Chris Bowen's Blog

Developer Events in the Northeast – February, 2012

Chris Bowen — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 23:43:26 GMT

Welcome to February. It’s time for a new roundup of developer-focused events that you may find interesting. Most are free, but the exceptions are noted with [$].

Interested in other local user groups? Boston User Groups lists New England area tech groups of all kinds.

As always, if you know of other (free or nearly free) developer-focused events, please let me know.

-Chris

[Last updated 2/7/12]

Connecticut

February 2
Fairfield/Westchester .NET User Group – Stamford, CT
“Azure, Azure, Azure: Windows Azure Update” – Peter Laudati

February 8
Connecticut Access Users Group – Farmington, CT

February 9
[$] Agile Connecticut - Farmington, CT

February 13
Hartford Area Build Guild – Farmington, CT
“Web People + Adult Beverages + High Fives”

February 14
Connecticut SharePoint User Group – Farmington, CT
“Building Custom Workflows in SharePoint 2010 Using Visual Studio 2010” – Reddy Kadasani

Schedule TBA
Connecticut .NET Developers Group – Farmington, CT
Connecticut DotNetNuke User Group - Bethany, CT
Connecticut Web Innovators – Hartford, CT
Fairfield County SharePoint User Group – Fairfield, CT
Fairfield/Westchester SQL Server UG - Stamford, CT
Hartford SQL Server Users Group – Farmington, CT

Maine

February 16
Maine Bytes User Group - Portland, ME
“Get Kinected” – Angelo Castigliola

February 28
Bangor Area .Net Developers (BAND) - Bangor, ME
“WebSockets & WebWorkers – Getting plugged in, powered up and getting things done” – Corey Gray

Schedule TBA
Agile User Group – Portland, ME
Maine Developer Network - Augusta, ME
SharePoint Maine User Group – Portland, ME
Usability / User Experience User Group – Portland, ME
Web Designers User Group – Portland, ME

Massachusetts

February 2
New England Visual Basic Professionals - Waltham, MA
“Async Programming in .NET 4.5” – John Bowen

February 2
Refresh Boston – Cambridge, MA
Patrick Haney

February 2
Boston Software Engineering Meetup – Boston, MA
#WeAreTech Icebreaker Networking Event

February 2
HPC & GPU Supercomputing Group of Boston – Cambridge, MA

February 2
Boston Accessibility Roundtable – Cambridge, MA

February 3
New England Database Summit 2012 – Cambridge, MA

February 3
Kinect Boston Users Group – Cambridge, MA
”Kinect Accelerator Info Session!”

February 6
HTML5 Boston – Boston, MA
”Mobile Website Development” – Tunde Ashafa & Jeff Boulay

February 6
Drinks on Tap – Boston, MA
”Demos, drinks and discussions about mobile development'”

February 7
Microsoft DevBoston & Boston Azure Cloud User Group Joint Meeting – Cambridge, MA
“Architecting for Failure: Why Cloud Architecture is Different” – Michael Stiefel

February 9
New England Mobile .NET Developers’ Group – Cambridge, MA
“Windows 8” – Chris Bowen

February 9
New England SQL Server User Group - Waltham, MA
“Big Data with Hadoop and SQL Server”

February 10-12
[$] Startup Scramble – Cambridge, MA

February 13
Boston Area SharePoint Users Group – Cambridge, MA
Rob Windsor on Visual Studio LightSwitch applications (using data from SharePoint 2010)

February 13
Kinect Boston Users Group – Cambridge, MA
”Demos and Kinect for Windows!”

February 15
HTML5 Game Development Meetup – Boston, MA

February 15
Boston Web Performance Group – Boston, MA
“An Expert’s Guide to Making a Website Slow! Anti-Patterns” – Bob Buffone

February 15
Boston PHP Meetup – Cambridge, MA
“Security-Centered Design: Exploring the Impact of Human Behavior”

February 16
Boston Orchard CMS User Group – Cambridge, MA
“Website Development”

February 21
Tech Tuesday – Cambridge, MA
”Developers Wanted”

February 21
Hacks / Hackers Boston – Dorchester, MA
”The Boston Globe’s digital strategy: A peek behind the (pay) wall” – Jeff Moriarty

February 21
Boston Predictive Analytics – Cambridge, MA
”How far away from me is Kevin Bacon? (Social Media & Network Analysis)”

February 22
Boston XNA Developers Group - Waltham, MA

February 22
Boston Tech Meetup - Cambridge, MA
“SharePoint Performance: Best Practices from the Field” – Jason Himmelstein

February 22
Western Mass Microsoft Technology Users Group - Agawam, MA
“Telerik Product Presentation”

February 22
Agile Boston User Group - Waltham, MA
“A Culture of Agility” – Pete Behrens

February 23
Boston Azure Cloud User Group – Cambridge, MA
”Solving Access Control in the Cloud – from WIF to ACS” – Brock Allen

February 23
Worcester Web Technology – Worcester, MA
“Practicing Agile/Scrum”

February 23
Boston New Technology Meetup – Boston, MA
Multiple presentations on what’s new in the startup scene

February 23
Boston JavaScript Meetup – Boston, MA
“The Promises Pattern in JavaScript” – Eric Strathmeyer

February 23
Lean Startup Circle Meetup – Cambridge, MA

February 27
Boston WordPress – Cambridge, MA

February 29
Emerging Business Tech – Newton Center, MA
”Native and HTML5-based mobile: Strategies for mobile app development”

March 1
HPC & GPU Supercomputing Group of Boston – Cambridge, MA

March 5
Beantown ALT.NET Group – Cambridge, MA
“Introduction to F#” – Talbott Crowell & Scott Theleman

March 5
Web Innovators Group 33 – Cambridge, MA

March 5
Cloudy Mondays – Cambridge, MA
”Battle of the Public Clouds”

March 8
New England SQL Server User Group - Waltham, MA
“T-SQL Bad Habits to Kick” – Aaron Bertrand

March 10
Boston Predictive Analytics – Cambridge, MA
“Big Data Workshop: Session 1”

March 13
Build Guild – Salem and Cape Cod
“Web People + Adult Beverages + High Fives”

March 13
DotNetNuke Boston Meetup – Cambridge, MA

March 14
[$] Xconomy Forum: Mobile Madness 2012 – Total Mobility – Cambridge, MA

March 15
Microsoft DevBoston – Cambridge, MA
”Service Design Patterns & Solutions” – Robert Daigneau

March 21
HTML5 Game Development Meetup – Boston, MA

March 22
Worcester Web Technology – Worcester, MA
“SpringRoo”

March 22
Western Mass Microsoft Technology Users Group - Agawam, MA
TBD – Ian Drake

March 26
Boston WordPress – Cambridge, MA

March 26
Drinks on Tap – Boston, MA
”Demos, drinks and discussions about mobile development'”

March 29
Boston Azure Cloud User Group – Cambridge, MA
”Introduction to Windows Azure SDK” – Jason Haley

March 29
Lean Startup Circle Meetup – Cambridge, MA

Schedule TBA
Boston .NET Architecture Study Group - Waltham, MA
Boston Arduino Users Group – Cambridge, MA
Boston Artists + Coders – Boston, MA
Boston BizSpark Meetup – Cambridge, MA
Boston Business Intelligence – Waltham, MA
Boston Cloud Services – Waltham, MA
Boston Front End Developers – Cambridge, MA
Boston Node.js Meetup – Boston, MA
Boston Web Design Meetup – Cambridge, MA
Boston WebsiteSpark Group – Cambridge, MA
Cape Cod .NET User Group – Plymouth, MA
jQuery Boston Meetup – Boston, MA
Mobile Monday Boston – Boston, MA
New England ASP.NET Professionals – Waltham, MA
New England F# User Group – Cambridge, MA
New England Windows Phone User and Developer Group - Waltham, MA
North Shore .NET User Group - Ipswich, MA
North Shore Web Geeks – Newburyport, MA
OWASP (Open Web Application Security Project) – Cambridge, MA
UX Book Club, Boston – Cambridge, MA
Western Mass Developers’ Group – Hadley, MA

New Hampshire

February 2
eBrew – Portsmouth, NH

February 8
Joomla NH User Group – Durham, NH

February 15
NH .NET User Group, Seacoast – Portsmouth, NH
“Windows 8” – Chris Bowen

February 15
Web Dev Meetup – Portsmouth, NH

February 28
Systems Engineering and Administration Technical User Group – Portsmouth, NH
”Big Data: What it is and What it’s Good For” – Geoff Noel

Schedule TBA
Granite State SharePoint User Group – Nashua, NH
Nashua Scrum Club – Nashua, NH
NH .NET User Group, Concord – Concord, NH
NH .NET User Group, Nashua – Nashua, NH
Seacoast SQL Server Users Group – Portsmouth, NH

New York (Upstate)

February 1
Central New York .NET Developer Group - East Syracuse, NY
“Design and Usability” – Gary Davis

February 1
Rochester JavaScript Meetup (Coworking Rochester) – Rochester, NY

February 8
Western NY SQL Server PASS – Amherst, NY
”What’s New in SQL Server 2012” – Erik Harman

February 15
Tech Valley .NET Users Group - Latham, NY
“ASP.NET MVC 3” – Joseph Payette, Jr.

February 15
Build Guild – Troy, NY
“Web People + Adult Beverages + High Fives”

February 20
Capital Area SQL Server Users Group – Albany, NY

February 21
Upstate NY PowerShell Users Group – Rochester, NY

Schedule TBA
AppRochester – Rochester, NY
MS Dev WNY– Buffalo, NY
OWASP (Open Web Application Security Project) – Rochester, NY
Refresh Rochester – Rochester, NY
Rochester SharePoint User Group – Rochester, NY
VDUNY - Visual Developers of Upstate NY - Rochester, NY
Western New York Back Office Technology User Group – Blasdell, NY

Rhode Island

February 8
Southern New England SQL Server Users Group – East Greenwich, RI
”Policy based management with SQL Server 2008 R2” – Scott Abrants

February 9
Providence Web Development Lunch Hour – Providence, RI

February 15
Providence Geeks – Providence, RI

March 8
Providence Web Development Lunch Hour – Providence, RI

Schedule TBA
MoDevRI (Mobile Developers & Entrepreneurs) – Providence, RI
Rhode Island .NET User Group - Bristol, RI
WordPress Providence Meetup – Providence, RI

Vermont

February 13
Vermont .NET User Group – S. Burlington, VT
10th Anniversary Celebration!

Schedule TBA
Burlington PHP Users Group – Burlington, VT
Vermont SQL Server User Group - Burlington, VT

HTML5 Game Development Resources

Chris Bowen — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 22:27:00 GMT

The first series of HTML5 Game Camps concluded yesterday, helping attendees to learn HTML5 by diving in and writing games. Here’s a summary of links and resources for anyone who would like to get started.

The events featured introductions to the underlying technologies (HTML5, JavaScript, graphics) then a look at engines that can make game development easier. The second half was hacking time followed by a chance for everyone to demo their creations. It was great to see what could be made in just a few hours!

Thanks to everyone who participated, and let me know if you’ve continued working on your creations after the events!

Session 1 – A Tour Around HTML5

This session focuses on a brief introduction to HTML5, CSS3, standards, and browser support.

Learning HTML5

List of HTML5 Presentation Resources – Earlier post with many links for this session
HTML5 at W3C – Specifications and learning materials
HTML5: Edition for Web Authors – Focused subset of the specification for web devs
HTML5 on the Internet Explorer Learning Site – Videos, tutorials, articles
HTML5 Demos from Giorgio Sardo – HTML5, CSS, JS, etc.
HTML5 Doctor – HTML5 articles, Element Index, and resources

Implementing HTML5

CanIUse.com – Details support by browser for HTML5, CSS3, and other technologies
Modernizr – HTML5 & CSS3 feature detection made easy
HTML5 Cross Browser Polyfills – Helpful for implementing features while supporting a range of browsers

Internet Explorer & HTML5

Internet Explorer Test Drive - IE9 & IE10 resources
IE Blog – Windows Internet Explorer Engineering Blog
Beauty of the Web – Shows IE and HTML5 in action

Session 2 – Adding the Fun(ctionality) with JavaScript and Tools

The focus is on a few resources for learning JavaScript, libraries to make things easier, and support in developer tools.

