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DevComponents.comRecently I explored DotNetBar for Silverlight which is a 3rd Party library by DevComponents. I wrote two articles explaining Ribbon Controls for Silverlight from the DotNetBar library. It's amazing and simple to use. I have my own license of that Library. Thought to give some licenses to my Blog readers and Twitter followers.

 

Read this post to know more about DotNetBar and if you feel that you want it, try to Win the license for FREE. This time I am going to give 4 Silverlight Licenses of the same. So, more chances to Win. Hurry!!! The free registration process will end on 28th February 2011.

Published by on under DevComponent | Silverlight

In my previous article "Exploring Ribbon Control for Silverlight (Part - 1)", we discussed about the Ribbon control Library provided by Devcomponents. We created a small demo application, where we integrated the Ribbon control bar in the XAML.

 

 

In this article, we will discuss more on the Ribbon control items. It will be helpful for you to understand them in depth and use it in your application. Read the complete post and at the end, let me know your feedbacks.

Published by on under DevComponent | Silverlight

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Earlier in December 2010, I posted three articles on DataGrid titled as "Grouping Records in Silverlight DataGrid using PagedCollectionView", "Filtering Records in Silverlight DataGrid using PagedCollectionView" and "Paginating Records in Silverlight DataGrid using PagedCollectionView". If you didn't read them, go thru each articles to know more about Silverlight DataGrid.

 

One of my reader "Dan" asked me to write an article on "Group Row Header customization of Silverlight DataGrid" and here is that article for you. If you want to do UI customization of Row Group Header, this article will definitely help you. Here, I will show you how to modify the XAML to add different content to create a multi level row group header too.

Published by on under DataGrid | ExpressionBlend

Microsoft Office 2010 has a cool new Ribbon Control bar which looks pretty rich and it is very easy to use with compare to the old Menu bar. Probably you may know that, we can create such Ribbon bar using WPF but did anyone think whether we can do it using Silverlight too, very easily?

 

DotNetBar Ribbon Silverlight Control with Office styling

 

Yes, we can create such Ribbon UI for our Silverlight application. So, if you want it for your Silverlight application, you can implement it very easily after reading these series of articles on Ribbon control.

Published by on under DevComponent | Silverlight

Do you work with Child Window in Silverlight and want to customize the look & feel to match with your application UI? Then this post will help you to understand the process. I am going to discuss with you the customization steps in detail, so that, next time when you want to modify your Child Window UI, you will find it very useful.

 

In this article, I will guide you through the steps of customization with the help of a sample application. We will need Microsoft Expression Blend for the full customization. Read the complete article to learn about it.

Published by on under ExpressionBlend | Silverlight

imageVisual Studio LightSwitch is a new tool for building data-driven Silverlight Application using Visual Studio IDE. It automatically generates the User Interface for a DataSource without writing any code. You can write a small amount of code also to meet your requirement.

 

In my previous chapter “Beginners Guide to Visual Studio LightSwitch (Part – 4)” I guided you step-by-step process to create a List and Details screen. There I demonstrated you, how to integrate two or more tables inside a single screen.

 

In this chapter, I am going to demonstrate you of doing custom validation using Visual Studio LightSwitch. This time we will jump into writing some code to extend the functionalities.

Published by on under LightSwitch | LightSwitchTutorial

imageToday morning I received the great news that, I have been awarded as CodeProject Most Valuable Professional (MVP). It's definitely a great achievement for me.

 

Last year I wrote 32 articles, added 37 small blog articles, 8 Tips & Tricks in CodeProject; also I answered some queries in Technical forums. I was an active GIT forum member too. All this effort gave me the fruit. Last year, received the Microsoft MVP award for Silverlight and this year from CodeProject. Wuhu!!!

Published by on under Achievements | Awards

On 11th November, I declared a Contest to giveaway a Developer License of Telerik RadControls for Silverlight which costs around $799. The contest ended on 25th December 2010 and as mentioned, I am going to announce the Winner of this contest in this post today.

 

I got a huge response in this contest and it was very difficult for me to chose the Winner but finally the Winner’s name is in my hand. Read to know who among of you will receive the $799 of Telerik RadControls License.

Published by on under ExpressionBlend | Silverlight

As predicted, the site is Live now (1st January 2011, Indian Standard Time) and you will find 100+ great posts on Silverlight and Windows Phone 7 already fetched from 2010 to start with the site.

 

 

I will daily add new Silverlight related posts in this site and the Twitter account @SilverlightZone will broadcast the news whenever a new post made. So, follow @SilverlightZone in your Twitter client to be updated on the latest Silverlight related stuffs.

