Is there an SDK out for Windows Run Time (WinRT)? - windows-8

Is there some kind of SDK out for WinRT.? Can we develop applications for it now?
Is VS2010 usable for developing or will some other IDE be shipped? Also, is C++ necessary to develop performance-oriented apps in WinRT, or will the C# applications give equivalent performance? Can development be done on Win7?
I am curious about this because I missed out when WPF was released and I don't want to miss out on this.

Take a look at the Windows Dev Center where you can download a copy of Windows 8, complete with all the new tools for developing for it.

Visual Studio 11 Developer Preview is also available on Subscriber Downloads if you do have a subscription, and it includes the WinRT SDK and runs on Windows 7 and other operating systems. So you can build it and debug it, but you still have to run your code on a Windows 8 machine.
Performance-wise, WinRT doesn't change the guidance for whether to use native code. The APIs will behave near identically regardless of what language you choose, so make the decision between C++ and C# just as you would today.

Related

How do I build an Adobe AIR application using Visual Studio Team Services

I have a client with an application that is written in MXML and ActionScript 3 and is deployed as a desktop app using Adobe AIR. The client would like me to implement automated builds and releases for this application and currently uses Visual Studio Team Services as their build and release management platform. My question is, what is the best way to use Visual Studio Team Services (VSTS) to build an Adobe AIR application?
I am familiar with the amxmlc tool for building AIR applications using the command line but this relies on Java and I cannot find any documentation on how to run a Java-based tool from within VSTS. Any assistance on this matter would be appreciated.
I understand that Adobe AIR is an older technology but for reasons that are beyond the scope of this question the client does not want to rewrite the application in newer technology at this time.
In addition, alternative build and deployment platforms are out of the question. I have experience doing something similar using Jenkins however the client would like to stick with VSTS.
Please let me know if you require any additional information to help answer my question. Thanks in advance.
You can setup a private build agent on a machine (can be on your local machine) that have requirement software installed (e.g. JDK, JRE). Deploy an agent on Windows
You can build the AIR application via amxmlc tool, so you can add Command Line task to call amxmlc tool to build your project.

Should my app target Windows 8.1 before it is widely adopted?

Windows 8.1 is the update to Windows 8.0. Right now, using Visual Studio 2012 I can target my Store App to Windows 8.0. But with Visual Studio 2013 I can target Windows 8.1. There are new APIs available, some changes to the framework, and new XAML controls I can use - the date picker control alone will remove third party libraries from my solution.
Knowing the benefits of Windows 8.1's APIs and controls over Windows 8.0, is it worth targeting my app to Windows 8.1 as quickly as it is available (basically, now), or should I wait?
Please, this is an honest question that many developers are asking right now. The changes are significant, but the answer to this question is not apparent. Though I can have a Windows 8.0 and a Windows 8.1 app in the store, my goal is have a great app with a single code base.
Is targeting Windows 8.1 worth it (at all)?
Is "early" a valuable-enough quality of an app?
Is there some "trigger metric" for adoption?
What's the rule of thumb on other platforms?
How should serious developers answer this?
I don't have "the" answer, but I could share my approach when Windows 8.1 is not a requirement :
Maintaining two versions of an app (W8 & W8.1) costs. Measure that cost.
If your application is not already published and is not likely to reach the store before the end of the year go for W8.1.
If you already have a version of application live on Store, update it as quickly as possible to integrate an analytics solution and gather OSVersion (http://bit.ly/15X2B3K). Decide when you have enough users using W8.1 to justify the migration cost. Plan the drop of W8 support.
Hope this helps

Is there a reason to install the MonoTouch environment on Windows if the iOS simulator only runs on OS X?

Given that the iOS emulator only runs on OS X, what are reasons that people do MonoTouch development on Windows? They offer MonoDevelop for both Windows and OS X.
Some people prefer Visual Studio. Some teams may have invested in tools (like ReSharper, etc) that run in Visual Studio. And teams that maintain other .NET projects may not to switch to Macs as their primary environment.
The idea of only being able to place an app using ONLY the mac tools is not ENTIRELY correct. You are completely able to use the iTunes connect website https://itunesconnect.apple.com/WebObjects/iTunesConnect.woa/wo/4.0.0.7.3.0.9.3.1.1 to place apps on the app store, and you only need the xcode tool for stuff like using the simulator and other options such as that. The reason why people do things such as program on a Windows is because some people are more native with the way the UI works on Windows than on a Mac, as they are quite different. The Windows is more visual, and it offers a simple way to get to things; although the Mac is more user friendly when it comes to the way applications are handled in the core of them. Also, people don't always want to pay the 1200+ price for a Mac machine, when yet they can spend 200+ on a simple Windows OS machine, and still possess the same kind of options. Another thing, you can always run Windows through a mac, so it's kind of a positive negative situation in almost any circumstance.
Hope this helps!
My personal reasons for using Visual Studio currently for my iOS development are:
I'm doing mixed-client-and-server development, and have a single solution with several project types which Xamarin Studio doesn't yet support - or which it only partially supports:
Portable Class Libraries
Azure website projects
WindowsPhone projects
WindowsStore projects
Resharper and the Visual Studio productivity tools and are key parts of my toolchain - they really do make me more productive. (There are other tools too which I'm more familiar with on the PC - e.g. even things like notepad++ and Paint.Net)
Because of my last 20 years on Windows I'm faster at working on the PC - although I am getting quicker at using the Mac.