General JavaScript

JavaScript Fundamentals – MSDN reference
Eloquent JavaScript – Introduction to JavaScript programming (published online under an open license)
W3Schools JavaScript Introduction
JSLint and JSHint – Tools to help identify problems in your JavaScript
jsFiddle – Tool for testing snippets of JavaScript, HTML, and CSS

JavaScript Frameworks & Tools

jQuery – JavaScript library to help with common functionality with cross-browser support
jQueryUI – Effects, widgets, and themes with cross-browser support
The Big List of JavaScript, CSS, and HTML Development Tools, Libraries, Projects, and Books – A helpful list from scriptjunkie

Internet Explorer Developer Tools (built in to IE 8+) – See also Firebug for Firefox and the Chrome Dev Tools

WebMatrix 2 Beta

WebMatrix 2 Beta - Free, lightweight, and supports HTML5/CSS3, ASP.NET, and PHP development

Visual Studio 2010 Extensions

Visual Studio Web Standards Update – Adds HTML5 & CSS3 support to VS2010
Web Essentials Extension – Many new CSS, HTML and JavaScript IDE extensions for VS2010
CSSCop Extension – Uses CSS Lint to help detect issues in your CSS

Expression Web 4 HTML5 Support

HTML5, CSS3, and More with Expression Web 4 SP1 – Post describing CSS3 & HTML5 support added in SP1 (now on SP2)

Session 3 – HTML5 Graphics

Focused on 2D graphics with SVG and Canvas and choosing between them.

SVG

“Modernizing Your Website: SVG Meets HTML5” – Mix11 session by Jennifer Yu
UN Systems Org Chart – Shows the effects of zooming with SVG
SVG-Oids – Simple SVG game example
Inkscape – Open Source SVG editor

Canvas

Canvas Pad – Great way to see/learn canvas capabilities
“Deep Dive into HTML5 <canvas>” – Mix11 session by Jatinder Mann
How to Use Canvas to Create a Space Game – MSDN resource
Paper.js – Open source framework for vectors on canvas

SVG & Canvas

How to Choose Between Canvas and SVG to Create Web Graphics – MSDN resource
HTML5 Blizzard – Demo featuring Canvas, SVG, Audio, WOFF, and CSS
“HTML5 Blizzard: Full Hardware Acceleration in Action” – Describes the creation of the HTML5 Blizzard demo
Programming Simple Games Using Canvas or SVG – Very basic MSDN sample game

Session 4 – Creating an HTML5 Game

At this point, the survey of the moving parts (HTML5, JavaScript, graphics, etc.) is done, so it’s time to pull it all together and make games! So many choices, but to keep things simple the focus was on leveraging game engine libraries already out there.

JavaScript Game Engines

List of Game Engines – Before you start, take a look at this list to see what’s already out there
EaselJS – Canvas-based JS library by gskinner.com. Used in some of the demos during the session.
Akihabara Tutorials – A nice tutorial series by Boston locals Darren Torpey and Darius Kazemi

Audio

Getting Started with the HTML5 Audio Element – MSDN resource
SoundJS – Helps make it easier to work with HTML5 audio

3D in 2D

ThreeJS – A way to add 3D to your 2D games
Galactic Demo – Built using ThreeJS
“Galactic: Building a 3D Solar System with HTML5” - Describes how ThreeJS was used in Galactic

Game Dev Resources

IGDA – Find a chapter near you and network with game developers
Game Development Podcasts
Game Development on MSDN – Targets XNA & Silverlight, but the Education Catalog has some interesting tutorials and starter games that could inspire your HTML5 work

The Slides

Much of the time was spent in code and demos, but the slides we did use are up in a presentations folder on SkyDrive. The relevant files are:

HTML5 – Practical First Look
HTML5 Camps – Scripting
HTML5 Game Camp – Graphics
HTML5 Game Camp – Games

Webcasts

Missed the in person events? Fortunately, it isn’t game over! The content is being brought to you online via these webcasts:

Enjoy creating those games!

-Chris

Windows Azure Developer Opportunities

Chris Bowen — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 22:31:10 GMT

As the Learn Windows Azure event rolls along today (keep an eye on the site for recordings of the content if you missed it), here are some other great ways to dive into cloud computing. Update: the session recordings are now available.

The Rock Paper Azure Challenge

Entertain your competitive side, improve your cloud development skills, and have a chance to win prizes! Enter your bot in the Rock Paper Azure Challenge by this Friday evening (12/16, 6PM EST), battle the competition, and see if you emerge victorious:

Play Rock, Paper Scissors in the cloud for your chance to win a trip to Cancun, an Acer Aspire S3 Laptop, a Windows Phone, or an XBOX 360/Kinect bundle! Entering is simple – create a player bot (sample code provided) and enter it before December 16th. Winners will be chosen at random from all bots submitted.

Want to test your strategic coding skills as well? Build a killer bot to crush the competition and see how you stack up against other players on the Leaderboard. Each Friday the top 5 players will receive a $50.00 Best Buy Gift Card.

Think you don’t have the time to ramp up and create a winning bot? You’ll be surprised at how quickly you can take the starter code and turn it into a fierce competitor!

Windows Azure Dev Camps

For a great way to get some in-person instruction on Windows Azure, check out the Windows Azure Dev Camps series, now touring all over the place.

Don’t see one in your area? The Windows Azure Training Kit has the content and labs, and recordings are available for some of the past events.

(While you’re visiting, take a look at the Windows Phone Camps and Web Camps!)

Windows Azure Resources

Looking for more? Here are some resources to help you to the cloud:

Windows Azure Home
Windows Azure Developer Center - Support for developing with .NET, node.js, Java, PHP and more.
Windows Azure Downloads – Get the tools to develop with Windows Azure
Windows Azure Training Course – Hands-on labs and videos
Channel 9 Windows Azure Content – Videos, screencasts, and show episodes
Windows Azure Toolkit for Social Games – Build a casual/social game using Windows Azure

-Chris

Learn Windows Azure Event – Online, December 13th

Chris Bowen — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 13:05:59 GMT

Scott Guthrie has announced a Learn Windows Azure event on December 13th (12 – 8PM EST). It’s free and will be streamed live via Channel 9, featuring sessions with Mark Russinovich, Dave Campbell, Scott Guthrie, and others:

Getting Started with Windows Azure
Cloud Data & Storage
Channel9 Cloud Cover Show Live
Developing Windows Azure Applications with Visual Studio
Building Scalable Cloud Applications
Expert Panel Q&A

Register for the online event, or, because there’s an real event with real people on the other end of the connection, you can attend in person if you’re in the Redmond area.

If you’d like to have the tools to work with as they’re mentioned during the event, you can head to the Windows Azure site to learn more, download the SDK, and get a head start with some code samples and tutorials.

-Chris

List of Game Development Podcasts

Chris Bowen — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 14:30:00 GMT

As you might know from my list of podcasts for .NET devs, I’m a big fan of podcasts to help make travel time less… [annoying | mind-numbing | wasteful].

As my recent work has focused more on game development, I’ve been keeping an eye out for relevant podcasts. Here are the ones I know of that focus primarily on game development and the gaming industry.

Game Development Podcasts

Another Castle
Charles J. Pratt
Interviews with game developers, especially with a focus on game development in New York.
gamedesignadvance.com/?page_id=1616

The Brainy Gamer Podcast
Michael Abbott
Interviews with game developers and a focus on the video game community.
www.brainygamer.com/the_brainy_gamer/podcast/

Experimental Game Dev Podcast
About independent (indie) games and development.
www.indiegamepod.com

The Game Developer’s Radio
Joseph Burchett & Devin Becker
Focused on game development and design.
www.gamedevradio.net

The Game Engine Podcast
Andrew Bittman, Paul Sztajer, Saul Alexander, and Dan Graf
Focused on game developers and topics around game development.
www.gameenginepodcast.com

IndieGames.com Podcast
Interviews with indie game developers.
indiegames.com (and indiegames.buzzsprout.com)

Irrational Interviews
Ken Levine & Shawn Elliott
Irrational’s Ken Levine and Shawn Elliott conduct interviews around the industry.
irrationalgames.com/insider/irrational-interviews

LostCast
Geoff Blair & Matt Hackett
A brand new HTML5 game development podcast by Lost Decade Games (creators of the HTML5 “Onslaught!” game).
www.lostdecadegames.com

One of Swords
Dan Amrich
Activision’s Dan Amrich hosts industry interviews and provides insights into what’s happening at Activision.
OneOfSwords.com

Each of these podcasts has had activity in the past few months. If you know of any other active ones, please comment below (and thank you!)

-Chris

Developer Events in the Northeast – November & December, 2011

Chris Bowen — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 17:28:17 GMT

It’s pretty amazing that this list already has events that bring us to the end of the year. Every year does seem to go more quickly than the last! Anyhow, here’s the latest list of developer-focused events you may find interesting as the remaining weeks of 2011 breeze by.

Most are free, and the exceptions are noted with [$].

As always, if you know of other (free or nearly free) developer-focused events, please let me know.

-Chris

Connecticut

November 14
Hartford Area Build Guild – Farmington, CT
“Web People + Adult Beverages + High Fives”

December 7
Windows Azure DevCamp – Farmington, CT
Free afternoon to evening event to help you learn about Windows Azure. Sessions in the afternoon, and hands-on hackathon in the evening.

December 14
Fairfield County SharePoint User Group – Fairfield, CT

December 14
Connecticut Access Users Group – Farmington, CT

Schedule TBA
Agile Connecticut - Farmington, CT
Connecticut .NET Developers Group – Farmington, CT
Connecticut DotNetNuke User Group - Bethany, CT
Connecticut SharePoint User Group – Farmington, CT
Fairfield/Westchester .NET User Group – Stamford, CT
Fairfield/Westchester SQL Server UG - Stamford, CT
Hartford SQL Server Users Group – Farmington, CT
New England Silverlight Guild – Hartford, CT

Maine

November 15
Bangor Area .Net Developers (BAND) - Bangor, ME
Windows Azure (w/RockPaperAzure) - Jim O’Neil

November 16
Maine Developer Network - Augusta, ME
Windows Azure (w/RockPaperAzure) - Jim O’Neil

Schedule TBA
Agile User Group – Portland, ME
Maine Bytes User Group - Portland, ME
Usability / User Experience User Group – Portland, ME
Web Designers User Group – Portland, ME (on Summer break)

Massachusetts

November 14
Windows Phone Inner Circle – Cambridge, MA
“Enjoy free appetizers and cocktails, be one of the first people to get your hands on incredible new Windows Phones, and meet the team that brought them to life.”

November 15
Boston New Technology Meetup – Boston, MA
6 presentations on what’s new in the startup scene

November 15
Harvard Tech Meetup – Boston, MA

November 15
Boston Predictive Analytics – Cambridge, MA
”Big Data” .. Applications from Enterprises to Individuals

November 16
HTML5 Game Development Meetup – Boston, MA
“Enchant.js” - Ubiquitous Entertainment
“Internet Explorer 9 & 10 and HTML5” – Chris Bowen

November 16
New England Windows Phone User and Developer Group - Waltham, MA
“Developing Microsoft Push Notification Service (MPNS) Applications”

November 16
Boston .NET Architecture Study Group - Waltham, MA

November 17
HTML5 Game Camp – Cambridge, MA
Free event w/ morning sessions on HTML5 & game dev, then the afternoon is a hands-on game dev hackathon!

