you are one of them, it’s the right time to grab the offer and use over 650 high quality components in your application.

 

Be a successful developer by using high quality product. Don’t wait!!! To know more about the products and get the free license of Syncfusion Enterprise Edition community license, read more.

Published by on under News | Syncfusion

Today I have received the certificate of recognition from Microsoft as a “Windows 10 Champion” for my contributions towards the Windows 10 Community. This means a lot for me. Thank you Microsoft, Biplab Paul and Gandharv Rawat for recognizing my contributions.

 

This post is not about any technical brief but just to share with you the love and the certificate of recognition that I received from Microsoft.

Published by on under Awards | Windows

Microsoft has announced a new Windows 10 build for the Windows Insiders and has already aired to the Fast ring users. If you are one of them, you might have already received update notification of the Windows 10 build 10565. This build came with some new features and bug fixes.

 

Read more to find out the list of new features, bug fixes and known issues. As it is a preview build, known and unknown issues are quite possible.

Published by on under News | WinDev

After the final release of Visual Studio 2015 in the month of July 2015, Microsoft has released the Update 1 CTP version of the all new Visual Studio 2015 IDE. This update has few new features for the developers, bug fixes and known issues. It’s a preview release and hence cannot guaranteed as bug free.

 

In case you want to try out the latest bits, find the download link in this post. Don’t forget to check out the release notes before downloading it.

Published by on under News | Visual Studio 2015

More or less everyone in this computing world are familiar with PDF documents aka. Portable Document Formats, which opens in Acrobat Reader or any other compatible PDF Reader applications. Prior to Windows 10, it was not quite easy to create PDF document unless you have Acrobat Writer or Office 2013 installed in your system.

 

With Windows 10, Microsoft brought this feature by default with the operating system, by which, you can now easily create PDF document from any files or web page. Let’s check how to do it.

Published by on under Tips | Win10Tips

October 1st is generally a big day for me like others who are in the same renewal cycle of the most precious award called “Microsoft Most Valuable Professional (MVP)”. I am happy to announce that, I have been rewarded as Microsoft MVP for the sixth time is a row for my continuous support in the developer community.

 

Thanks a lot to Microsoft, Microsoft MVP Award team and Biplab Paul for this special recognition. This means a lot for me. Thank you all my community friends for your support and feedback throughout the year.

Published by on under Achievements | Awards

Windows 10 provides an easy way to hide notifications. You can handle it in different ways; either you can completely turn off or can turn off for specific apps. If you are a presenter, you can also ask the system to turn off all notifications while you are in presenting mode.

 

In this post, we will discuss all the different approaches and guide you to easily handle it as per your convenient way. Continue reading to know further about it.

Published by on under Tips | Win10Tips

If you are building an outlook Add-In and looking for a code to programmatically search and highlight texts inside an email body, this post will help you to understand the steps with proper code snippet. Just you have to plugin to proper event based on your  business logic.

 

Continue reading to learn and implement the same in your Add-In and in case you are facing issues, drop a line and I will try to reply back as soon as possible.

Published by on under Office | Outlook

The giant company made the announcement. 22nd September, the date was already set for this released and as expected the latest version of the company’s Office suite is now available. If you are using Office 2013, you will see a bunch of new features in this version focusing more on team collaboration.

 

Along with Office 2016 for Windows, Microsoft also released Office 2016 for Mac. Find out more links and videos attached in this blog post and know “why you should upgrade to Office 2016“.

Published by on under News | Office

With the Windows 10 preview build 10547 for fast ring Windows Insiders, Microsoft now allows you to add more tiles in a Start menu/Start screen group. In the prior version, it only supports 3 columns of medium sized tiles but with this build 4 columns of medium sized tiles is possible.

 

Continue reading this post to learn out more on this topic as well as to know the way to change the settings and allow more no. of tiles in a Start group.

Published by on under Tips | Win10Tips

Microsoft has released another new build of Windows 10 to the fast ring users of Windows Insiders, numbered as 10547. This new build introduces new features and improvements, as well as bug fixes. As this is a preview build, it definitely has some known issues and already mentioned in release posts by Gabe Aul.

