Twittering with friends seems to be the new “thing-to-do” on the web these days. Many bloggers are using it and it has even made its way into an episode of CSI! So what exactly is Twitter you ask? Twitter is an online web service that lets you post what you are doing - in 140 characters or less - in which those who are “following” can track what you’re doing based on what you post. Bloggers sometimes also use Twitter to share URLs and to share quick thoughts on a variety of topics.

Now I said that Twitter was a web service right? Well the Twitter developers have released an API in which developers can use to create “Twitter clients” to be used outside the web browser.

Alan Le, from the company Vertigo, has utilized the Twitter API and designed a WPF Twitter client called Witty that extends the Twitter experience into Windows Vista. If you recall, WPF (Windows Presentation Foundation) is built in to Windows Vista.  

I also blogged about another awesome product from the Vertigo folks back in August called Family.Show. Family.Show is a WPF app used in tracking family history and creating a family tree.

With Witty, I can quickly receive updates from people I am following as well as quickly post on what I’m doing (or any specific thought quickly I might have) quickly as the app nicely sits on my notification area of my taskbar.

Download: Witty 0.1.5 (986Kb)

To install Witty, just download the .zip file (above) and extract to a folder on your PC. Once the files are extracted, open the folder the files were extracted to and double click on Witty.exe. Feel free to follow me! You cal also follow the Windows Vista Team Blog on Twitter as well - which will update whenever a new post is made here on the blog.

Please note that the latest version of Witty released is 0.1.5 - which is what I recommend you use. My screenshots reflect 0.1.6 but it is an early alpha (pre-beta) version of Witty I am helping test out for Alan. For future versions of Witty, feel free to leave comments and I’ll make sure Alan gets them!

In early builds of Windows Vista, testers were shown a new 3D interface powered by the Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) that was filled with animations of all sorts. This interface was very cool looking. However, because of delays, Microsoft had to cut the use of WPF in the UI and most of the “WOW” was removed.

Thankfully, there are some very talented developers out there that have made utilities to bring back the excitement of the cut features. The one I am covering in this article, is the animated user picture shown on the Start Menu.

Using a great utility called 3D User Picture, you can easily make your start menu look just like the video above. (more…)

3d interface, 3d user, animation speed, Code, compatible graphics card, computer, directx 9, Drivers, files run, graphics chip, intel gma950, override, photo x, shutdown, start button, talented developers, vista, wpf

Title: Foundations of WPF: An Introduction to Windows Presentation Foundation (Foundations)
Author: Laurence Moroney
Publisher: Apress
ISBN: 1590597605
Pub-Date: 2006-11-15

Book Description

Windows Presentation Foundation is a cutting-edge presentation framework for creating high-fidelity applications for Windows Vista and Windows XP. WPF is a composite technology with a noteworthy graphics engine that gives you more control over your application’s screen output than has ever been possible in Windows before. New control frameworks and a new XML-based markup language, XAML, complete the core WPF package. On top of this, WPF can be linked to the new Microsoft Expression Suite to simplify the creation of your user interfaces, and it can be linked to .NET 2.0 to handle complex business logic.

Foundations of WPF: An Introduction to Windows Presentation Foundation teaches you everything you need to get started with the technology, and is broken into three parts. The first introduces and contextualizes the WPF technology; the second part dives deeper into the facets of the technology that are of immediate and valuable use in developing applications; the last part offers you the real-world perspective you need to be productive in the community and customer base. In summary, this book

• Explains how WPF interoperates with myriad new ancillary and support technologies being released by Microsoft (XAML, WCF, WinFX, and the Expression Design Suite)
• Gets you up and running, building applications for the new Windows “Vista” as quickly as possible
• Separates design and implementation to make life easier from a business and development perspective

Foundations of WPF: An Introduction to Windows Presentation Foundation (Foundations)

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/redirect?path=ASIN%2F1590597605

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A few weeks ago Tim Sneath, who is a Group Manager and Evangelist at Microsoft, posted about Family.Show which caught my eye. I decided to give it a try. Family.Show is a genealogy application built on the Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) by a company called Vertigo. Family.Show is a very slick application for building your family tree and tracking your own family history. Tim Sneath also points out that Family.Show is an excellent example of WPF in a “complex, realistic” scenario for developers to take a look at. 

In giving Family.Show a try - I discovered I really would like to know more about my family history. I had such a great experience with it I decided to create a small video demo of how Family.Show works in managing and tracking your family tree:

Video: Demo: Family.Show

Forgive the video’s abruptness and pace. I didn’t want to bore you with filling out a complete family - rather simply to highlight how easy it is to create your family in Family.Show.

The ability to drag and drop images into profiles of family members is an excellent showcase of some of the advantages with building apps with WPF for Windows Vista. But in regards to Family.Show - using WPF allows me to easily navigate through my family tree entering details on family members quickly and efficiently and is not overly complicated for my needs. Family.Show stores your .family files in a directory in your Documents folder which is also easily movable and backed up as well.

Click here to install Family.Show via ClickOnce. You can also view Vertigo’s Family.Show site here.

A few weeks ago Tim Sneath, who is a Group Manager and Evangelist at Microsoft, posted about Family.Show which caught my eye. I decided to give it a try. Family.Show is a genealogy application built on the Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) by a company Read More……(read more)