November 17
Boston Azure User Group – Cambridge, MA
“Back to the Basics: What is Cloud, What is Azure, and Intro to Windows Azure”

November 17
Boston JavaScript Meetup – Boston, MA
“JavaScript Style, Code Conventions & Quality” – Joe Morgan

November 17
Lean Startup Circle Meetup – Cambridge, MA

November 17
North Shore Web Geeks – Newburyport, MA

November 17
Worcester Web Technology – Worcester, MA
“Rackspace Tutorial” – Chris Johnson

November 17
Western Mass Developers’ Group – Hadley, MA

November 17
[$] EFactor Presents: Mobile App Accelerant – Boston, MA

November 18
Social Mobile Cloud Event – Boston, MA

November 19
AT&T Mobile App Hackathon – Boston, MA

November 19-20
Fall 2011 Boston Game Jam – Cambridge, MA

November 22
Cape Cod .NET User Group – Plymouth, MA
“HTML5 – A Practical First Look” – Chris Bowen

November 22
New England Mobile .NET Developers’ Group – Cambridge, MA
Microsoft’s Jesse Liberty

November 22
Agile Boston User Group - Waltham, MA
[$] “Give Thanks for SCRUM” – Honoring Jeff Sutherland & Ken Schwaber

November 23
Boston XNA Developers Group - Waltham, MA

November 28
Boston WordPress – Cambridge, MA
“WordPress, HTML5 Adoption, and Internet Explorer 9 & 10” – Chris Bowen
“Caching, Scaling, and What I’ve Learned Programming for WordPress.com VIP” – Erick Hitter

November 28
Beantown ALT.NET Group – Cambridge, MA
“Exploring Domain Driven Design Implementation Patterns in .NET” – Steve Bohlen

November 29
Web Innovators Group (webinno) – Cambridge, MA

November 29
Tech Tuesday: Meet the Rockstar Developers of Massachusetts – Cambridge, MA

November 30
Boston Front End Developers – Cambridge, MA
“Implementing the New BostonGlobe.com” – Adam Salsman

December 1
Microsoft DevBoston (formerly Boston .NET & Beantown .NET) - Cambridge, MA
“How to be a C# Ninja in 10 Easy Steps” – Ben Day

December 1
New England Visual Basic Professionals - Waltham, MA
“XBox/Kinect Using the .NET Framework” – Phil Denoncourt

December 1
HPC & GPU Supercomputing Group of Boston – Cambridge, MA

December 1
Boston Tech Meetup - Cambridge, MA

December 3-4
Random Hacks of Kindness (RHoK) – Cambridge, MA

December 5
New England F# User Group – Cambridge, MA

December 6
Boston Web Performance Group – Boston, MA
“Testing in the Cloud” – Dan Bartow

December 7
Boston Artists + Coders – Boston, MA
“Playing with Music” – Echno Nest co-founder Tristan Jehan

December 8
New England SQL Server User Group - Waltham, MA
“Enterprise Information Management” – Chad Gronbach

December 12
Boston Area SharePoint Users Group – Cambridge, MA

December 13
Boston Azure User Group – Cambridge, MA

December 13
Build Guild – Salem, MA
“Web People + Adult Beverages + High Fives”

December 13
Build Guild in Cape Cod – Sandwich, MA
“Web People + Adult Beverages + High Fives”

December 14
Microsoft DevBoston (formerly Boston .NET & Beantown .NET) - Cambridge, MA
“Using Windows Azure to Build Cloud Enabled Windows Phone Apps” – John Garland

December 14
Boston Area SharePoint Users Group – Cambridge, MA

December 14
North Shore .NET User Group - Ipswich, MA
“Cloud Architecture Patterns” – Bill Wilder

December 14
Boston PHP Meetup – Cambridge, MA
“Paper Prototyping: Sketching and Evaluating Your Design Concepts” – Christine Perfetti

New Group!
December 15
Boston Orchard CMS Group – Cambridge, MA
Kickoff Meeting

December 20
New England Mobile .NET Developers’ Group – Cambridge, MA

December 21
Boston .NET Architecture Study Group - Waltham, MA

December 27
Beantown ALT.NET Group – Cambridge, MA
“Introduction to MonoTouch” – Michael Bluestein

Schedule TBA
Boston Arduino Users Group – Cambridge, MA
Boston BizSpark Meetup – Cambridge, MA
Boston Business Intelligence – Waltham, MA
Boston Cloud Services – Waltham, MA
Boston Node.js Meetup – Boston, MA
Boston Web Design Meetup – Cambridge, MA
Boston WebsiteSpark Group – Cambridge, MA
DotNetNuke Boston Meetup – Cambridge, MA
jQuery Boston Meetup – Boston, MA
Mobile Monday Boston – Boston, MA
New England ASP.NET Professionals – Waltham, MA
New England Silverlight Guild – Cambridge, MA
OWASP (Open Web Application Security Project) – Cambridge, MA
Refresh Boston – Cambridge, MA
UX Book Club, Boston – Cambridge, MA
Western Mass Microsoft Technology Users Group - Agawam, MA

New Hampshire

November 16
NH .NET User Group, Nashua – Nashua, NH
“Developing Cloud-Enabled Windows Phone Applications with Windows Azure” – John Garland

November 16
NH .NET User Group, Concord – Concord, NH
“XBOX / Kinect Using .NET Framework SDK” – Phil Denoncourt III

November 16
NH .NET User Group, Seacoast – Portsmouth, NH
“Real Projects with Entity Framework 4.1”

December 8
Granite State SharePoint User Group – Nashua, NH
“SharePoint Loggins & Debugging: The Troubleshooter’s Best Friend” – Cornelius J. van Dyk & Jason Himmelstein

Schedule TBA
Nashua Scrum Club – Nashua, NH
Seacoast SQL Server Users Group – Portsmouth, NH

New York (Upstate)

November 15
Upstate NY PowerShell Users Group (Rochester chapter) – Rochester, NY

November 15
Windows Phone Camp – Univ. of Rochester, Rochester, NY
Free and open to all. Afternoon w/ dev sessions followed by evening hands-on hackathon.

November 16
MS Dev WNY– Hamburg, NY
“Introduction to HTML5 Development” – Patrick Lupiani

November 16
Build Guild – Troy, NY
“Web People + Adult Beverages + High Fives”

November 17
VDUNY - Visual Developers of Upstate NY - Rochester, NY
“Windows 8 Metro Development” – Steve Maier

November 21
Capital Area SQL Server Users Group – Albany, NY

December 2-4
RIT Game Camp – Rochester, NY
Special free weekend, combining four events! A weekend-long Game Jam, along with “XNA in a Day”, HTML5 Camp, and Windows Phone Game/App Camps on Saturday.

December 6
AppRochester – Rochester, NY

December 7
Rochester JavaScript Meetup (Coworking Rochester) – Rochester, NY

December 20
Upstate NY PowerShell Users Group (Rochester chapter) – Rochester, NY

Schedule TBA
Central New York .NET Developer Group - East Syracuse, NY
OWASP (Open Web Application Security Project) – Rochester, NY
Refresh Rochester – Rochester, NY
Rochester SharePoint User Group – Rochester, NY
Tech Valley .NET Users Group - Latham, NY
Upstate NY PowerShell Users Group (Syracuse chapter) – Syracuse, NY
Western New York Back Office Technology User Group – Blasdell, NY
Western NY SQL Server PASS – Amherst, NY

Rhode Island

November 16
Providence Geeks – Providence, RI

December 8
Providence Web Development Lunch Hour – Providence, RI

December 13
Tech Club Rhode Island – Providence, RI
End of Year Celebration

Schedule TBA
Rhode Island .NET User Group - Bristol, RI

Vermont

November 17
Burlington PHP Users Group – Burlington, VT
”Building Faster Websites”

December 5
Vermont .NET User Group – S. Burlington, VT
“WCF RIA Services” – Kathleen MacMahon

Schedule TBA
Vermont SQL Server User Group - Burlington, VT

Schedule Posted for Code Camp 16

Chris Bowen — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 23:55:19 GMT

The schedule has just been posted for this Saturday’s Code Camp 16 (in Waltham, MA):

    New England / Boston Code Camp 16
    Saturday, October 29th
    8:30 AM to 6:40 PM (Doors at 8 AM)
    Microsoft, 201 Jones Road (6th Floor)
    Waltham, MA

Schedule and registration at http://codecampboston.eventbrite.com

About 40 sessions spanning many topics - HTML5, cloud computing, Kinect, mobile, JavaScript, Netduino, XNA, SharePoint, SQL/NoSQL, ASP.NET MVC, and more. All by the community, for the community, and free.

Thank you to the speakers, contributing companies, and especially Patrick Hynds, Robert Goodearl, and Chris Pels for organizing the event!

This is going to be a good one, and I hope to see you there!
-Chris

P.S. The tag for the event is #boscc

HTML5 Game Camp Series Coming Soon

Chris Bowen — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 18:41:13 GMT

Update: Slides and links from the events are now available.

Ready to learn HTML5? Enjoy games, too?

Join in the HTML5 Game Camps, free events offering a chance to learn about the next wave of web standards including HTML5, CSS3, Canvas, SVG, and more. And while you gain practical knowledge about HTML5 and JavaScript techniques, it’s all joined together by the fun of creating games!

These are part of the Microsoft Web Camps series and feature a half day of sessions followed by hands-on game creation time. Get up to speed with HTML5 and game dev concepts in the sessions, then turn your ideas into reality as we leave the slides behind. Design and develop creations of your own, with plenty of guidance and help for your questions.

The Schedule

Here’s where the HTML5 Game Camps are heading, with links to details and registration:

Atlanta, GA – November 10 – Georgia Tech – Registration
Cambridge, MA – November 17 – Microsoft NERD – Registration
New York, NY – December 9 – Columbia University – Registration
University Park, PA – December 14 – Penn State – Registration

(Note some of these events are morning through afternoon, and others are afternoon to evening.)

Don’t forget to read the prep steps at the bottom of the event pages. To get ready for coding, consider installing WebMatrix (it’s free) and other tools via the Web Platform Installer. Also, consider attending with a friend and tackling the game creation as a team!

Bonus Points for Rochester, NY

For those of you in the Rochester, NY area, there’s a special RIT Game Camp the weekend of December 2nd-4th. It’s all about game development, and features multiple ways to learn about and create games:

HTML5 Camp (Saturday, 12/3)
Game Jam (all weekend)
XNA in a Day (Saturday)
Windows Phone Camp (Saturday)

It’s free, hosted on the campus of RIT, and open to everyone. So, choose what you’d like to participate in, and enjoy!

-Chris

Developer Events in the Northeast – October & November, 2011

Chris Bowen — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 03:08:49 GMT

Fall is upon us, and with it comes an uptick in the tempo of developer events in our area. Here’s the latest (and long!) list of developer-focused events you may find interesting. Most are free, and the exceptions are noted with [$].

As always, if you know of other (free or nearly free) developer-focused events, please let me know.

-Chris

Connecticut

October 6
Fairfield/Westchester .NET User Group – Stamford, CT
“jQuery 101 – Making JavaScript Fun” – Mark Freedman

October 10
Hartford Area Build Guild – Farmington, CT
“Web People + Adult Beverages + High Fives”

October 11
Connecticut .NET Developers Group – Farmington, CT
“Introduction to Metro UI Application Development in Windows 8 Developer Preview” – Michael Gerety

October 12
Connecticut Access Users Group – Farmington, CT

October 13
Fairfield/Westchester SQL Server UG - Stamford, CT
Business Intelligence – Andrew Brust

November 9
Fairfield County SharePoint User Group – Fairfield, CT

November 10
Fairfield/Westchester SQL Server UG - Stamford, CT
Zoho Creator – Herb Wexler

Novermber 11-13
[$] Startup Weekend New Haven – New Haven, CT

Schedule TBA
Agile Connecticut - Farmington, CT
Connecticut DotNetNuke User Group - Bethany, CT
Connecticut SharePoint User Group – Farmington, CT
Hartford SQL Server Users Group – Farmington, CT
New England Silverlight Guild – Hartford, CT

Maine

October 13
Maine Bytes User Group - Portland, ME
“BUILD Conference Debrief” – Fritz Onion

October 25
Bangor Area .Net Developers (BAND) - Bangor, ME
“SketchFlow – It’s Like a Big Pile of Napkins” – Charlie Villard

Schedule TBA
Maine Developer Network - Augusta, ME
Agile User Group – Portland, ME
Usability / User Experience User Group – Portland, ME
Web Designers User Group – Portland, ME (on Summer break)

Massachusetts

October 6
Microsoft DevBoston (formerly Beantown .NET) - Cambridge, MA
“HTML5 Development” – Chris Bowen

October 6
New England Visual Basic Professionals - Waltham, MA
“Interactive Dashboards with PerformancePoint 2010” – Sunil Kadimdiwan

October 6
HPC & GPU Supercomputing Group of Boston – Cambridge, MA
”C++ AMP” – Ken Domino

October 8
OWASP (Open Web Application Security Project) – Cambridge, MA
2011 Boston Application Security Conference (BASC)

October 11
Build Guild – Salem, MA
“Web People + Adult Beverages + High Fives”

October 11
Build Guild in Cape Cod – Sandwich, MA
“Web People + Adult Beverages + High Fives”

October 11
DotNetNuke Boston Meetup – Cambridge, MA
“Introducing DotNetNuke 6!”

October 12 & 13
MSDN Event: Windows Phone Camp – Cambridge, MA
Two free days of the tech to help you develop Windows Phone apps, practical guidance (interested in making money?), and the latest on Windows Phone 7.5 (codename “Mango”).

October 12
Boston Artists + Coders – Boston, MA
”Super Data Vis Skills (Intro to D3.js)” – Pascal Rettig

October 12
Worcester Web Technology – Worcester, MA
“Ruby on Rails” – Chris Johnson

October 12
Boston Area SharePoint Users Group – Cambridge, MA
“Heavy Metal PowerPivot” – Jason Himmelstein & Cornelius J. van Dyk

October 12
Boston PHP Meetup – Cambridge, MA
“Introduction to FirePHP 1.0” – Christoph Dorn
”Proof You do not Need SQL Anymore…” – Chhean Saur

October 13
New England SQL Server User Group - Waltham, MA
“Enterprise Information Management” – Chad Gronbach

October 13
Boston Node.js Meetup – Boston, MA
”Node.js and Using nowjs” – Eric Zhang

October 14
Boston JavaScript Meetup – Cambridge, MA
“Using CommonJS with PINF JavaScript Loader” – Christoph Dorn

October 14-16
[$] Boston Startup Weekend – Boston, MA

October 15
New England Business Intelligence Code Camp 2 – Waltham, MA
Community event for developers and IT professionals, with a focus on building real-world business intelligence solutions.

