This isn't a programming question....I hope...
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I would strongly recommend WPF: A Beginner's Guide - Part 1 of n[^] and the rest of the series, and in fact, any of Sacha's brilliant articles.
Ohh yes, I intend to use Sacha's articles as well! Thanks! :)
"Benjamin is nobody's friend. If Benjamin were an ice cream flavor, he'd be pralines and dick." ~ Garth Algar "If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur." ~ Paul Neal "Red" Adair
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Oxford and Cambridge say "Aye!" :-D
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So you would recommend he step back instead of forward? Learn an outdated tool that is no longer mainstream and he wouldn't find a job in instead of a modern more capable tool that is widely used? There is zero logic in this.
If it's not broken, fix it until it is
I like WPF - it definitely seemed like a step forward - but there is a question mark over its future that a lot of developers (myself included) feel uneasy about. It's summed up by Peter Bright in his article at over at Arstechnica: "The situation for developers using the WPF graphical framework was similar. There have been rumors that it has been cancelled and the team that worked on it disbanded, but there was never any positive confirmation from Microsoft and little or no light shed on the framework's future, if it even had one. Again, developers made the investment in WPF, and they were left in the lurch. The same is true for developers using the XNA game framework (which, unlike WPF, has been killed off) and arguably even .NET as a whole."
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I've just built myself a nice Access DB to keep track of my Gym workouts to keep me focused on the gym (always on an eye on progression not stagnation and boredom). During the build I sidetracked to build myself a little WinForms app to auto generate some Access VBA Class code rather than having to write it all out for another Access DB (which I had an idea about). Easy peasy, whacked it together in virtually no time at all...then it struck me...I have absolutely no idea about WPF! So, my new mission, which I accept, well sort of accept, sort of dread - is to learn WPF!!! (Which I will only be able to do in my 'spare' time outside of work, seeing as that I don't do C# in my day to day stuff). So, I've just bought "WPF 4.5 Unleashed" by Adam Nathan, and shall begin be working my way through that - with the ambition to turn my Access DB into a WPF application, and maybe to ditch the Access backend altogether replaced by something that I haven't decided yet. Anyone got any quick tips, gotchas, helpful hints, 'beware of' or any other words of wisdom before I begin my fraught and perilous journey?? :D
"Benjamin is nobody's friend. If Benjamin were an ice cream flavor, he'd be pralines and dick." ~ Garth Algar "If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur." ~ Paul Neal "Red" Adair
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I've just built myself a nice Access DB to keep track of my Gym workouts to keep me focused on the gym (always on an eye on progression not stagnation and boredom). During the build I sidetracked to build myself a little WinForms app to auto generate some Access VBA Class code rather than having to write it all out for another Access DB (which I had an idea about). Easy peasy, whacked it together in virtually no time at all...then it struck me...I have absolutely no idea about WPF! So, my new mission, which I accept, well sort of accept, sort of dread - is to learn WPF!!! (Which I will only be able to do in my 'spare' time outside of work, seeing as that I don't do C# in my day to day stuff). So, I've just bought "WPF 4.5 Unleashed" by Adam Nathan, and shall begin be working my way through that - with the ambition to turn my Access DB into a WPF application, and maybe to ditch the Access backend altogether replaced by something that I haven't decided yet. Anyone got any quick tips, gotchas, helpful hints, 'beware of' or any other words of wisdom before I begin my fraught and perilous journey?? :D
"Benjamin is nobody's friend. If Benjamin were an ice cream flavor, he'd be pralines and dick." ~ Garth Algar "If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur." ~ Paul Neal "Red" Adair
WPF is the front-end, the GUI. You don't have to have it to work with your access database. If you want to learn it, that's one thing, but you're talking apples & oranges here. Your back end code (the Access stuff) doesn't care if you use WinForms or WPF.
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WPF is the front-end, the GUI. You don't have to have it to work with your access database. If you want to learn it, that's one thing, but you're talking apples & oranges here. Your back end code (the Access stuff) doesn't care if you use WinForms or WPF.