 

This post is just an announcement along with the features list, list of fixes and known issues. Before going to download via the Windows Update, check out the issues list.

Published by on under News | WinDev

Gabe Aul, the head of Microsoft's Windows Insider program, in a blog post today announced that Microsoft has started rolling out Windows 10 for Mobile build 10536 for the fast ring Windows Insiders. If you are already part of Windows Insiders and in the fast ring, check out the phone update to get the notifications.

 

Before going further to update your device, you should first know what has been fixed and what are the known issues in this build. This post will detail those referring the announcement made by Gabe Aul.

Published by on under News | WinDev

If you are using Windows 10 in Laptop or Tablet PCs, you might notice that it drains battery little bit quicker. This is not due to the OS, but for the apps running in the background. In Windows 10, you can easily turn OFF the background apps and when needed, you can turn them back to ON state.

 

Today in this blog post, we will discuss how to turn ON or OFF the background apps with proper screenshots. Continue reading to learn more about the feature.

Published by on under Tips | Win10Tips

These days, most of us are using Cloud Storage to store all our documents, pictures and other important files as a backup. Among them few important services are like OneDrive, Drop Box, Google Drive etc. and all of those mentioned services has easy to integrate apps to access your files.

 

OneDrive app comes along with Windows 8+ and has a very good integration with Windows 10. Apart from app, you can also map your OneDrive account as a network drive in File Explorer. In this post, we are going to discuss on it.

Published by on under OneDrive | Tips

If you stay online while navigating in map, it takes additional time and bandwidth to download and show in your device. Why to bear that additional cost in a metered connection, whereas Windows 10 allows you to download the map data selectively for offline uses? Just download once and use it every time.

 

In this post I will show you how to download offline maps in Windows 10. Also, I will cover few additional settings related to it. Continue reading and then share this post.

Published by on under Tips | Win10Tips

Microsoft Edge is the new web browser on Windows 10, came with a completely new interface and has better speed than other browsers including Internet Explorer, Chrome etc. As the UI of Microsoft Edge is different than the Internet Explorer, you might get it little difficult to find all it’s settings and features.

 

If you are using this new browser and looking to clear the browser history, saved passwords, browser cache and other browsing data, here is how to do this. Continue reading to know about it further.

Published by on under Microsoft Edge | Tips

Do you want to be the first to hear about the latest innovation on Azure platform and want to find the way to address your IT challenges? Microsoft came up with a free, virtual event named “AzureCon” and scheduled for Tuesday, the 29th September 2015. If you work on Azure or interested to learn about it, don’t miss this opportunity.

 

More than 50 technical sessions are planned for this event to accelerate your journey to the cloud. Join the live Q&A sessions and interact with the architects and engineers who are building the latest features.

Published by on under Azure | Events

I was just exploring the new features in OneDrive and found an interesting feature that came up with Windows 10. It calls as fetch any files remotely using OneDrive. For this, your PC must be synced with OneDrive having an active internet connection and the associated settings must be enabled.

 

In this post we will discuss more about this feature and also see the settings which needs to be enabled. Continue reading and share your views on this existing new feature.

Published by on under OneDrive | Tips

Who doesn’t want to be productive? Everyone, right? And this accelerates when you know some most useful keyboard shortcuts. Windows 10 specifies few new keyboard shortcuts along with existing shortcuts which were available for a long time. Using these keyboard shortcuts, you can improve your day-2-day activities.

 

In this post, I am sharing the Windows 10 keyboard shortcuts along with the descriptions of each key combination. If I missed any, let me know so that, I can update this post for future references.

Published by on under Tips | Win10Tips

Are you using OneDrive to store your documents, pictures and musics? If not, you should start using it. OneDrive is secure and has very good integration with Windows 10. The app itself creates local copy of the selected files/folders and you are just one step away to store and retrieve files.

 

In Windows 10, it also offers one click sharing option directly from the explorer window. In this post, we will discuss about it. Read more to continue.