October 17
Mobile Monday Boston – Boston, MA
”Building Successful Mobile Web and Native Apps in the Enterprise”

October 18
Boston New Technology Meetup – Cambridge, MA

October 19
New England Windows Phone User and Developer Group - Waltham, MA
”It’s a (Third) Party!: Tools Beyond Just Visual Studio and Blend for Windows Phone 7 Development”

October 19
Boston .NET Architecture Study Group - Waltham, MA

October 19
HTML5 Game Development Meetup – Boston, MA

October 20
Western Mass Microsoft Technology Users Group - Agawam, MA
“Using PowerShell to Run SharePoint 2010, and Fill it Full of Data”

October 24
Boston Tech Meetup - Cambridge, MA
”What Can Cloud Do for You?” – Jim O’Neil

New Group!
October 26
New England Mobile .NET Developers’ Group – Cambridge, MA

New Group!
October 26
North Shore .NET User Group - Ipswich, MA

October 26
Boston XNA Developers Group - Waltham, MA

October 26
Agile Boston User Group - Waltham, MA
“Teams and Leadership” – Christopher Avery

October 27
Boston Azure User Group – Cambridge, MA
“Azure Architecture or Other Topics”

October 27
Lean Startup Circle Meetup – Cambridge, MA

October 29
New England Code Camp 16! – Waltham, MA
A free, full day of technical content, by the community, for the community.

October 29-30
[$] WhereCampBoston – Cambridge, MA
An unconference focused on geography and technology.

November 2
jQuery Boston Meetup – Boston, MA
“Why Wait for Harmony? Use Asynchronous Modules with jQuery Now!” – John Hann

November 3
Microsoft DevBoston (formerly Beantown .NET) - Cambridge, MA
“Geo-Aware Applications for Windows Phone 7” – John Zablocki

November 3
New England Visual Basic Professionals - Waltham, MA
“Scrum Project Management with Team Foundation Server 2010” – Steve Resnick

November 7
New England F# User Group – Cambridge, MA

November 9
Boston PHP Meetup – Cambridge, MA
“Google Analytics for Developers” – Justin Cutroni

November 10
Boston Business Intelligence – Waltham, MA
“Dimensional Modeling Fundamentals for the SQL Server Platform” – Warren Thornthwaite

November 10
New England SQL Server User Group - Waltham, MA
“Denali HA/DR” – Allen Hirt

November 10
World Usability Day – Cambridge, MA

November 16
Boston .NET Architecture Study Group - Waltham, MA

November 19
AT&T Mobile App Hackathon – Boston, MA

November 22
New England Mobile .NET Developers’ Group – Cambridge, MA

Schedule TBA
Boston .NET User Group - Waltham, MA
Boston Arduino Users Group – Cambridge, MA
Boston BizSpark Meetup – Cambridge, MA
Boston Cloud Services – Waltham, MA
Boston Front End Developers – Cambridge, MA
Boston Web Design Meetup – Cambridge, MA
Boston Web Performance Group – Boston, MA
Boston WebsiteSpark Group – Cambridge, MA
Cape Cod .NET User Group – Plymouth, MA
New England ASP.NET Professionals – Waltham, MA
New England Silverlight Guild – Cambridge, MA
North Shore Web Geeks – Newburyport, MA
Refresh Boston – Cambridge, MA
UX Book Club, Boston – Cambridge, MA
Western Mass Developers’ Group – Hadley, MA

New Hampshire

October 13
Granite State SharePoint User Group – Nashua, NH
“Planning and Configuring Extranets in SharePoint 2010” – Geoff Varosky

October 19
NH .NET User Group, Seacoast – Portsmouth, NH
“HTML5 Practices and Adoption” – Chris Bowen

November 10
Granite State SharePoint User Group – Nashua, NH
“Developing in SharePoint’s Middle Tier” – Marc D. Anderson

November 16
NH .NET User Group, Concord – Concord, NH
“XBOX / Kinect Using .NET Framework SDK” – Phil Denoncourt III

Schedule TBA
Nashua Scrum Club – Nashua, NH
NH .NET User Group, Nashua – Nashua, NH
Seacoast SQL Server Users Group – Portsmouth, NH

New York (Upstate)

October 5
Central New York .NET Developer Group - East Syracuse, NY
“Windows Phone 7 Ad-Network Manager Development with XNA” – Dan Colasanti

October 12
Western New York Back Office Technology User Group – Blasdell, NY
”Introduction to PowerShell” – Joel Bennett

New Group!
October 17
Capital Area SQL Server Users Group – Albany, NY
”SQL Server Reporting Services Tips & Tricks” – Daniel Bowlin

October 18
Rochester Web Startups Meeting – Rochester, NY
”Legal Entities” – Jennifer Lunsford

October 19
Build Guild – Troy, NY
“Web People + Adult Beverages + High Fives”

October 27
VDUNY - Visual Developers of Upstate NY - Rochester, NY
“The Model View ViewModel (MVVM)” – Larry O’Heron

October 29
BarCamp Rochester – RIT, Henrietta, NY

November 2
Rochester JavaScript Meetup – Rochester, NY

November 4-6
[$] Startup Weekend Syracuse – Syracuse, NY

Schedule TBA
AppRochester – Rochester, NY
OWASP (Open Web Application Security Project) – Rochester, NY
Refresh Rochester – Rochester, NY
Rochester SharePoint User Group – Rochester, NY
Tech Valley .NET Users Group - Latham, NY
Upstate NY PowerShell Users Group – Rochester, NY
Upstate NY PowerShell Users Group – Syracuse, NY
Western New York .NET Users Group - Amherst, NY
Western NY SQL Server PASS – Amherst, NY

Rhode Island

October 11
Tech Club Rhode Island – Providence, RI
”The Art of the Schmoze” – Robbie Samuels

October 13
Providence Web Development Lunch Hour – Providence, RI

October 19
Providence Geeks – Providence, RI

November 8
Tech Club Rhode Island – Providence, RI
”Video for Nonprofit Websites”

November 10
Providence Web Development Lunch Hour – Providence, RI

November 16
Providence Geeks – Providence, RI

Schedule TBA
Rhode Island .NET User Group - Bristol, RI
Southern New England SQL Server User Group, Warwick, RI

Vermont

October 10
Vermont .NET User Group – S. Burlington, VT
“Making Sense of the Microsoft .NET MicroFramework” – Eric Hall

October 27
MSDN Event: “Windows Phone Camp” – Champlain College, Burlington, VT
A free, full day of the tech to help you develop Windows Phone apps, practical guidance (interested in making money?), and the latest on Windows Phone 7.5 (codename “Mango”).

November 7
Vermont .NET User Group – S. Burlington, VT
”Developing Metro-Style Applications in Windows 8” – John McConnell

Schedule TBD
Vermont SQL Server User Group - Burlington, VT

New England Code Camp 16 – Registration and More

Chris Bowen — Sat, 01 Oct 2011 19:09:41 GMT

New England Code Camp 16, a major community event for developers, is coming to Waltham, MA on October 29th!

Registration (free!) is now open, as are the Calls for Speakers, Volunteers, and Contributors (details below).

    New England Code Camp 16
    Saturday, October 29, 2011
    8:30 AM – 6 PM + post-event Geek Gathering
    Microsoft, 201 Jones Road, Waltham, MA
    http://codecampboston.eventbrite.com
    #necc16

Code Camps are free events, held outside of regular work hours, organized by and for the developer community, and offer a chance to learn, share, and network. What kind of stuff might you see? It varies significantly camp to camp, but take a look at the previous camp’s schedule to get an idea.

Call for Speakers

From first-time presenters to veterans of national conferences, Code Camps are made great because we hear from many perspectives – including yours. Have something to share, the community wants to hear from you.

How? Just see the registration page for details (speakers only need to register as a speaker, not as an attendee.) Proposals can be for any technology topic and sessions will be 75 minutes long.

The Call for Speakers will close at the end of Friday, October 21st.

Have a question about speaking? Send a note to codecampspeaker@bostondotnet.org.

Call for Contributors

Contributors are a critical part of each Code Camp, relied upon to provide the essentials for the Code Camp experience, like:

Morning coffee (& doughnuts when possible)
Lunch
Giveaways – items to be given out by speakers in sessions
SWAG - items like pens, pads, and bags – branded or unbranded – it’s all welcome!

You’ll have a highly-targeted audience thanking your company for its support of the developer community, so please send a note to codecamp@bostondotnet.org if your company can help make Code Camp 16 a success!

Call for Volunteers

Want to help before or at the event? Great, and thank you! Just drop a line to codecamp@bostondotnet.org.

Call for Thanks!

Special thanks to Patrick Hynds, Chris Pels, and Robert Goodearl for the care and feeding of this event, to the contributing companies, and of course to the many speakers who volunteer their time and expertise!

See you at New England Code Camp 16!

-Chris

Windows Phone Camps in the East Have Begun!

Chris Bowen — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 21:58:15 GMT

A series of Windows Phone Camps has just kicked off, bringing free, full days of the tech to help you develop Windows Phone apps, practical guidance (interested in making money?), and the latest on Windows Phone 7.5 (codename “Mango”):

Don't miss the new Windows Phone 7.5 (codename "Mango") features as well - with detailed sessions in the afternoon around Fast Application Switching, Multitasking, Live Tiles, Push Notifications, and more.

The day will be capped with an open lab hands-on session and prizes for apps completed. This is the perfect opportunity to begin work on your dream application, or finish that app you've already started, with Windows Phone experts there to guide you every step of the way. Bring your own laptop to join in the fun and show off your killer app!

Those of us in New England will have two chances to join in, with a visit to Burlington, VT and a special two-day event in Cambridge, MA.

Series Schedule

9/22	Atlanta, GA	Registration
9/27	Malvern, PA	Registration
9/29	Reston, VA	Registration
10/12 10/13	Cambridge, MA	Day 1 Registration Day 2 Registration
10/18	Chevy Chase, MD	Registration
10/19	New York City, NY	Registration
10/25	Tampa, FL	Registration
10/27	Champlain College, Burlington, VT	Registration
11/2	NCSU, Raleigh, NC	Registration
11/4	Fort Lauderdale, FL	Registration
11/8	UCF, Orlando, FL	Registration
11/10	Univ. of Miami, Coral Gables, FL	Registration
11/10	SUNY (New Paltz), NY	Registration
11/15	Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA	Registration
11/17	Howard University, Washington, DC	Registration
11/29	Pittsburg, PA	Registration
11/29	Georgia Tech, Atlanta, GA	Registration
12/1	Hofstra, Long Island, NY	Registration

Event Agenda

Most of the events are featuring the following agenda, including a mix of presentations and hands-on labs:

9:00 AM	Welcome Campers
9:15 AM	How to make money with your Windows Phone app
10:00 AM	Frameworks for fun and profit > Silverlight and XNA
Noonish	Canteen
1:00 PM	Hands-on lab
3:00 PM	Cool stuff your app can do
4:00 PM	To the Cloud
4:45 PM	Be What's Next > People's Choice Awards

Cambridge, MA Special Event

In Cambridge, MA, the event packs an extra punch, spanning two days, October 12th & 13th:

Day 1 will feature inside advice from Windows Phone experts and local MVPs, plus technical sessions on Windows Phone app development. Day 2 goes hands-on with the opportunity to roll up your sleeves and code.

Whether you're a student just starting out or a seasoned developer for Windows Phone, Android, Symbian, Web OS or iOS, we'll be sharing tips and tricks and valuable app development know-how throughout the sessions. Check out the agenda and select the day that best fits your needs — or join us for the full event. The choice is yours.

You can attend either or both days, but there’s separate registration for each day (day 1, day 2).

Day 1 Agenda: October 12th

8:00 AM	Arrival and Registration
9:00 AM	Windows Phone Overview
9:45 AM	How to get started building Windows Phone Apps with Visual Studio
10:45 AM	Break
11:00 AM	Frameworks for fun and profit (part 1) – Building apps with Silverlight
12:00 PM	Lunch
1:00 PM	Frameworks for fun and profit (part 2) – Building games with XNA
2:00 PM	Live Tiles and Push Notifications
3:15 PM	Break
3:30 PM	Windows Phone 7.5 Fast Application Switching, Tombstoning and Multitasking
4:30 PM	How to make money with your Windows Phone App
5:00 PM	What's Next/Resources
5:00 PM	Event Ends

Day 2 Agenda: October 13th

8:00 AM	Arrival and Registration
9:00 AM	Open Lab Hands-on Sessions
9:15 AM	Event Ends

I’ll be at the Cambridge event and hope to see many of you there!