Yes, thanks, I'm aware of that - its just an idea at the moment; a goal to focus on. :)
"Benjamin is nobody's friend. If Benjamin were an ice cream flavor, he'd be pralines and dick." ~ Garth Algar "If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur." ~ Paul Neal "Red" Adair
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Yes, thanks, I'm aware of that - its just an idea at the moment; a goal to focus on. :)
"Benjamin is nobody's friend. If Benjamin were an ice cream flavor, he'd be pralines and dick." ~ Garth Algar "If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur." ~ Paul Neal "Red" Adair
:) I spent a little time a few years ago playing with WPF and found it to be a real overkill for the types of stuff I write. I'm not so much into making pretty pictures as just presenting data which WinForms is fine for; it's consistent, mature and just plain works.
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:) I spent a little time a few years ago playing with WPF and found it to be a real overkill for the types of stuff I write. I'm not so much into making pretty pictures as just presenting data which WinForms is fine for; it's consistent, mature and just plain works.
Yeah - it does appear to be fairly large in scope! But, I can nob about with Winforms and I just thought that I should really start getting to grips with it - just for the fun of it. Winforms won;t be going away any time soon, but (at the moment at least) WPf is the future :~
"Benjamin is nobody's friend. If Benjamin were an ice cream flavor, he'd be pralines and dick." ~ Garth Algar "If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur." ~ Paul Neal "Red" Adair
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Yeah - it does appear to be fairly large in scope! But, I can nob about with Winforms and I just thought that I should really start getting to grips with it - just for the fun of it. Winforms won;t be going away any time soon, but (at the moment at least) WPf is the future :~
"Benjamin is nobody's friend. If Benjamin were an ice cream flavor, he'd be pralines and dick." ~ Garth Algar "If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur." ~ Paul Neal "Red" Adair
The thing I didn't care about with WPF was having to constantly deal with XAML, which is fine I guess but if I wanted to deal with an HTML type language I'd just write a web application. I just felt that doing that on the desktop when I had gotten used to a GUI designer was just too much work for what I was trying to accomplish. With WinForms most of my time is focused on the application itself (making things work, etc.) whereas with WPF I felt like I was spending an inordinate amount of time trying to get the GUI right. I mean, how many methods must I ingest into my head for presenting a grid of data, or a list of items to choose, etc? I'm not at-all against these technologies per-se you might just say I've finally settled down and decided to be an expert at a few with which I can solve business problems instead of constantly trying to keep up with all these different technologies. I've been at this 38 years and as far as the type of stuff I develop I can't tell you that all the presentation technologies they've come up with since WinForms would enhance my presentations in any meaningful way. Heck ... I could have completed my last project as a character-based DOS application and it would have served the needs of my client very well! Like you said, WinForms ain't going anywhere. The output generated by VS2008 (my preferred tool) runs on everything from Windows XP right on up to Windows 8.1 desktop. That's a pretty huge audience. I think I'll just focus on solving these business problems with technology I already have and leave off chasing the "latest" stuff all the time. I suspect I'll have enough work to do without having constantly to upgrade and spin my wheels.
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The thing I didn't care about with WPF was having to constantly deal with XAML, which is fine I guess but if I wanted to deal with an HTML type language I'd just write a web application. I just felt that doing that on the desktop when I had gotten used to a GUI designer was just too much work for what I was trying to accomplish. With WinForms most of my time is focused on the application itself (making things work, etc.) whereas with WPF I felt like I was spending an inordinate amount of time trying to get the GUI right. I mean, how many methods must I ingest into my head for presenting a grid of data, or a list of items to choose, etc? I'm not at-all against these technologies per-se you might just say I've finally settled down and decided to be an expert at a few with which I can solve business problems instead of constantly trying to keep up with all these different technologies. I've been at this 38 years and as far as the type of stuff I develop I can't tell you that all the presentation technologies they've come up with since WinForms would enhance my presentations in any meaningful way. Heck ... I could have completed my last project as a character-based DOS application and it would have served the needs of my client very well! Like you said, WinForms ain't going anywhere. The output generated by VS2008 (my preferred tool) runs on everything from Windows XP right on up to Windows 8.1 desktop. That's a pretty huge audience. I think I'll just focus on solving these business problems with technology I already have and leave off chasing the "latest" stuff all the time. I suspect I'll have enough work to do without having constantly to upgrade and spin my wheels.