Published by on under News |

To all my followers: “Wish you and your family a Happy and Prosperous New Year 2011". May God make you more knowledgeable in the coming year and give you more prosperity than ever.”

 

The year 2010 is over. We did lots of things in 2010 and let us do more on 2011 and deliver our best to our work.

 

Thanks for all your support and vote to my articles. This gave me more energy to deliver more contents to you. Keep supporting me always in the coming year and I will try to deliver as much as I can. Stay in touch with me in the year 2011. Don’t forget to read the whole post to know more about my work in 2010.

Published by on under News |

Microsoft Virtual Techdays is the India’s Premier online Technical Event. This was the 10th edition of the series, started on 22nd November 2010 and continued for 3 days. On 23rd November 2010, I delivered my session on “Building Visual Studio LightSwitch Application” and the session video is online now.

 

If you missed to attend the session, you can view it online or download it from the given link.

 

Published by on under .Net | Events

It was a nice time to present myself to the audience to deliver my presentation on Visual Studio LightSwitch for Silverlight application development in Pune Developer Conference (DevCon) event organized by Pune User Group. Today my session was from 2:45pm. Though the count of attendees was low than the expected count but they really enjoyed to know about LightSwitch.

 

Thanks to all who attended my session. Those who were unable to attend it for any reason, can view the PPT online. You can also download it for your future reference.

Published by on under .Net | Events

DevCon is a technical event to communicate, collaborate and connect with like-minded technology enthusiasts. The event comprises technology presentations, scenario showcases on the latest and most upcoming Microsoft Technologies.

 

Speakers focus on providing technical solutions for line of business applications allowing professionals to get insight into their structured learning experiences.

 

It is going to happen on 18th and 19th December 2010 in Pune, Maharashtra, India. I am going to speak on 19th December. Read the full post to know more about the session agenda and schedule. Don’t forget to register for the event.

Published by on under .Net | Events

imageDo you have a huge collection of data inside your DataGrid and want to integrate Pagination to show records page by page and don’t know how to do? Then this article will help you to understand the same.

 

After reading this article, you will be able to integrate pagination to your DataGrid to do the paging automatically by using a simple trick. Read the complete article to know about it. Feedback/Suggestions are always appreciated.

Published by on under DataGrid | Silverlight

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In my last article, we discussed about “Grouping Records in Silverlight DataGrid using PagedCollectionView” where we grouped our data records by column name using the PagedCollectionView.

 

In this article, we will see how this PagedCollectionView will help us to filter out the records based on the search keyword. Not much code but the trick done with the same class will do everything for us in some easy way. We will learn about this here in this article. Not only this, we will also see the filtering on top of the grouped records too. Read the complete article to see it in action.

Published by on under DataGrid | Silverlight

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Do you work with Silverlight DataGrid and want to group your records inside the DataGrid in a proper manner? If so, this article is for you. Here we will learn about data grouping inside a DataGrid.

 

In this article, we will learn how to group data inside a Grid. We will discuss all these steps-by-step and with proper images, so that, you can understand it very easily.

 

The full source code has been attached. You can freely download it and that will be more helpful for you to understand. Read the complete article to learn it.

Published by on under DataGrid | Silverlight

Today is the 2nd December 2010, when ScottGu gave a Keynote on the future of Silverlight. There he spoke about the next version of Silverlight, yes, Silverlight 5 Beta. He gave a brief overview of the new & improved features which are coming in Silverlight 5.

 

 

Read the full post to know more about the features of Silverlight 5. Silverlight 5 Beta is not yet launched. This is just the preview of the features which are going to come in this new version.

Published by on under CodeProject | News

image110Visual Studio LightSwitch is a new tool for building data-driven Silverlight Application using Visual Studio IDE. It automatically generates the User Interface for a DataSource without writing any code. You can write a small amount of code also to meet your requirement.

 

In my previous chapter “Beginners Guide to Visual Studio LightSwitch (Part – 3)”, I described you how to create a DataGrid of records to insert/update/delete records.

 

In this chapter, I will guide you to create a List and Details screen using LightSwitch. This will show you how to integrate two or more tables into a single screen. Also, we will discuss on some custom validation. These all steps are without writing any code. We will use just the tool to improve our existing application. Read to Learn more about it.

Published by on under LightSwitch | LightSwitchTutorial

In my earlier post “How to Reposition a Silverlight Child Window?”, I demonstrated you how to reposition a Silverlight Child Window into the screen. I tried the same with the WPF Modal Window too. But was not able to make it.