-Chris

New Boston Developer Group! Beantown ALT.NET

Chris Bowen — Thu, 25 Aug 2011 23:21:07 GMT

On the heels of the launch of the New England Mobile .NET group, there’s another Boston-area developer group – Beantown ALT.NET! The group is organized by John Zablocki and starts in September.

First of all, what’s “ALT.NET”? The concept has been around quite a while, and there are groups in many other cities. In fact, click through to NY ALT.NET or DC ALT.NET for a good description. John also has a post describing “Why Beantown ALT.NET?”

First meeting’s details:

    Beantown ALT.NET
    September 28th, 6:30 PM
    Microsoft NERD
    1 Memorial Dr., Cambridge, MA
    Topic: “HTML5 Practices and Adoption”
    Speaker: Well, me…

John kindly invited me to speak for this meeting. We’ll go beyond the “What is HTML5?” introduction to focus on practical strategies, tools, libraries, etc. for adopting HTML5 technologies today, while accommodating browsers that don’t natively support those features.

On October 26th, John will be covering “.NET and NoSQL: Relaxing with CouchDB”.

I hope to see you there!

-Chris

New England Code Camp 16 – October 29th – Save the Date!

Chris Bowen — Thu, 25 Aug 2011 00:57:38 GMT

I’m happy to pass along word that the date is set and venue reserved for the 16th New England Code Camp, a free, full day of knowledge sharing and networking, driven by developer community volunteers.

New England Code Camp 16
Saturday, October 29th, 2011
Microsoft
201 Jones Road, 6th floor
Waltham, MA

Never been to a Code Camp? To get an idea of what to expect, take a look at the schedule for Code Camp 15, held earlier this year.

Registration and the Calls for Speakers and Sponsors will be coming later, but in the meantime, mark your calendar and get ready to join hundreds of your fellow developers for this great community event!

-Chris

New Boston User Group – New England Mobile .NET Developers

Chris Bowen — Mon, 08 Aug 2011 14:29:41 GMT

There’s a new developer group forming in the Boston area, focusing on cross-platform development for mobile devices. Topics will include mobile devices (iPhone, Windows Phone 7, Android, etc.) and development, .NET, Mono, and frameworks like MonoTouch and beyond.

First meeting:

    New England Mobile .NET Developers’ Group
    August 24th, 6PM
    Microsoft NERD
    Cambridge, MA

The group is organized by Mike Bluestein, who has spoken at area events like Code Camps and is author of Learning MonoTouch.

See you there!

-Chris

P.S. Focusing on Windows Phone development, there’s also the Boston / New England Windows Phone User and Developer Group, meeting monthly in Waltham, hosted by Don Sorcinelli and Steve Hughes. (Next meeting, August 17th.)

List of HTML5 Presentation Resources

Chris Bowen — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 19:54:25 GMT

I’ve been running sessions on HTML5, Internet Explorer 9/10, CSS3 and more at recent Web Camps, Code Camps, and user group meetings. Many resources are shown or mentioned in those sessions, so I’ve compiled a list of them for you here.

I hope you find these useful!

HTML5

HTML5 at W3C – Specifications and learning materials
HTML5 W3C Logo – HTML5 and related logos
HTML5 Labs – Prototypes of early web specifications (e.g. IndexedDB, FileAPI, etc.)
ScriptJunkie.com – Articles and information on web development
CanIUse.com – Details support by browser for HTML5, CSS3, and other technologies
Modernizr – HTML5 & CSS3 feature detection made easy
HTML5 Cross Browser Polyfills – Shims, polyfills helpful for implementing features while supporting a range of browsers
HTML5 Boilerplate – An HTML5 template. Useful also as a reference.
Initializr – HTML5 template builder
Yepnope.js – Conditional resource loader that utilizes asynchronous calls

HTML5 Sample Applications/Sites

Never Mind the Bullets – HTML5 canvas, audio, etc. parallax example
Tron Legacy – Another great HTML5 canvas, audio, etc. example
Pirates Love Daisies – HTML5 canvas tower defense game
World’s Biggest PAC-MAN – Also try the Windows 7 pinning integration
Microsoft OneNote 2010 product page – Interesting example of applied HTML5

Internet Explorer

IE Test Drive – Samples, documentation, and IE 10 Platform Preview downloads
Beauty of the Web – Showcase of the latest web technologies in action
IE Developer Center – MSDN
IE Testing Center – web standards test cases
Internet Explorer Home
BuildMyPinnedSite.com – Quickly add features to improve retention of & experience for Windows 7 users

CSS

CSS3 Media Queries – Shows Media Queries and Listeners
Lost World’s Fairs – Demonstrations of WOFF support and CSS techniques
MediaQueri.es – Showcase of sites using CSS3 Media Queries to optimize content/layout
CSS3 Click Chart – Shows the source and effect of various CSS3 styles
Font Squirrel – Resource for @font-face kits and generator

Canvas & SVG

Canvas Pad – Great way to see/learn canvas capabilities
Easel.js – A library to help create HTML5 Canvas graphics
UN Systems Org Chart – SVG example showing effects of zooming
SVG-Oids – SVG game example (Fire up the F12 dev tools with this one)
Raphael – A library to help create vector graphics - SVG/VML

Microsoft Web Platform

Web Platform Installer – Easiest way to install what you need
WebMatrix – Free platform & tools for building websites
ASP.NET MVC – The Tools Update release uses HTML5, Modernizr and more
ASP.NET Web Forms
- Damian Edwards on ASP.NET Web Forms Futures – Mix11 session

Tools

Visual Studio Web Standards Update – HTML5 & CSS3 support in VS2010
- Mads Kristensen’s Post
- Scott Hanselman’s Post
Expression Web 4 (and Expression Web 4 SP2)
- My post on HTML5 and CSS3 support in Expression Web 4
Expression Web SuperPreview – Strong support for cross-browser testing

Presentation Slides

And finally, here are slides I’ve used at some point for various presentations.

SkyDrive folder share. Contains:
- HTML5 and Friends
- HTML5 Web Camp – Graphics and UI with CSS3, SVG, and Canvas
- HTML5 Web Camp – Practices and Adoption Techniques

My teammate Rachel Appel has posted materials from her HTML5 Web Camp sessions as well.

-Chris

More Microsoft HTML5 Web Camps Coming Soon!

Chris Bowen — Tue, 12 Jul 2011 17:43:13 GMT

The Microsoft HTML5 Web Camps are free, full-day events to help you get up to speed with HTML5 and related web standards.

After the popular events in Massachusetts & NYC in June, Rachel Appel, G. Andrew Duthie and I will be running six more Web Camps in August and September:

Farmington, CT – August 2nd – Registration
Atlanta, GA – August 4th – Registration
Chevy Chase, MD – August 23rd – Registration
Malvern, PA – August 25th – Registration
Tampa, FL – August 30th – Registration
Ft. Lauderdale, FL – September 1st – Registration

They’re all listed on the MSDN Events site and will soon be on the Microsoft Web Camps site as well.

What’s Being Covered?

Over the course of four sessions, we’ll introduce you to the next wave of web standards including HTML5, CSS3, ECMAScript5, SVG, and more:

HTML5

Semantic Markup, Audio, Video, Canvas, Geolocation, and more

Cascading Style Sheets, Level 3 (CSS3)
Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG)
ECMAScript5 and scripting techniques
Internet Explorer 9

Standards support and testing
Performance

Present and future of web standards
- Internet Explorer 10
- Emerging standards (e.g. WebSockets, IndexedDB, etc.)
Developer options and tools

Libraries
IE9 Developer Tools
Visual Studio 2010 and Expression Web 4

We’ll also show you techniques and frameworks to help you get started today while still offering good experiences for non-modern browsers.

Hope to see you at the Web Camps!

-Chris

Internet Explorer 9 Developer Tools Deep Dive – Part 5: Network Performance and Debugging

Chris Bowen — Fri, 08 Jul 2011 20:06:15 GMT

This post completes a series on the F12 Developer Tools included with Internet Explorer (since version 8) to help you improve your websites with tools to review content, diagnose issues, improve performance, and more:

Part 1 – Introduction
Part 2 – Working with HTML and CSS
Part 3 – Debugging JavaScript
Part 4 – Profiling JavaScript
Part 5 – Network Performance and Debugging

If this is your first look at the F12 Tools, I recommend you skim through the introductory post first.

Network Performance and Debugging in IE9

So far, our discussion of the F12 Tools focused on the client-side experience, but it’s very important to know how your applications utilize network resources.

Reducing download sizes, finding missing/redirected content, improving cache utilization, and much more can improve performance (actual and perceived) and lower your bandwidth bills.

The Network Tab

New in Internet Explorer 9, the Network tab offers an easy way to capture and investigate network traffic and cache requests. You can get a quick report of requests and responses, including headers, timing, and many more details.

“Wait, is this Fiddler ported to IE?”

No, but…

Fiddler is a web debugging proxy developed by Eric Lawrence (who also happens to be a PM on the Internet Explorer team.) While in some cases you’ll see similarities to Fiddler, they are very different in other regards.

Eric gave a great session on Fiddler at MIX11, and spent time (around 12:30 in) describing key differences from the F12 Tools. The session recording and slides are available for free.

You can also hear more in Eric’s very recent appearance on episode 116 of the “Herding Code” podcast.

Creating a Capture Session

To begin, launch the F12 Tools (Tools –> “F12 developer tools” or just press F12) and click to the Network tab. Click “Start capturing” and request a page (in this case, the IETestDrive home page):

Summary View

By default, captured traffic is shown in summary view, with the following fields:

URL
Method – HTTP method (GET, POST, etc.)
Result – HTTP response code (200, 301, 304, etc.) There are many codes, including redirects and errors. For example, look for 404 results, indicating the URL is incorrect or the content is unavailable.
Type – Content type received
Received – Size of data received
Taken – Duration of request
Initiator – Cause of the request (see Request Initiators below)
Timings – Graph of request/response timings (see Request Timings below)

Click any field header to sort, and right-click for options such as showing data as bytes and times in milliseconds:

Double-click or select an item and press “Go to detailed view” for full details.

Detailed View

There are seven detail categories for each request:

Request headers
Request body – The content (body) of the request, if any.
Response headers
Response body – The content (body) of the response. Shown as text (if script, css, etc.) or visually if possible (image types)
Cookies – Any cookies sent or received for the request
Initiator – What prompted the request. See Request Initiators below.
Timings – Detailed breakdown of timing. See Request Timings next.

Cycle through items with the Previous (CTRL + ,) and Next (CTRL + .) buttons, and press “Back to summary view” to return.

Request Timings

Timing details can seem a bit complex at first, but they’re fairly straightforward once you learn a few concepts.

Let’s start with a simple image request from the IETestDrive home page (after clearing the cache – see later), showing Timing details for GraySwooshWatermark.png:

Zooming in to the left-hand side:

The request/response cycle has seven timing components:

Wait – Time since start of page navigation to when the request started.
Start – From when the request was created to when it started to be sent.
Request – When the request was started to be sent to the first response. Also known as time to first byte.
Response – Time from first byte to completion of receiving the response.
Gap – Time between response completion to page load event.
DOMContentLoaded – Time of DOMContentLoaded event.
Load (event) – Time of page Load event.

Click in the list or on the diagram to highlight each timing component.

Tip: If you forget, the above descriptions are shown in the F12 Tools as you click each.

DOMContentLoaded vs. Page Load Event

Why are DOMContentLoaded and page Load different events? DOMContentLoaded fires when the page and scripts are loaded. This can happen before other requests (e.g. for images) are complete, at which point the page Load event would fire.

The difference between these can be significant, especially when downloading large graphics, ads, or other content, so it may be useful to tie script to the DOMContentLoaded event rather than page Load.

For a good demonstration of this in action, run the DOMContentLoaded example from the IETestDrive site:

Run it twice to see the impact that browser caching has on the delta between the events.

Analyzing Ongoing Traffic

So far, we’ve focused on profiling network use related to an initial page load, but the F12 Tools can also track ongoing requests, such as requests for additional content and Ajax-based calls.

To see this in action, we’ll run the Texas Hold’em example from IETestDrive.