How can i Obfuscate a monogame windows8 metro app?

I have a windows 8 metro game (using monogame) that i developed and plan to submit to windows 8 app store and i wish to obfuscate it. How can i do it? Will obfuscation cause runtime errors?
We use Crypto Obfuscator. It has a very decent GUI, a great support team, and most importantly both Visual Studio integration and support for Obfuscating Windows 8 Store apps.
You can try Manco .NET Obfuscator. Version 4.5 supports obfuscating of the .NET Windows 8 Store applications.
Check the babel obfuscator.
The obfuscator usually "just" makes your code unreadable, alone it won't cause any runtime exceptions but if some occurs (due to an app problem) you probably won't be able to track the error (because everything is obfuscated).
PS: Google is our friend

Do Windows 8 Store Apps (Metro) run in Windows 7 or XP?

I want to know whether Metro Applications developed using Visual Studio 11 Developer Preview and .Net FrameWork 4.5 can run in Windows 7 or XP.
Not the normal Windows Form or WPF, I want to know about the all new Metro Apps.
What new things needed to run Metro Apps in Windows XP or Windows 7
What new things needed to run Metro Apps in Windows XP or Windows 7
A virtual machine of Windows 8. Metro apps currently don't run on Windows 7, and definitely don't on Windows XP. According to this thread, it's difficult but might happen eventually:
Keep your eyes out on future Channel 9 videos and on the BCL/CLR blog
for more information around the challeges of enabling the Portable
Library story, however, I will give a quick summary with regards to
ViewModels:
While the ViewModels themselves are defined by the
application, they often take dependencies on types (ie
INotifyXXXChanged interfaces, ICommand, etc) that live inside the
framework. Currently if you look across our multiple .NET platforms
(Silverlight, Phone, .NET and now Metro style apps), these all live in
different assemblies, and with Metro apps, a different
namespace/technology (WinRT). This makes it challeging to give the
user a surface area that can compile against and still have it run on
all these other platforms. We've got some ideas on how we're going to
enable this, however, it requires some work and doesn't come for free.
In saying that, however, we completely see the value and
really, really want to do this.David
But it's not currently possible. At best, you could just make a desktop app version of the same thing.
I tried it on Window 7 and answer is definitely no, you can not even develop Metro style App in Windows 7, for developing also you need Windows 8 and Visual Studio 11.
I'd be astonished if Win8 Metro-Style apps would ever work on Win7 - there is a huge amount of OS level infrastructure necessary to get those apps to work on Win8 that simply isn't available on Win7.
Having said that, people have figured out to write applications that can be made to work on both *nix and Windows with a recompile, so I imagine eventually it might be possible to write an app that could be recompiled to produce a metro-style version and a WPF/Silverlight version. But that technology simply doesn't exist at the moment.
Id say no, based on the fact that Metro requires WinRT which is not available on Windows 7 or XP
This depends on what you might want to do.
For example, if you're developing a game and want it to run on Metro/Modern UI but also on other Windows versions, MonoGame is a great option!
It will allow you to develop for and run on:
All Windows desktops
Windows 8 Metro/Modern UI
Mac OS X
Linux
XBOX 360
iOS
Android
Windows Phone
And possibly more platforms on the future.
In my honest opinion having such a wealth of target platforms warrants any learning curve you might have to develop for MonoGame. And not to mention that you can develop in the comfort of Visual Studio, so IMHO it's something to be considered even if your app is not strictly a game (who said you can't develop a non-game with a game framework...?).
Update: Here's a tutorial, and by the way, you may want to also consider HTML5 for games or non-games. Cut the Rope (very fun game) uses this, and it seems to be doing pretty well (I didn't even notice it was HTML5!).
I am developing an app for the apptivate.ms contest right now. So I can definitely tell you that the Metro apps won't work on Windows 7 or XP.
What is more, the Visual Studio Express version needed for developing the Metro Apps won't even install on Windows 7.
Also, just remember this sentence - "All Windows apps are not Windows 8 apps!"