Published by on under OneDrive | Win10Tips

Microsoft released Windows 10 preview build 10532 for Windows Insiders. If you are one of the fast ring beta testers, you might have already received the build notification via the Windows Update Service. It is the second public preview build after the release of Windows 10 RTM.

 

There are few bug fixes and interesting features in this build. This post will cover what’s new in build 10532. The post will also cover a small list of known issues.

Published by on under News | WinDev

Everyone cares about internet data usage, especially when they are using a limited bandwidth. Most of the people don’t have a free or unlimited internet connection. Hence, it’s require to check which application of your Windows installation mostly uses your internet bandwidth.

 

Microsoft provides a way to check the network usage by different applications in Windows 10. In this post, we are going to discuss on this. Continue reading to further know about it.

Published by on under Tips | Win10Tips

Storage Sense is one of the great feature Microsoft has brought to Windows 10. The feature analyses the files on your hard drive and tells you how much space is actually occupied by different types of content. It also suggests you to locate and clean up unused files/contents.

 

In this blog post, we will discuss about Storage Sense in Windows 10. This will help you to keep track of and manage the files on your drive. Continue reading to know more about this feature.

Published by on under Tips | Win10Tips

Like Windows Phone 8.1, Microsoft also included quick actions and better notification system in Windows 10. You can customize the quick action buttons and select the favorite four from a collection of eleven action buttons. Not only this, you can also choose settings to customize the notifications.

 

In this post of the Windows 10 Tips & Tricks series, we will go thru the settings page in order to understand the various options to customize the quick actions and notifications in Windows 10.

Published by on under Tips | Win10Tips

You might be interested on turning off some system icons from the system tray to gain some space in your taskbar. This situation might arise when you have too many icons there and/or you want to turn off some system icons from your system tray. This is also applicable for the systray clock.

 

If you want to do so and looking around an option in Windows 10, this post will definitely help you. Continue reading to find out the steps with screenshots.

Published by on under Tips | Win10Tips

Starting Google Chrome version 42, Google has blocked NPAPI plugins in their browser and as a result, you will not be able to run Silverlight applications in your Chrome browser. So, what to do? There is a quick but temporary solution by which you will be able to re-enable the plugin.

 

In this blog post today, we are going to detail the process. Do remember that, it’s a temporary solution and won’t work in future release of Google Chrome.

Published by on under Chrome | Silverlight

Cortana is a personal digital assistant, which can provide you suggestions, ideas, reminders, alerts, parcel tracking information, flight information and more. Have you tried Cortana yet in Windows 10? If you are in region where this feature exists, you might have already experienced this.

 

In Windows 10, you can configure Cortana to launch by just saying “Hey Cortana” and can train her to understand your voice. In this post, we will learn how to train Cortana to learn your speech.

Published by on under Tips | Windows

Gabe Aul, the head of Microsoft's Windows Insider program, in a blog post today announced that Microsoft has rolled out it’s first Windows Insiders Preview build after RTM having build no. 10525. If you are a Windows Insider in the first ring, check for Windows Update and you might have receive it by now.

 

Remember that, it’s a preview build and has numerous known issues. These issues are already published by Microsoft and mentioned in this post too.

Published by on under News | WinDev

Another feature of Microsoft Edge in Windows 10 is the ability to take Web Note easily without any additional tool or plugin. Using this, you can not only able to take web note, but also can mark, highlight, comment in that captured note before saving it.

 

Today we will show you how to do this. Continue reading the post and let us know, what you think about Web Note in Edge browser.

Published by on under Microsoft Edge | Tips

Visual Studio 2015 is an integrated, end-to-end solution for defining, building and managing  applications and solutions targeting Microsoft and other cross-platform technologies for Windows, iOS, Android and more by using a single IDE.

 

Syncfusion author “Alessandro Del Sole” (Microsoft MVP) recently published a 122 pages of eBook which is available for free download and this post provides you details and links of it.

