Xaml Fest, SD2IG and Coolaid

The Seattle Developer Designer UX Group meet wed night. Ableit we had to meet in the Lincon Square accross from where we normally meet but it was alot of fun. Charles was good enough to take a picture and prove that yes we do indeed drinking Coolaid, in this case 'Silverlight' Coolaid.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=17817&id=721326429&saved#/photo.php?pid=1757210&id=721326429

Here is some cool training you might be interested in the Seattle Area that Brain sent me on Mithun's blog:

Mithun's Blog with XamlFest announcement.
http://blogs.msdn.com/MithunD/
http://blogs.msdn.com/mithund/archive/2009/01/22/xaml-fest-coming-to-redmond.aspx

& event details & schedule is at:

XamlFest Redmond event on Feb 16 & 17.
http://blogs.msdn.com/usisvde/archive/2009/01/21/you-re-invited-to-xamlfest-redmond-february-16-17.aspx

The SD2IG meeting we talked about Smart Device UX. Our goal was to look at the designer developer work flow on mobile devices but clearly on the iphone it kind of sucks right now...

Devin and Matt, I must say the iUI kit that Matt used does give a good story for designers building HTML apps. But really apps on the iphone Devin showed us that this is very very difficult.

Microsoft Tag

Here is an interesting if only vaguely connected to Silverlight bit from Microsoft...

Microsoft 'Tag'

Personally I could do without the colors but is an interesting idea that allows these computer read tags for embedding information on a page, or email etc. Something like an ubber UPC. In silverlight I can see some uses such as on crossfader I could have a tag for each artist on the back of media tiles. but maybe only if the tags work with gray scales...

http://tag.microsoft.com/

DotNetShoutOut and Super Secret Silverlight 3

Check out the latest edition of Channel 9 with Dan Fernandez and some other guy. They mentioned a number of cool stuff including a project my friend Faisal's helped put together called 'DotNetShoutOut' and a few notes about the Super Secret Silverlight 3.

http://channel9.msdn.com/shows/This+Week+On+Channel+9/This-Week-on-C9-Live-Mesh-wins-a-Crunchie-Win-7-tips-and-a-VPC-and-Codeproject-apps/

Rounded Corners MediaElement

so I was working on a new media player for Crossfader and wanted the media element in the new wizbang super tile to be able to form fit as in have roundy corners... I swear I spent hours trying to make this work and I guess had a brain block on this and thanks to Jobi pointing out the obvious the solution looks like this:

<mediaelement width="0" name="ThisMediaElement" height="0" stretch="Uniform" source="http://localhost:36825/Seiryu.wmv" balance="5" volume="0" autoplay="True" downloadprogresschanged="ThisMediaElement_DownloadProgressChanged">
<rectangle width="Auto" name="ControlBack" fill="Black" radiusy="30" radiusx="30" height="Auto">
<rectangle width="Auto" radiusy="30" radiusx="30" height="Auto">
<rectangle.fill>
<videobrush stretch="Uniform" sourcename="ThisMediaElement">
</rectangle.fill>
<rectangle.stroke>
<lineargradientbrush endpoint="0.972438,1.14352" startpoint="0.972438,0.000225328">
<gradientstop offset="0" color="#FF848484">
<gradientstop offset="1" color="#FF000000">
</lineargradientbrush>
</rectangle.stroke>
</rectangle>

seemed like the obvious solution but some how missed it...

FacingBlend and the New Year

I have been off line for the Holidays, more a function of my wifes surgury in Decemeber. Over the holidays I noticed a designer friend of mine started blogging alot alot more. I was reviewing the material she posted and I think its great stuff. Check it out at:

http://www.facingblend.com/blog/