Run the example and on the Network tab, click “Start capturing”. Next, hover over the game’s “START” button, but don’t click it yet:

You’ll see an image request (buttonGeneric_Hover.png) was made the moment the cursor hovered over the button:

Request Initiators

Why did IE9 wait to download this? For details, double-click (or hover over for a tooltip) the Initiator field, pictured above showing the value “background-image”, and the following is displayed:

The Initiator tells us what prompted IE9 to make the request. In this case CSS indicated an alternate background for hovering over the button, but IE deferred downloading the image until the hover event was executed. (As shown in Part 2, you can select the button and view the CSS Styles tab to see the input.actionButton:hover rule.)

Now click the game’s “START” button and you’ll notice three more requests:

The requests were for the background for another element, along with the first two playing cards dealt. Click “Go to detailed view” or double-click on of the card requests, then choose the “Response body” tab:

Again, to see why the request was made, click the “Initiator” tab:

Now we see JavaScript changed the src attribute for the img element (in this case to “Hearts_Queen.png”), and that resulted in a request to download the image.

From HTML to CSS and scripting, there are many possible request initiators. Some common examples:

background-image
click
@font-face
<frame>
frame navigate
<img>
@import
innerHtml
<input type=“image”>
navigate
Refresh
<script>
XmlHttpRequest

Taking time to understand initiators will give you another tool for improving page & network performance. For more detail, see “Understanding Download-Initiator” in this Fiddler blog post.

Browser Caching

After a number of Texas Hold’em hands, you may notice requests for certain items either aren’t made or show a 304 Result. This is because they’ve already been downloaded to play other hands and are already available locally.

Restart the application (refresh IE9) and you may see some 304 results. For example:

Notice the large difference in the Received field between cached (304) and downloaded (200) images. In this example, 11.65KB for the full image vs. just 162 bytes for a 304 - Not Modified result.

To see this at a higher level, here is an initial request to the CSS3 Media Queries example:

The second request is very different:

Not only is the page ready more quickly, but most requests were served by the browser cache (evidenced by the 304 Results, smaller Received sizes, and fewer blue segments under Timings.)

Tip: Use the F12 Tools to ensure your web server is setting cache headers that properly set expiration policies.
Tip: To improve cache hits, ensure file names match in spelling and case wherever referenced. The Network Monitoring example shows the effect of inconsistent case requests.

To clear the cache so requests again hit the network, click the “Clear browser cache” button (CTRL + R).

The Timings field shows timing of later requests relative to the original requests (including time waiting for you to click a button as in the Texas Hold’em example). This happens until you start a new session or click the “Clear” button , which clears results and resets timings for subsequent requests.

Saving Network Captures

As we saw with JavaScript profiling, you can also save network profiling details to an external file. Press the “Export captured traffic” button to save captured results:

Network data can be saved in CSV (comma separated values) format or as XML using the HTTP Archive format, described in this IE Blog post.

Tip: As mentioned in the IE Blog post, you can import these XML files into Fiddler.

Conclusion

I sincerely hope you’ve found this series useful. If you have feedback or ideas for other scenarios to cover, please leave comments here or send me a note.

Thanks, and enjoy using the F12 Tools!

-Chris

Internet Explorer 9 Developer Tools Deep Dive – Part 4: Profiling JavaScript

Chris Bowen — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 20:52:16 GMT

This continues a series of posts on the F12 Developer Tools included with Internet Explorer (since version 8) to help you improve your websites with tools to review content, diagnose issues, improve performance, and more:

Part 1 – Introduction
Part 2 – Working with HTML and CSS
Part 3 – Debugging JavaScript
Part 4 – Profiling JavaScript
Part 5 – Network Performance and Debugging

If this is your first look at the F12 Tools, I recommend you skim through the introductory post first.

Profiling JavaScript with Internet Explorer

In the last post, we saw many ways to help create JavaScript that is correct, but what about making it efficient? Though the new “Chakra” JavaScript engine in IE9 helps, it certainly that doesn’t mean we can stop looking for ways to optimize script performance.

Let’s fire up the IE9 Developer Tools (press F12 or choose Tools –> F12 Developer Tools) and take a look.

Introduction to Profiling

The F12 Tools’ Profiler tab lets you analyze the execution of JavaScript, showing which functions (whether custom or built-in) are being called and where time is spent.

Just click “Start profiling”, load a page and/or use page functionality, and click “Stop profiling”. You can also use F5 and Shift+F5 to start/stop, though I rarely find that easer.

In this example, we’re using the “ECMAScript5 Tile Switch Game” sample from the IETestDrive site

When the session is stopped a report of the instrumented script is shown, including the following by default:

Function name
Count of times called
Inclusive time (ms) – Time in the function plus any functions it calls
Exclusive time (ms) – Time in the function only
URL (of file containing the function)
Line number

Viewing Function Source Code

Double-click a line to go directly to the source for the function, if you have access to it. See Part 3 - JavaScript debugging for more on the Script tab.

Tip: Typically you can click to source where the URL field is specified. In this case playSound(), but not play() or getElementById():
Tip: You can also add the Function type column (see next) and look for “User” functions.

Click the Profiler tab to return to the list.

Customizing and Sorting the Report

There are more details available via columns that are hidden by default. To show them, right-click in the report and choose “Add / Remove columns”:

This will give access to:

Inclusive time % – Percent of total time
Exclusive time %
Avg time (ms)
Max time (ms)
Min time (ms)
Function type – User, DOM, Built-In

The right-click menu also enables sorting by displayed columns, but you’ll probably find it easier to click on column headers to toggle between sorting ascending and descending.

Report Views

There are two options available for viewing profiling report data: Functions and Call Tree views.

Functions View

By default, reports are shown in Functions view, listing content at the function level (one line per function) and allow an easy way to see where the most calls are made and where time is spent.

Call Tree View

Call Tree view shows the same data (each line is still a specific function), organized into a hierarchy by caller/callee relationships. From the root function(s), expand to see functions were called (and continue to expand to functions they in turn called.)

Tip: Unlike in Functions view, the same function may appear in more than one place because it was called by different parts of the application. In the above picture, playSound() appears under endPieceFlip() and startPieceFlip().

Sorting in Call Tree view works at the group level, with each subgroup sorting individually.

Searching Reports

As with other areas of the F12 Tools, use the Search box to find functions by name:

If a match is found, use the Next/Previous Result buttons (Enter / Shift+Enter) to navigate results.

Comparing Reports

As you create profiling sessions, you may notice the report drop-down is keeping track:

Use this to switch between individual profiling sessions. These are retained only for the life of the window.

To save the data for later use, or to perform more analysis, click the “Export data” button to save to a CSV format (that can then be load directly into Excel):

Tip: You can copy items (tab-delimited format) from the report directly. Click, CTRL+Click (for multiple items), or CTRL+A (all items), then CTRL+C or right-click and choose “Copy” to add details to the clipboard.

Once in Excel, you can decide where to go next. Build up an archive to document application performance during development, create various analysis graphs, or even extend Excel with .NET to help detect changes and trends from session to session.

Performance Optimization Tips

Now that you know how the profiler works, what should you be looking for? It’s a huge topic, subject of books, presentations, and articles, but here are some ideas to get you thinking:

Find hotspots – Obvious, but hard to master. Invest time where there’s the largest potential benefit. Profile, then sort on exclusive time to get a quick view. The more you read JavaScript optimization articles & books and keep up with advances in JavaScript (e.g. new ECMAScript 5 options), the better you’ll be at finding ways to improve.
High function counts – Having many calls to a function isn’t necessarily a problem, but it’s a good place to start looking. Can you refactor to batch requests together? Move conditionals earlier to prevent code path execution (a good use of the Call Tree view)? Make asynchronous requests?
Repeated calls – Calling a function with the same arguments repeatedly? Recomputing values frequently? They may be a good candidates for caching and/or precomputing common requests (server- or client-side).
Use realistic data – Some issues only manifest themselves in production scenarios. Test with realistic data and conditions… before your users do (e.g. testing that document processor using “Hello world!” might not be enough.)

Again, just a starting point, and many books and articles await you. For more ideas, watch Jason Weber’s “50 Performance Tricks to Make Your HTML5 Web Sites Faster” session from Mix11.

Next: Part 5 – Network Performance and Debugging

JavaScript execution is only part of the performance landscape. How you utilize (and don’t utilize) the network is another major performance factor.

In the next article, we’ll take a look at the Network feature that was added to the F12 Tools with Internet Explorer 9.

-Chris

Internet Explorer 9 Developer Tools Deep Dive – Part 3: Debugging JavaScript

Chris Bowen — Fri, 24 Jun 2011 17:25:47 GMT

Part 1 – Introduction
Part 2 – Working with HTML and CSS
Part 3 – Debugging JavaScript
Part 4 – Profiling JavaScript
Part 5 – Network Performance and Debugging

If this is your first look at the F12 Tools, I recommend you skim through the introductory post first.

Debugging JavaScript with Internet Explorer

Because using JavaScript to create web applications isn’t without its share of… challenges, the F12 Developer Tools can be very handy.

In this article, you’ll see how features from breakpoints and debugging code, to variable inspection and script formatting can make things easier.

Using the Debugger

To start debugging, open the Developer Tools (press F12 or choose Tools –> F12 Developer Tools) then select the Script tab and set a breakpoint (F9 or right-click and choose “Insert breakpoint”), then press “Start Debugging”.

Use the script drop-down list to switch between all of the page’s scripts:

Tip: Use CTRL+G to go to a specific line:

Start debugging, and if the breakpoint (or an error as we’ll see next) is hit, the debugger will pause at the line:

Use the toolbar buttons or access keys to step through code:

The options are (from left to right):

F5 – Continue – Continue execution
CTRL+SHIFT+B – Break All – Break on any next statement
F11 – Step Into – Step forward, including into any functions
F10 – Step Over – Step forward, without going into any called functions
SHIFT+F11 – Step Out – Step forward, but out of the current function

Right-click on the code for more options:

Set next statement – Makes the target statement execute next, skipping any code between it and the current statement.
Run to cursor – Executes code until the target statement is reached, including running any code between it and the current statement.
Add watch – See Working with Variables - Watch and Locals below

Tip: If Internet Explorer reports “not responding”, check to see if the F12 Tools are waiting on a line of code in debugging mode. The F12 Tools’ window detaches in debugging mode and may have snuck under IE’s window while awaiting your input.

Errors

If you run a script with an error (and the F12 Tools running), you’ll see the error highlighted in the Script tab:

The Console (on the right-hand side) will display a list of messages and errors. You can click on the hyperlinks to navigate to the line of code when available. MSDN has a list of built-in error codes (and suggested fixes) for common issues (from security to HTML5). More on the Console in a moment.

Note that before seeing this, you may be prompted to launch the debugger. Click Yes to launch the debugger (and check “Do not show this message again” to keep it quiet in the future).

Note that you can enable/disable breaking for errors via the “Break On Error” configuration option (CTRL+SHIFT+E).

Formatting JavaScript

Many times, you’ll use “minified” versions of JavaScript files to reduce download sizes and improve performance. That’s great for optimization… but not so great for readability.

Fortunately, the Configuration (CTRL+ALT+O) menu has a “Format JavaScript” option:

Same source, just formatted to be easier to read (notice how the line numbers are preserved). Set breakpoints as you wish and enjoy.

Working with the Console

The Console was given its own tab in IE9, but as you’ve seen above, is also available as a pane of the Script tab (in IE8 and later).

Console displays error messages and also supports diagnostic information via the window.console object. You can use these functions to instrument your scripts to help you detect and trace issues (instead of those jarring alert() calls):

console.log – General logging
console.info – Informational message
console.warn – Warning message
console.error – Error message
console.assert – Emit message only if a condition fails

Also:

console.clear – Clears the console window
console.dir – Displays details for an object
console.profile/profileEnd – Start/stop a script profiling session (covered in Part 4 of this series)

You can check existence of window.console if you have script you only want executed when the F12 Tools are running. For example:

Tip: You don’t need to be debugging for these diagnostic messages to display.

Seeing too many messages, or just want to see certain message types? Right-click in the Console and choose “Filter” option(s):

Executing Script

The textbox at the bottom of the Console supports direct script execution. Enter variable names to see details (via window.console.dir), expressions, or statements.

You’ll see the result in the Console, and browser’s rendering of the page will reflect any effects/changes as well.

Tip: This is a great way to learn/test commands from JavaScript libraries like jQuery.
Tip: If you run script that modifies the DOM (e.g. adding elements), the HTML tab won’t show the change (nor let you select it via “Select Element By Click”) until you hit the Refresh button - the one in the F12 Tools, not IE’s page refresh.

You can enter a single line, or click the multiline button (CTRL+ALT+M) to enter multiline scripts.