:) Haha, yeah - I can image in 38 years you've seen quite a few new technologies come in and go out! Winforms is brilliant, I've got VS 2008 which is excellent, and I'm using VS 2013 Express for this WPF learning. The Winforms designer is superb - really feels like a polished bit of kit. I'm just starting with WPF, and the designer already doesn't feel as polished, but, I'm still learning, so I'll get better (with any luck!) Anyway, thanks for you input - I always like hearing opinions of more experienced people; always something to learn :)
"Benjamin is nobody's friend. If Benjamin were an ice cream flavor, he'd be pralines and dick." ~ Garth Algar "If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur." ~ Paul Neal "Red" Adair
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Good to know the British agree. Perhaps when they sober up they will tell us what they agree with? ;P
Once upon a time, there wsa a strike. A miner's strike. The leader was Arthur Scargill. He lost. A few years later, a comedy troupe made a film called 'Strike!', which was all about a fictional attempt by Hollywood to make a film about the strike. Arthur would be played by 'Al Pacino' who would insist on turning Scargill into a victorious hero. When Scargill rides a motorbike to parliament in a last ditch attempt for peace, he makes a 'common man' speach to the members. They all say 'Aye!' in American accents, except for the member for 'Oxford and Cambridge'(!) who has a plummy English accent as this might actually be English. It was a funny film. Look it up on You Tube. ;)
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I've just built myself a nice Access DB to keep track of my Gym workouts to keep me focused on the gym (always on an eye on progression not stagnation and boredom). During the build I sidetracked to build myself a little WinForms app to auto generate some Access VBA Class code rather than having to write it all out for another Access DB (which I had an idea about). Easy peasy, whacked it together in virtually no time at all...then it struck me...I have absolutely no idea about WPF! So, my new mission, which I accept, well sort of accept, sort of dread - is to learn WPF!!! (Which I will only be able to do in my 'spare' time outside of work, seeing as that I don't do C# in my day to day stuff). So, I've just bought "WPF 4.5 Unleashed" by Adam Nathan, and shall begin be working my way through that - with the ambition to turn my Access DB into a WPF application, and maybe to ditch the Access backend altogether replaced by something that I haven't decided yet. Anyone got any quick tips, gotchas, helpful hints, 'beware of' or any other words of wisdom before I begin my fraught and perilous journey?? :D
"Benjamin is nobody's friend. If Benjamin were an ice cream flavor, he'd be pralines and dick." ~ Garth Algar "If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur." ~ Paul Neal "Red" Adair
Embrace XML. Not just the idea of angle-bracket delimited text. Understand how namespaces (i.e. xmlns) work. Understand why some tags have a prefix. If you have the time, learn XML schema. THis might already be in your wheelhouse, but it never ceases to amaze me how many C#/VB.NET guys claim they know XML but then attack XAML and don't know why their XAML code says Some tag not found! I've been to user group meetings where the presenter is introducing XAML and he tries to go through what all those attributes in the root Window element mean and everyone is literally, "Can we skip this and start writing our app?" No, understand that first. My only other tip is that if it seems difficult to get what you want done in VS, try it in Blend.
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Embrace XML. Not just the idea of angle-bracket delimited text. Understand how namespaces (i.e. xmlns) work. Understand why some tags have a prefix. If you have the time, learn XML schema. THis might already be in your wheelhouse, but it never ceases to amaze me how many C#/VB.NET guys claim they know XML but then attack XAML and don't know why their XAML code says Some tag not found! I've been to user group meetings where the presenter is introducing XAML and he tries to go through what all those attributes in the root Window element mean and everyone is literally, "Can we skip this and start writing our app?" No, understand that first. My only other tip is that if it seems difficult to get what you want done in VS, try it in Blend.
Thanks ! Yeah I'm doing my best to get to grips with xaml as much as possible as it appears to be such a massive part of wpf, and as for blend, yeah, that'll be on my list as well!! :-)
"Benjamin is nobody's friend. If Benjamin were an ice cream flavor, he'd be pralines and dick." ~ Garth Algar "If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur." ~ Paul Neal "Red" Adair
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Thanks ! Yeah I'm doing my best to get to grips with xaml as much as possible as it appears to be such a massive part of wpf, and as for blend, yeah, that'll be on my list as well!! :-)
"Benjamin is nobody's friend. If Benjamin were an ice cream flavor, he'd be pralines and dick." ~ Garth Algar "If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur." ~ Paul Neal "Red" Adair
Remember: XML, then XAML. :)