Cliplets: still and dynamic images

Created: Nov 01, 2012

If you are as addicted as I am with looking at Bing’s totally awesome photographs, there is now a way to actually create your own piece of art. Microsoft Research provides a nice little interactive app that gives users the power to create “Cliplets” – a type of imagery that sits between stills and video, including imagery such as video textures and “cinemagraphs”. The app provides a simple, yet expressive way to mix static and dynamic elements from a video clip.

Windows Azure: updates from the spring release

Created: Jun 08, 2012

Below please find some new information on Windows Azure and related information:

Now Available: New Services and Enhancements to Windows Azure: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/now-available-new-services-and-enhancements-to-windows-azure/
Announcing New Windows Azure Services to Deliver “Hybrid Cloud”: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/announcing-new-windows-azure-services-to-deliver-hybrid-cloud/
Case Study: E-Publisher Aims to Triple Revenues by Switching from Amazon to Windows Azure: https://t.co/Y4srAaiq

Enjoy and let me know if you have any questions!

BMW 5-series E61: CD-changer hangs/does not release magazine ... do it yourself

Created: May 01, 2012

Today, I noticed that the CD-changer of our BMW 5-series E61 hangs and it did not release the CD magazine. What made it worth is that it tried to release it every couple of minutes which started to hurt the car’s battery.

I bing’d and luckily found this post (in German) that describes how to fix it yourself.

Basically you have to follow these steps in order to solve this problem:

Windows Phone: Skype 1.0 now in Marketplace

Created: Apr 23, 2012

Skype for Windows Phone is now officially available in Marketplace. Download it now here.

It supports free voice and video calls to other Skype users (or cheaper calls to landlines and other cell phones with Skype Credit) along with other cool features like portrait mode video calling, support for joining audio conference calls, call-in-progress notifications and block and unblock contacts.

See more information at Big Blog or at Skype Garage.

See a nice video walk-through below:

Microsoft Script Explorer for Windows PowerShell (pre-release)

Created: Mar 20, 2012

If you always wanted to learn how to script using PowerShell, this tool makes it even easier to learn and explore all the cool features. Very nice new experience of guidance and content. Check it out at https://www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?displaylang=en&id=29101

Skype app for Windows Phone is here

Created: Feb 27, 2012

Finally, the long awaited Skype app for Windows Phone is here. This information has been announced today during Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. Please find a blog post here (original URL https://windowsteamblog.com/windows_phone/b/windowsphone/archive/2012/02/27/windows-phone-at-mobile-world-congress-2012.aspx). Just in case the Zune link does not work, please try it via marketplace (original URL https://www.windowsphone.com/en-GB/apps/c3f8e570-68b3-4d6a-bdbb-c0a3f4360a51) … this worked for me!

Windows Phone 7 - new update named Mango coming soon

Created: Sep 03, 2011

If you have some knowledge of Silverlight and .NET it will be so easy to leverage your knowledge and develop for WP7 codenamed Mango.

Please see this new ad for Mango update: [youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XpI8252TieM&feature=player_embedded]!

Yay! my first Windows Phone 7 Mango app officially published

Created: Sep 02, 2011

Today I uploaded my first Windows Phone 7 Mango app to Microsoft’s App Hub. It is all about the service provided by OnlineTvRecorder.com. It talks to their API to view TV programs/schedules, shows your own recordings as well as future highlights and top-recordings. An integrated search lets you search the OTR catalog using keywords.

I just got confirmation that it is officially certified and published to private beta test.

OTRApp v.1.0

Windows Phone 7: application development caveat with ViewModel entity class

Created: Aug 26, 2011

The other day I played around with the newest release of the Windows Phone 7 SDK (7.1 Beta 2) and started by using the base application template. I created a new class that serves as the entity definition for the view model. The data is bound to a list box. Nothing spectacular.

In design time (Visual Studio) my static sample data that I created showed up just fine. During application start I created some “real” data and bound it to the list box. As a result, the list box is empty and does not show any data at all … no exceptions or other runtime errors. After a bit of testing I found out that the problem is with the entity class definition. The class was specified to be private instead of public. This little keyword led to an empty list box.

Entity Framework Code First Migrations ... sounds like a dream come true

Created: Jul 29, 2011

Check this out: I just read this post from Scott Hanselman about an upcoming release from the entity framework team. This really sounds like a dream come true.

For very long time now, I had to struggle with updates to database schemas. In almost any custom software development project you have to somehow take care of such issues. I used different tools from different vendors (e.g. Schema Compare, UDB Workbench, Altova DatabaseSpy, etc.). Some proved to be more efficient, flexible or productive, but at least you get to a point that automates some of your tasks (and I guess this is seems to be one (of many) success factor).