 

Later Thomas Claudiush gave me a cool sample where he did it very easily. In this post, I am going to share that code for you so that, if in near future you need the same behavior, you don’t have to research for it again.

Published by on under Tips | WPF

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Today I delivered the 1 hour session on “Building Visual Studio LightSwitch Application” in Microsoft Virtual Techdays from 1:45PM – 2:45PM (Indian Standard Time). It was my first public session and due to this, I was little nervous when I started my presentation. But when I jumped into the demo, I got some confidence on that.

 

Here, I am going to share the whole presentation for those who wasn’t able to join. Thanks to all my attendees for joining the session.

 

Don’t forget to give your feedback (online/offline) about the session. It will give me more confidence on my next session and from your feedback I will be able to improve my presentation skill.

Published by on under .Net | Events

Sometime we need to reset the position of the Silverlight Child Window at the center of the screen. This generally require when you have a static instance of the ChildWindow and you want to use the same instance to show various messages in the screen. When you loads the ChildWindow for the first time, by default it loads at the screen center. But think when your user reposition that ChildWindow to a different location in the screen, closes and reopens it, what will happen?

 

What will you see is, the ChildWindow opens at the same location where the user closes it last time. So, how can we reset it to the center of the screen? This small tip will help you to achieve the functionality. Read it to know more details. Code is available for use.

Published by on under CodeProject | Silverlight

Microsoft Virtual Techdays is again back. It’s a three days event, starting from 22nd November to 24th November 2010. This time I am going to speak in this Virtual Techdays on 23rd November. Join me at 1:45 PM (IST) to learn about “Building Visual Studio LightSwitch Application”.

 

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Read the complete post to know more about this event and registration process.

Published by on under .Net | Events

One of my reader “Girish” recently contacted me with a problem statement. His problem is, he wants to show a TextBox on selection of “Others” from a ComboBox and I informed him to use a ValueConverter and also told him, I will do a blog post on it, so that he can understand each step from that.

 

This post I am dedicating to him. May be, some other people who are new to Silverlight can get benefit from it. Read the full post to learn the process to do it.

Published by on under MVVM | Silverlight

In some case, we need to customize the Scrolling functionality in Silverlight depending upon the requirement. The default look of ScrollViewer doesn’t give proper UI effect. In such case, you need to create the whole scroll behavior by modifying XAML and writing a bunch of C# code.

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In this article, I will demonstrate you how to create the above scrolling functionality simply without writing any lines of C# code. You have to use only Expression Blend to create the richness of the Scrolling. Read more to learn about it.

Published by on under CodeProject | ExpressionBlend
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Last time I did a Giveaway of Telerik JustCode Developer license of $299 and this time as a Silverlight Geek, I thought to giveaway a developer license of Telerik RadControls for Silverlight which costs around $799 to one of my readers & followers.

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Gift with a bow    If you want to Win it, read the complete post for details. Share this information to all your friends by tweet, mail or blog. Hope to see one of you as the Winner. All the best… Thumbs up

Published by on under ExpressionBlend | Silverlight

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Visual Studio LightSwitch is a new tool for building data-driven Silverlight Application using Visual Studio IDE. It automatically generates the User Interface for a DataSource without writing any code. You can write a small amount of code also to meet your requirement.

 

In my previous chapter “Beginners Guide to Visual Studio LightSwitch (Part – 2)”, I described you how to create a search record window & export the records to Excel Sheet using Visual Studio LightSwitch for Silverlight. I also demonstrated about sorting and navigating records without writing a single line of code.

 

In this chapter, I will guide you step-by-step to create a DataGrid of records. Here you will know, how to insert/modify/delete records. These all steps are without writing any code. We will use just the tool to improve our existing application. Read more to Learn about it.

Published by on under LightSwitch | LightSwitchTutorial

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I have seen people writing Code Behind a lot while they are working in the MVVM framework. A huge lines of code in their xaml.cs file actually creates problem to the designers to change anything present in the XAML. Why is this so? Because, lots of people don’t know how to use Triggers to call the MVVM methods to complete their business need.

 

Michael Washington has a nice article on DataTrigger to reduce the Code behind file. It definitely reduces the problem of MVVM that world faces generally. Also, we need to do some additional things to reduce the code behind.

 

In this article, I will show you how to fire Triggers to call some methods present in your ViewModel, instead of writing in the code behind file. Read more to learn about it.

