Looking at Windows Presentation Foundation

Yes, of course, as a .NET guy, I also use VS. Due to my new job I also have to use it frequently. I was very much interested in WPF in the first place. I already bought a book about it about six months ago, however, the beta releases and previews never allowed me to have a proper look at it. But since Tuesday, when Microsoft released VS 2008, that all changed. I truly have to say that after getting into ECO, this is definitely technology that has me amazingly excited for hours and hours. It is just cool how quickly you can build fancy looking interfaces without having to break any sweat - that’s what marketing says. It is not easy and you will stumble at first, that needs to be said. You have to get yourself acquainted with things like XAML, a XML-based language, and a big chunk of new classes [...]. Furthermore, there is not only VS involved. You also need to look at things like Expression Blend and Expression Design in order to design your applications properly. You can do it in VS, but the designer is still not as comfortable to use compared to Expression Blend. But from what I have seen so far, the high learning curve will be worth it. I successfully wrote examples that use data binding, even converter classes that transform values (more precise: objects) before they are shown…

The reason for this blog entry is to change this wonderful page with you that will get you started with WPF. It is called “WPF Bootcamp” and contains quite a lot of - free - sessions about WPF. You can find it at http://www.visitmix.com/university/wpf/wpfbootcamp.htm.

I can hardly wait for CapableObjects to announce an ECO version that has templates for WPF applications. Yes, I forgot to blog about it, but the VS beta for ECO is open. You may apply for a beta license key and a link to download the software at http://www.capableobjects.com.

Well, back to the bootcamp…