Working with Variables - Watch and Locals

Because seeing code is only part of the battle, you’ll want to inspect variables as well. When debugging, the Script tab lets you hover over variables to see details.

From simple properties and scalars:

To full object inspection:

The Locals and Watch panes help you track values of variables and objects. Locals is constantly updated to show you values of locally-scoped variables:

Values changed by the latest executed statement are shown in red.

The Watch pane shows only variables and expressions you indicate. You can also add a watch directly in the Watch pane, from an entry in the Locals pane, or by right-clicking on a variable name in debugging mode:

Also note that as you execute script via the Console, variables, jQuery results, and the like offer an “Add to watch” option.

Unlike the Locals pane, Watch retains the same set of items as you step through code. In-scope watch variables will have values displayed, out-of-scope variables are shown as “undefined”:

The Watch and Locals panes allow you to edit variables. Double-click the Value cell or right-click and choose “Edit value”:

The Call Stack

Many times you will be debugging code but wondering just what series of functions led execution to that point. Use the Call Stack pane to see the path of functions:

You can navigate between items on the call stack by double-clicking. The chosen stack item line will be highlighted in green (and as always the current/executing line of code is highlighted in yellow):

Managing Breakpoints

Finally, you can direct the tools to break at certain lines by setting breakpoints. Just select the line in the Script tab and press F9 or right-click and choose “Insert breakpoint”:

You can further control breaking by setting the “Break on error” and “Continue after exception” options:

The Script tab’s Breakpoints pane lets you view and manage (disable/enable and delete) all breakpoints at a glance:

Conditional breakpoints can be set via the Breakpoints pane (above), or by right-clicking on the breakpoint indicator and choosing “Condition…”:

Enter the JavaScript expression for the condition to check (you have access to any in-scope variables as well):

Conditional breakpoints are displayed with a plus indicator:

Next: Part 4 – Profiling

I hope you’ve enjoyed this look at working with JavaScript in the F12 Tools.

In the next article, we’ll take a look at profiling and optimizing JavaScript, using the F12 Tools Profiler tab to analyze script performance.

-Chris

Developer Events in the Northeast – Early Summer, 2011

Chris Bowen — Tue, 21 Jun 2011 19:55:41 GMT

Welcome to summer! Though beaches, ice cream trucks, and vacations await, the developer community marches on, so here’s a look at events in the northeastern U.S. for the first part of the season.

As always, if you know of other (free or nearly free) developer-focused events, please let me know.

-Chris

Connecticut

July 5
Agile Connecticut - Farmington, CT

July 11
Hartford Area Build Guild – Farmington, CT
“Web People + Adult Beverages + High Fives”

August 2
Agile Connecticut - Farmington, CT

August 8
Hartford Area Build Guild – Farmington, CT
“Web People + Adult Beverages + High Fives”

Schedule TBD
Connecticut .NET Developers Group – Farmington, CT
Connecticut DotNetNuke User Group - Bethany, CT
Fairfield/Westchester .NET User Group – Stamford, CT
Fairfield/Westchester SQL Server UG - Stamford, CT
Hartford SQL Server Users Group – Farmington, CT
New England Silverlight Guild – Hartford, CT

Maine

June 23
Maine Bytes User Group - Portland, ME
“Azure State of the Union” – Ben Day

June 28
Maine Developer Network - Augusta, ME
HTML5: Intro, graphics (CSS, SVG, Canvas), and practices/adoption – Chris Bowen

June 28
Bangor Area .Net Developers (BAND) - Bangor, ME
HTML5, IE9 & 10, and More – Chris Bowen (Yes, I’m also presenting in Augusta, but that’s during the day )

July 26
Bangor Area .Net Developers (BAND) - Bangor, ME

July 29 – 31
Maine Code Camp 2 – Mt. Blue State Park, Weld, ME
Escape from the office with fellow developers for a weekend of actual, honest-to-goodness camping and tech!

Schedule TBD
Agile User Group – Portland, ME
Usability / User Experience User Group – Portland, ME
Web Designers User Group – Portland, ME (on Summer break)

Massachusetts

June 22
Boston XNA Developers Group - Waltham, MA

June 22
Agile Boston User Group - Waltham, MA
“Agile Coaches Panel Presentation”

June 22
Boston Front End Developers – Cambridge, MA

June 23
Boston Azure User Group – Cambridge, MA
“Rock, Paper, Azure Challenge” – Hands-On in-the-Azure-cloud Game Challenge

June 23
Boston Web Performance Group – Boston, MA
“Powering Up Your Code with High Performance CSS and HTML5” – Tim Wright

June 23
Refresh Boston – Cambridge, MA
“Hopping on the Bandwagon: Branding & Marketing for Smallish Businesses” – Fred LeBlanc

June 25
Hack/Reduce Boston Hackathon – Cambridge, MA

June 29
Worcester Web Technology – Worcester, MA
“Intro to Ext JS 4”

June 30
Boston JavaScript Meetup – Cambridge, MA
“Sencha Ext & Sencha Touch” – Aaron White

June 30
UX Book Club, Boston – Cambridge, MA
“Christopher Alexander: The Timeless Way of Building”

June 30
Lean Startup Circle Meetup – Cambridge, MA

July 7
New England Visual Basic Professionals - Waltham, MA
“Identify & Fix Performance Problems with Visual Studio Ultimate” – Ben Day

July 7
HPC & GPU Supercomputing Group of Boston – Cambridge, MA

July 11
New England F# User Group – Cambridge, MA
“F# Type Providers” – Keith Battocchi

July 12
Build Guild – Salem, MA
“Web People + Adult Beverages + High Fives”

July 12
DotNetNuke Boston Meetup – Cambridge, MA

July 13
Boston Area SharePoint Users Group – Cambridge, MA
“SharePoint 2010 Usage and Adoption Best Practices” – Scott Jamison

July 13
jQuery Boston Meetup – Boston, MA
“Web Mapping with Geomap, a jQuery Plugin” – Ryan Westphal

July 13
Boston PHP – Cambridge, MA
“Learn the Secrets of SEO (Search Engine Optimization)”

July 14
Worcester Web Technology – Worcester, MA

July 19
Boston New Technology Meetup – Cambridge, MA

July 20
New England Windows Phone User and Developer Group - Waltham, MA
Summer of Mango: “Developing Windows Phone 7.1 Structured Storage Applications”

July 20
Boston .NET Architecture Study Group - Waltham, MA

July 20
HTML5 Game Development Meetup – Boston, MA

July 20
New England ASP.NET Professionals – Waltham, MA

July 20
Boston Arduino Users Group – Cambridge, MA

July 27
Boston XNA Developers Group - Waltham, MA

July 28
Boston Azure User Group – Cambridge, MA

August 9
DotNetNuke Boston Meetup – Cambridge, MA

August 17
New England ASP.NET Professionals – Waltham, MA
“Intro to HTML5” – Chris Bowen

August 17
Boston .NET Architecture Study Group - Waltham, MA

August 17
HTML5 Game Development Meetup – Boston, MA

August 17
Boston Arduino Users Group – Cambridge, MA

August 17
Worcester Web Technology – Worcester, MA

August 18
Western Mass Microsoft Technology Users Group - Agawam, MA
“ASP.NET MVC3 and Razor” – Chris Bowen

Schedule TBD
Beantown .NET User Group - Cambridge, MA (On Summer break)
Boston .NET User Group - Waltham, MA
Boston BizSpark Meetup – Cambridge, MA
Boston Business Intelligence – Waltham, MA
Boston Cloud Services – Waltham, MA
Boston Web Design Meetup – Cambridge, MA
Boston WebsiteSpark Group – Cambridge, MA
Cape Cod .NET User Group – Plymouth, MA
Cape Cod XNA User Group – Hyannis, MA
IASA New England – Waltham, MA
New England Silverlight Guild – Cambridge, MA
New England SQL Server User Group - Waltham, MA (On Summer break)
North Shore Web Geeks – Newburyport, MA
OWASP (Open Web Application Security Project) – Waltham, MA
Western Mass Developers’ Group – Hadley, MA

New Hampshire

July 13
Granite State SharePoint User Group – Nashua, NH

July 20
NH .NET User Group, Seacoast – Portsmouth, NH

July 20
NH .NET User Group, Nashua – Nashua, NH

August 10
Granite State SharePoint User Group – Nashua, NH

Schedule TBD
Nashua Scrum Club – Nashua, NH
NH .NET User Group, Concord – Concord, NH (On Summer break)
Seacoast SQL Server Users Group – Portsmouth, NH

New York (Upstate)

June 22
Build Guild – Troy, NY
“Web People + Adult Beverages + High Fives”

June 23
VDUNY - Visual Developers of Upstate NY - Rochester, NY
“Windows Communication Foundation (WCF)” – Steve Maier

July 6
Rochester Javascript – Rochester, NY

July 12
Rochester SharePoint User Group – Rochester, NY

August 3
Rochester Javascript – Rochester, NY

Schedule TBD
AppRochester – Rochester, NY
Central New York .NET Developer Group - East Syracuse, NY
OWASP (Open Web Application Security Project) – Rochester, NY
Refresh Rochester – Rochester, NY
Tech Valley .NET Users Group - Latham, NY
Upstate NY PowerShell Users Group – Rochester, NY
Upstate NY PowerShell Users Group – Syracuse, NY
Western New York .NET Users Group - Amherst, NY
Western NY SQL Server PASS – Amherst, NY

Rhode Island

July 13
Providence Geeks – Providence, RI

July 14
Providence Web Development Lunch Hour – Providence, RI

August 11
Providence Web Development Lunch Hour – Providence, RI

Schedule TBD
Rhode Island .NET User Group - Bristol, RI
Southern New England SQL Server User Group, Warwick, RI

Vermont

July 11
Vermont .NET User Group – S. Burlington, VT
Mark Dunn

September 10
Vermont Code Camp 2011 – Burlington, VT

September 16
VT Hackathon – Burlington, VT

Schedule TBD
Vermont SQL Server User Group - Burlington, VT

Internet Explorer 9 Developer Tools Deep Dive – Part 2: HTML & CSS

Chris Bowen — Fri, 17 Jun 2011 15:59:16 GMT

Part 1 – Introduction
Part 2 – Working with HTML and CSS
Part 3 – Debugging JavaScript
Part 4 – Profiling JavaScript
Part 5 – Network Performance and Debugging

If this is your first look at the F12 Tools, I recommend you skim through the introductory post first.

Working with HTML and CSS

One of the best uses of the F12 Tools (press F12 or choose Tools –> F12 Developer Tools) is to work through issues with page structure and design. Usually you’ll start by selecting a particular element. You can browse the HTML tab to find content manually, but here are three shortcuts:

Find Element by Click

Easy enough. Just click the arrow button (or CTRL+B) and click on the element you’d like. The element will be outlined in the page and selected in the HTML display.

Search Box

Next is the Search box, available on all tabs except Console. Enter text to find and, if matches are found, they will be highlighted in the main and HTML/CSS windows, and the forward/back buttons will be enabled.

On the HTML tab, Search supports selectors as used by CSS (and the basis of jQuery selectors) but you need to type an “@” symbol before your expression, otherwise it’s treated as a literal text search.

For example, a search for “@.navigation-list li” on my blog finds the li items in elements assigned the “navigation-list” class:

The matching items are highlighted in the HTML (or CSS) tab and the first match outlined in the browser window.

Outline Elements

If you want to quickly survey a page to find a category of element, use Tools –> Outline Elements (CTRL+O):

Add elements and/or selectors (and colors) and they’ll be outlined in the browser window:

For example, the two selectors enabled above outline all images and non-local links:

Unlike search, Outline Elements affects only the main browser window, and does not highlight matches in the HTML tab. However, your choices will be highlighted on all pages you visit while the F12 Tools are open.

Working with HTML

Now that you’ve found the content, the HTML tab will let you review, change, and save changes to your page.

Any existing attribute can be edited, and new ones added by right-clicking the element and choosing “Add Attribute”. You can also edit the HTML directly by clicking Edit (CTRL+E).

Content changes modify only your local view, so you’ll need to update your site manually. You can click Save to save HTML or CSS files, but a handy way to isolate a change is the Element Source with Style button (CTRL+T). It shows the markup focusing on that element, plus any applied CSS styles.

You can also view just the DOM either for the page or just an element via the View –> Source options:

In the CSS section next, we’ll cover the details shown in the panes on the right-hand side of the HTML tab, but note that while most nodes deal with CSS, the Attributes node applies to both CSS and HTML attributes.

Note: The HTML display reflects changed attributes and edited HTML, but if script changes the page structure, refresh the HTML tab by clicking Refresh or pressing F5 (make sure the HTML tab has focus, or the main page will refresh, losing any changes you’ve made.)