Published by on under eBook | News

If you have recently upgraded to Windows 10, you have noticed that, it ate a huge space from your system drive where Windows is installed. Actually it creates backup of the existing Windows installation in case you want to revert back.

 

Though, in general it is not require to keep this space but in case you are falling short of space, you might want to recover approx. 18-20 GB of your drive by following the simple steps.

Published by on under Tips | Windows

Microsoft today announced REST APIs for mail, calendar and contacts having support for both Office 365 and Outlook.com. Now you can build apps for Outlook, Outlook.com and Office 365 users with one set of APIs targeting Windows, iOS, Android, Node.js, Ruby and more.

 

In this post, find more about the announcement and further links to proceed with. If you are a developer, you might want to try this.

Published by on under News | Office

Microsoft rolled out Windows 10 Mobile Insider Preview build 10512 for Windows Insiders on the  fast ring. Check for an update right now on your phone, if you are one of the testers. Microsoft also mentioned about more frequent builds for phones in coming days.

 

Check out this post to know “What’s new in Windows 10 insider build 10512 for phones” and “Known issues” currently there in this build.

Published by on under News | WinDev

Many people shared over different channels that, setting the default browser in Windows 10 is little difficult. For those who not yet played with the system, want to let you know that, it’s not difficult rather it is just a few clicks to set the default browser.

 

By default, Microsoft Edge sets as the default browser in Windows 10, but in case you want to switch, this post will help you to set it up.

Published by on under Tips | Windows

Microsoft Edge, you might have heard the name. Yes, that’s the new browser that has been introduced by Microsoft with Windows 10. If you have installed the new OS, you might have noticed that, Microsoft Edge is set as the default browser while installation.

 

In this blog post, we will discuss settings related to home page and also discuss how to set multiple home pages in Microsoft Edge.

Published by on under Microsoft Edge | Tips

If you have installed Windows 10, you have noticed that Microsoft released a new browser named “Microsoft Edge” with this new operating system. Internet Explorer is still present in Windows 10, but the default browser that you find is Edge, once you install Win 10.

 

In this blog post, we will discuss how to import the bookmark/favorites from another browser in Microsoft Edge. Continue reading to learn about it.

Published by on under Microsoft Edge | Tips

If you are facing issues installing .NET Framework 3.5 (many applications actually need this to run) in your Windows 10 and all the other options failed, my dear friend, you came to perfect page where I will show you how to install the same.

 

In this blog post, we will learn the command by which you can install .NET Framework 3.5 in Windows 10. This also works in other versions of Windows.

Published by on under .Net | Windows

Who wants to bear additional cost of data usage when you can connect your phone to a Wi-Fi connection, where you can utilize your internet connection bandwidth? This works fine if you have Wi-Fi hotspot. But what will happen in case you don’t have a router?

 

In this post, we will learn how to create a Wi-Fi hotspot in your Windows 10 PC without using any router or any 3rd party software. Continue to read more.

Published by on under Windows | Windows 10

Windows Update Delivery Optimization let’s enable you to receive Windows updates from various sources other than Microsoft. This can be systems in your local network or internet, which already download the update files.

 

In this post sharing with you the process to turn ON/OFF the Windows Update Delivery Optimization in Windows 10. I hope, most of you already upgraded to this new OS.

Published by on under DZone | Windows

Many of you asked me, why you didn’t receive the Windows 10 upgrade notification even though you reserved your free copy of Windows 10. Please note that, this is going in phases and you will get it soon. Might be, your update files already started downloading.

 

If you can not wait and want to force the same, you can do so by following some simple steps. Continue reading to know more.

Published by on under Windows | Windows 10

Along with global launch of Windows 10 build 10240 (RTM), Microsoft opened the path for the developers to build and publish apps for Windows 10. The Software Development Kit (SDK) is available for download. This SDK for Windows 10 contains headers, libraries and tools you can use to build apps.

 

In this post, sharing/bookmarking the link to download the SDK Tools for Windows 10 along with the known issues currently there in this build.