Published by on under MVVM | Silverlight

After the recent PDC 2010 event, we saw lots of tweets on Twitter about the same question “Is Silverlight Dead? Is HTML5 is going to take over the Silverlight? Is Microsoft changing their vision?” etc. etc. The answer is “No”. No need to worry about it. Silverlight is still there and will be there for Rich application development & smooth media streaming for long.

 

Read the whole post to know more about it.

Published by on under News | PDC2010

imageVisual Studio LightSwitch is a new tool for building data-driven Silverlight Application using Visual Studio IDE. It automatically generates the User Interface for a DataSource without writing any code. You can write a small amount of code also to meet your requirement.

 

In my previous Chapter “Beginners Guide to Visual Studio LightSwitch (Part–1)” I described about LightSwitch and did demonstration from creating a new LightSwitch project to create a simple form to insert new Student record.

 

In this article, I will show you how to create a search record window & export the records to Excel Sheet using Visual Studio LightSwitch for Silverlight. No need to write a single piece of code, no need to write a single XAML code. Read through the complete article to learn more about it.

Published by on under LightSwitch | LightSwitchTutorial

In all of my earlier articles on Silverlight Out-of-Browser (OOB) applications, I demonstrated you creating the OOB application using Visual Studio. There are plenty of steps you have to follow there. Today I found another way to change the settings for it.

 

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In this post, I am going to discuss about both the processes and at the end tell me which one is best & simple.

Published by on under ExpressionBlend | Silverlight

Are you looking for a Silverlight Child Window, which can’t move from it’s actual position? Then this article will help you to understand & create a non-movable child window in Silverlight.

 

Child Window is available inside the System.Windows.Controls.dll assembly. By default, it is movable. You can drag the Title Bar of the Window and position it anywhere in the screen. But, you may face some situation when you need to fix the position of the Window by restricting the user to drag it. So, how will you do this?

 

In this article, I will show you the simplest mechanism to make your child window not movable.

Published by on under Silverlight | SilverlightTips
imageVisual Studio LightSwitch is a new tool for building data-driven Silverlight Application using Visual Studio IDE. It automatically generates the User Interface for a DataSource without writing any code. You can write a small amount of code also to meet your requirement.

Recently, I got some time to explore Visual Studio LightSwitch. I created a small DB application with proper data inserting UI within a small amount of time (without any XAML or C# code).

Here in this article, I will guide you to understand it with the help of a small application. There will be a series of articles on this topic regularly. Read the complete article to learn about creating a Silverlight data driven application with the help of Visual Studio LightSwitch.
Published by on under LightSwitch | LightSwitchTutorial

Few days ago, I started a Giveaway of Telerik JustCode License (only for one Developer) which prices around $249. Very few responses I received and from that too, it was very difficult for me to select the Winner.

 

Telerik JustCode is an agile development add-in for Visual Studio 2005, 2008 and 2010 that enhances .NET development productivity by providing blazing fast solution-wide, on-the-fly code analysis and error checking, smart code navigation and refactoring features.

 

In this thread, I am going to declare the Winner. Read to know more about it.

Published by on under News | Telerik

Few days ago, in one my earlier post, I listed “Some Best Practices for C# Application Development” from my past few years experience, which got a huge hit by my readers. I got several feedbacks on that too. Many of my readers gave valued suggestions too.

 

In this article, I will discuss most of those points. I will keep this article regularly updated with new best coding practices. Hope, I will get more feedbacks and/or suggestions here too.

Published by on under .Net | C# 4.0
One of the new features introduced in Silverlight 4 is the silent installation of Silverlight Out-of-Browser application. This means, without user intervention, you can directly install them to their machines. You don’t have to open the browser window to install the OOB app. This is perfect for CD-ROM distribution. You can even automate the process from the CD/DVD media; if the user already has permission to auto run external media.

Here in this article, I will first create a simple OOB Silverlight application and then show you the steps to install it as OOB application silently from a CDROM device which will install the Silverlight runtime too, if it detects the absent of the same in user’s PC.
Published by on under .Net | Silverlight

Silverlight Firestarter is a one day Global event, live streamed by Scott Guthrie and others. It will be held in Redmond on 2nd December 2010 from 8am to 5pm PST. Scott will start the Keynote at 9am PST.

 

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The whole session will be conducted by Scott Guthrie, Jesse Liberty, John Papa, Tim Heuer, Mike Cook, Jossef Goldberg, Jaime Rodriguez and other. Join the session In-Person or online and learn more about the future of Silverlight.

Published by on under Events | News