Working with CSS

Now that you know how to work with HTML, let’s focus on styling with CSS. You’ll find the F12 Tools are great for diagnosing style issues (e.g. “Now why is that text red?!”).

When elements are selected in the HTML tab, the right-hand pane displays the Style view by default:

This view shows all styles that apply to the current element, organized by style. You can see which attributes have an effect and which aren’t used (indicated by strikethrough font) because they are overridden by another style. Click the checkboxes next to each to see the result of enabling/disabling the style or attribute.

Trace Styles takes a different approach, displaying by attribute rather than style. I find it the fastest way to discover why a particular effect/setting is being used. For example, to find why text is a certain color, expand the color attribute and you’ll see the various styles that set the color, and which has “won”:

As with Style, you can check/uncheck settings to determine their effects.

Layout is a graphical representation of the size, offset, margin, border, and padding for a given element. It is editable, so you can modify layout directly here.

Attributes shows all attributes for the selected element, including HTML and CSS. You can edit and add attributes as you wish, with a full drop-down list of attributes as guidance:

You can also click “Show Read-Only Properties” to see all attributes for that element. Read-only attributes will be listed in gray.

CSS Tab

The CSS tab displays current CSS classes and styles, allowing you to view specific CSS files in use by the page, make changes, and search.

Select from the available stylesheets for the page, and you’ll see the styles driven by that document.

You can modify styles directly in the tab, and right-click to create or delete rules and attributes:

And as described earlier, you can also use the Search box to find content in the selected stylesheet.

Browser Testing

Top of mind for many, especially when using HTML5 and CSS3, is making sure a site works and looks good in other browsers that might be used to access your site.

A good way to do this is to have the F12 Tools simulate being another browser and/or version. On the right side of the menu, you’ll see options to change the Browser Mode and Document Mode:

It’s important to know the difference between these, so here we go...

Browser Mode

While Browser Mode sets default Document Mode (we’ll get to that next), it more importantly also changes the UA (user-agent) string sent by IE to the web server.

For example, you could tell the website that you are running Internet Explorer 7. If the server cares about this (via conditional logic or controls), it might send you different content tuned for IE7. Of course, for static content, this setting will have no effect on what is sent by the website.

Keep in mind that the content itself might have logic that depends on the UA string, such as reacting to certain browsers/versions (e.g. “If Internet Explorer < 8, do this, else…”)

As mentioned, Browser Mode also sets Document Mode to the default choice for that browser (e.g. IE7 standards mode for IE7), but you could set these independently (e.g. IE9 Browser Mode w/ IE8 Standards Document Mode).

Document Mode

Unlike Browser Mode, Document Mode changes the way content is processed locally by Internet Explorer itself.

In other words, regardless of what you tell the server via Browser Mode, this sets how IE will process and display the received content. For example, if you are working in IE9 on a page using HTML5 features, you can switch to IE7 or IE8 mode to see how that same content would be rendered for users of those versions.

The best way to learn these is to try them, especially on a page that offers features not supported in an earlier version of Internet Explorer or has logic that depends on the UA string.

For more details on all of this, see Testing Browser and Document Compatibility Modes with the Developer Tools and Defining Document Compatibility on MSDN.

Change User Agent String

If you want to change the UA string beyond the default entries in Browser Mode, use Tools –> “Change user-agent string”:

You can choose one of the built-in UA strings, or define your own by clicking “Custom…”. In the image above, I have a custom UA string for a mobile device.

Remember that this has no effect on the Document Mode used to process the content, and is only a signal to the website/page that you have a particular browser/version.

Expression Web SuperPreview

While you can change the UA string as you wish, it can be important to see and compare how a page actually renders in different browsers beyond. Short of having all of those browsers (and OS versions) at your disposal, Expression Web SuperPreview can help.

There is a trial version and a full version that offers Remote Browsers, enabling rendering of pages on browsers you may not have (e.g. Safari 5 on a Mac).

See the end of my article “HTML5, CSS3, and More with Expression Web 4 SP1” for details on SuperPreview.

Next: Part 3

In the next article, we’ll begin diving into JavaScript, using the F12 Tools Console and Script tabs to debug your scripts.

-Chris

Internet Explorer 9 Developer Tools Deep Dive – Part 1: Introduction

Chris Bowen — Wed, 25 May 2011 19:23:58 GMT

In this series, we’ll take a detailed look at the Developer Tools included in Internet Explorer. They can be used to inspect page structure, improve design, debug scripts, optimize page and network performance, and much more.

Part 1 – Introduction
Part 2 – Working with HTML and CSS
Part 3 – Debugging JavaScript
Part 4 – Profiling JavaScript
Part 5 – Network Performance and Debugging

BTW, much of this content is covered in my screencast for The Code Project Virtual Summit on HTML5/CSS3 (available for free).

Getting Started

The F12 Developer Tools are a standard feature of Internet Explorer (no need to install anything else), so just make sure you’re running IE8, IE9, or the IE10 Platform Preview. Head to these sites to learn more and download IE:

IE Test Drive – IE9 and IE10 downloads, samples, tests, and resources
Beauty of the Web – IE9 features, showcase sites, and resources

Running the Developer Tools

Easy enough – just press F12 or choose Tools-> “F12 developer tools” to start.

You can either run the tools attached in the browser or press the double window icon at top right to detach for a second monitor or to use side-by-side with the browser.

Tip: On Windows 7, the Aero Snap keys are handy here – Windows Key + Arrow Keys.

A Quick Tour

Let’s take a quick tour of the main features, and we’ll delve into the details in the other posts. There are six tabbed sections of features: HTML, CSS, Console, Script, Profiler, and Network.

The HTML Tab

The HTML tab is great for inspecting your page, setting values, and seeing the effects of CSS styling.

The right-hand pane shows a per-element CSS summary (Style) and hierarchy/trace (Trace Styles), offers a visual layout tool (Layout), and a way to set custom attributes (Attributes).

The CSS Tab

The CSS tab displays current CSS classes and styles, allowing you to view specific CSS files in use by the page, make changes, and search.

Combined with the right-hand panes on the HTML tab, there are a lot a ways to view and modify your CSS. More details and advice for using these two tabs in Part 2 (HTML & CSS).

The Script and Console Tabs

The Script tab lets you work with script, setting breakpoints, debugging through code, and breaking on errors.

New in IE9 is the ability to Format JavaScript, which can make even minified script files easy to read and debug.

The pane at right features Console (supporting console.log() and other functions), Breakpoints, Locals, Watch, and Call Stack views.

New in IE9 is the Format JavaScript option, which can make even minified script files easy to read and debug:

The Console tab is much like the Console pane of the Scripts tab, offering a larger surface for viewing messages and executing script commands. You’ll find more on this in Part 3 (debugging).

The Profiler Tab

The Profiler tab lets you analyze the execution of JavaScript. Just “Start Profiling”, load a page and/or use page functionality, then click “Stop Profiling”.

You’ll see a summary report showing functions, times called, time elapsed and more. There is much more detail on using this feature in Part 4 (profiling).

The Network Tab

The Network tab is new with IE9, enabling the capture and analysis of network usage.

Like script profiling, just start capturing and load/use a page or pages. You’ll see the requests made, results, response details, and timing. Double-click an entry to see details:

There’s a lot to cover here, so see Part 5 (network profiling and debugging) for details and techniques for using this feature.

Menu Options

Don’t forget to look through the many options in the various menus. For example:

Image and Link reports
Element outlining (tables, divs, etc.)
Cache management
Setting custom User-Agent (UA) strings (e.g. mobile)
Clear/view cookies
Disabling of script, CSS, and the pop-up blocker
Tools to resize the browser, measure items, and select colors
Page validation

You can also change Browser Mode and Document Mode.

We’ll dive into this in the next post, but the short version is Browser Mode can send different User-Agent (UA) strings, simulating different browsers to a server, and Document Mode changes the engine mode IE will use to render pages.

Internet Explorer Resources

Finally, here are some resources to get you underway:

IE Test Drive – Downloads, samples, tests, and resources
Beauty of the Web – IE9 Features, showcase sites, and resources
IE Developer Center
Dev Tools Keyboard Shortcuts
IE Dev Tools Tutorial sample site
My Dev Tools screencast - part of The Code Project Virtual Tech Summit (free)

Stay tuned for more posts, and I hope you enjoy using the F12 Tools!

-Chris

The Code Project Virtual Tech Summit on HTML5 & CSS3

Chris Bowen — Wed, 25 May 2011 12:37:50 GMT

Starting today (and continuing after), you can access some great content on HTML5 and CSS3 for free via The Code Project’s Virtual Tech Summit:

http://www.virtualtechsummits.com/Register.aspx?eventID=13

The event kicks off at noon EDT with Molly Holzschlag’s keynote on “The Future of HTML5” followed by other sessions… including one by me on “Using the Internet Explorer 9 Developer Tools” (launching at 2:15 PM EDT).

If you can’t make it today, no problem, an advantage of this virtual event is you can drop by any time.

Enjoy!
Chris

Internet Explorer 9: Pinned Site Shortcuts vs. Internet Shortcuts

Chris Bowen — Thu, 12 May 2011 21:21:49 GMT

You may have noticed that with Internet Explorer 9, dragging a site’s icon to your desktop results not only in a link being created, but also the IE window being refreshed.

Why does that happen? (And is there a choice?)

A Tale of Two Shortcuts

By default, when you click and drag a site icon to desktop, you’ll create a Pinned Site Shortcut.

The page is relocated to a new window, which will show it as a pinned site. For example, you’ll see the navigation buttons take on the key color of the site icon (or the msapplication-navbutton-color meta element.) More on pinned sites in a moment.

The Alternative

Just want a basic link without the extras?

Hold down Shift then drag & drop the site icon to the desktop. This will create an Internet Shortcut. You’ll notice IE does not move or change in this case.

You may be asking “So… why the two options?”

The Differences

Pinned Site Shortcuts use the .website file extension, and Internet Shortcuts use the .url extension. They look the same when a site has a favicon, and slightly different without:

“Um, that’s fascinating, Chris, but what’s the practical difference?”

Certainly the most substantial difference is that one gives you a pinned site, along with the many features they support – Jump Lists, Notifications, Thumbnail Toolbars, etc. Links for learning more are at the end of this post.

Let’s look at some other differences.

Menu Options

Firing up the right mouse button, here are the right-click menus for each (Internet Shortcut on left, Pinned Site Shortcut on right):

Mostly the same, except the Internet Shortcut offers “Print”, and the Pinned Site Shortcut offers to pin to the Start Menu and Taskbar. Speaking of which…

A Stroll to the Taskbar

Dragging (or pinning) the shortcuts to the Taskbar has different effects by shortcut type:

Pinned Site Shortcut – Adds a new, separate pinned site to your taskbar. This will give you easy access to that site, plus the features mentioned earlier. Right click on shortcut in the Taskbar to see some of those features.

Internet Shortcut – Pins the site to Internet Explorer itself, not as a new entry in the Taskbar. Right-click on IE’s Taskbar shortcut and the site is listed under “Pinned”:

Learning About Pinned Sites

This post focused on the differences in shortcut features, but there’s much more that pinned sites can do (and generally don’t need much work to enable.) Here’s where to find more:

Enjoy making those shortcuts!

-Chris

HTML5 Web Camps in Waltham, MA and New York City

Chris Bowen — Mon, 09 May 2011 21:01:41 GMT

Want to get up to speed with HTML5 and related web standards? HTML5 Web Camps are a series of events to help you do just that.

In the northeastern U.S., join me and my NYC-based teammate Rachel Appel as we deliver two free, full-day HTML5 Web Camps in June:

June 13, 9 AM – 5 PM
Microsoft, 201 Jones Road
Waltham, MA
Registration
June 15, 9 AM – 5 PM
Microsoft, 1290 Ave of the Americas
New York, NY
Registration

We’ll be covering the next wave of web standards including HTML5, CSS3, SVG, and more:

HTML5 Semantic Markup
HTML5 Audio and Video
HTML5 Canvas
HTML5 Geolocation
Cascading Style Sheets, Level 3 (CSS3)
Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG)
ECMAScript5
Internet Explorer 9
- Standards Support
- Site Pinning
- Hardware Acceleration
Present and future of web standards
- A look at the IE10 Platform Preview
- Emerging standards (e.g. WebSockets, IndexedDB, etc.)
Developer options and tools
- IE9 Developer Tools
- Expression Web 4
- Visual Studio 2010

We’ll also show you techniques and frameworks to help you get started today while still offering good experiences for non-modern browsers.

It’s a full (and free) day, so register now and we’ll see you at HTML5 Web Camp!

-Chris