Published by on under DZone | News

It’s 29th July 2015 and long waited Windows 10 has been finally launched globally. If you are a consumer, you can now download and upgrade your Windows 7/8.x system for free. If you are a Windows Insider, you might have already installed it a few days ago.

 

This post will cover how to download the Windows 10 installation media and create an ISO image using the “Windows 10 media creation tool”.

Published by on under News | Windows

If you are already using Windows 10 Technical Preview, you might noticed that, you can not selectively install Windows updates now. Microsoft forces the updates to push in your system by default, but this recently caused some issues to few people.

 

Thus, Microsoft released a tool named “Show or Hide updates troubleshooter”, which will allow you to remove and/or block selective updates.

Published by on under Tips | Win10Tips

It’s 20th July 2015 and Microsoft hosted a launch event online and released Visual Studio 2015 for the developers, by which you can create multi-platform apps for Windows, iOS, Android, and more by using a single IDE.

 

In this post, sharing the links to download the Visual Studio 2015 web installer, ISO image for offline installation. Apart from the community edition, the other versions are trial versions unless you have a license code.

Published by on under News | Tech News

Microsoft announced the availability of a new open source library to integrate various functions of Facebook in your Windows apps. The new Windows SDK for Facebook will allow developers to enhance socializing in their Universal Windows apps.

 

This post will cover link to download the SDK, features list currently available and few more interesting links to continue with the integration.

Published by on under DZone | Facebook

Few days ago, I wrote about “Introduction to Azure Mobile Services” and I hope, that gave you basic overview of the same. As ongoing tutorial on this subject, we will learn how to integrate mobile service in our app to utilize the already available APIs.

 

But before that, we need to create the service. Today, in this blog post, we will learn how to create the mobile service from the Azure portal.

Published by on under Azure | Azure Tutorial

Did you install the latest version of Windows 10 Technical Preview? Microsoft added “Pin to Start” option to the Settings page icons, by which we will be able to pin any settings page in the Start Screen. So, from now onwards you will be able to pin your favorite settings icon for easy access.

 

In this post, let’s briefly describe the feature introduced in Windows 10 Technical Preview. Be ready for the Windows 10 launch on 29th July.

Published by on under Tips | Win10Tips

Windows 1 was first released in the year 1985 and after 30 years having so many versions of Windows, Microsoft is going to release Windows 10 on 29th July 2015. MicrosoftTraining.net has created an infographic of different versions of Windows operating system till now.

 

As per their request, I am sharing the infographic with you. Hope, you will like that. There is also a link to the high resolution image at the end of this post.

Published by on under Windows | Windows 10

Windows 10 updates comes as Windows update service, but in case if you have downloaded the ISO image of the Windows 10 installation media, you might want to create a bootable USB device from it for fresh installation.

 

You can easily create this bootable device from the ISO image using the ZOTAC WinUSB Maker, which is available freely. In this post we will discuss how to do it. Continue to read more.

Published by on under Windows | Windows 10

Windows 10, which is now near to polishing stage before final release, came with many new features and enhancements; that includes the UI, settings and apps. It’s still in Technical Preview version with the latest build no: 10162.

 

In this post, we are going to know the latest changes happened in the Windows Snipping Tool, which many users uses most of the days to take screenshots.

Published by on under Tips | Win10Tips

Big announcement just arrived. In a blog post, S. Somasegar, corporate vice president of the Developer Division at Microsoft announced the release date of Visual Studio 2015 RTM, .NET Framework 4.6 and Team Foundation Server 2015.

 

July 20 is the date when Microsoft is organizing the Visual Studio 2015 final release event online at 3:30 pm UTC (8:30 am PDT). Don’t forget to watch the live event.

Published by on under DZone | News

After pausing for few days, I have decided to write a series of tutorials in this blog. This time, I have chosen Azure Mobile Services based on the overwhelming responses I have received on Azure in my past few events. It’s better to be late than never and thus I am starting with an introduction to Azure mobile service.

 

In this post, we will learn about mobile service, it’s benefits followed by in-depth chapters on the same along with integration in Windows/Windows Phone apps.

Published by on under Azure | Azure Tutorial