Beginning Windows Phone 7 Development - Part 3

Working with Isolated Storage

In this part, I’ll explain how you can store basic data on the phone from within your application. Start by creating a new Silverlight for Windows Phone Application project as described in Part 1.

Open the MainPage.xaml file in design view so that you can see the default phone page created. On this screen you will add the following controls to interact with, along with the appropriate labels:

A TextBox to type in a string of text you want to save; name it txtData.
A Button that you can click to save the text in isolated storage; name it btnSave.
A TextBlock to show the saved text next time you run the app; name it tbData.

Beginning Windows Phone 7 Development - Part 2

Developing your first Windows Phone App

In this part, we will start off with developing a very simple, but fully functioning, Silverlight application for Windows Phone. After you are done with creating the application, it will allow you to browse the Internet from within the application.

Start by creating a new Silverlight for Windows Phone Application project as described in Part 1 of the blog series.

Unable to add data connection. Could not load file or assembly

If you receive an error message similar to "Unable to add data connection. Could not load file or assembly 'Microsoft.SqlServer.Management.Sdk.Sfc, Version=10.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=89845dcd8080cc91' or one of its dependencies. The system cannot find the file specified" and you are looking for a solution to the same, then you have come to the right place.

The following helped me solve this problem:

Install the following from the Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Feature Pack, August 2008 site:

1) Microsoft SQL Server Management Objects, and
2) Do a repair install on Microsoft SQL Server System CLR Types

This should solve the problem you are having.

Happy debugging!

The XML page cannot be displayed

This is a very common error people face when installing ASP.Net applications.

You finish installing the app and go to the corresponding URL in the browser and you see this error message "The XML page cannot be displayed. Cannot view XML input using XSL style sheet. Please correct the error and then click Refresh button, or try again later. A name was started with an invalid character. Error processing resource 'http://servername/applicationname/'."

This is caused due to the fact that the .aspx and .asmx extensions are not registered in your IIS website properly. Perform the following steps to remedy the solution:

1) Open IIS (Start->Run->inetmgr)
2) Right click your website (virtual directory) and select properties.
3) Click the configuration button.
4) In the Application Configuration screen, click add and browse to the path 'C:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\aspnet_isapi.dll' and in the Extension box type '.aspx' and click ok. Perform this step again for the .asmx extension pointing to the same executable file.
5) Click OK and close the properties box.

Now test your website and it should work fine. Please note that the above steps are for IIS 5.1, but the steps in IIS 6.0 mimic these closely.

Hope this helps!

Microsoft slashes Xbox prices

Microsoft announced that it is slashing prices of its flagship gaming device, XBOX 360, in the US. This will take the price of the basic model down to $199, approximately $50 cheaper than Nintendo Wii. It said that prices for the other Xbox models will drop by $50.

The US cut follows a similar move in Japan. In late August Microsoft announced that Japanese prices of the Xbox 360 would fall in September. The cut meant an Xbox Arcade will cost 19,800 yen ($182), also cheaper than the Wii. Earlier this year, in March Microsoft cut European prices making the recommended price for the Arcade £159.99, lower than the European price for a Wii.

Microsoft Launches SQL Server 2008

Microsoft has released a new version of SQL Server which promises to make the life of database administrators easier.

For database administrators, the addition of new management functionality makes SQL Server 2008 a great new product. The new policy management, multiple server query capability, configuration servers, and data collector/management warehouse offer powerful new abilities for database administrators who are often responsible for managing large and complex database environments with hundreds or thousands of databases on dozens or even hundreds of servers.

The new Multiple Server Interaction and Configuration Servers capabilities will come in handy when one needs to execute queries against multiple servers at the same time. One can register servers in the Management Studio and then place those servers together under a grouping. When needed to execute a policy or query against all the servers in the grouping, one can simply right-click on the grouping and do so.

Another great new management feature is the Data Collector. Database administrators often need to collect management data from a large number of servers, and many of these DBAs have created their own custom solution for doing so. The Data Collector is a built-in mechanism that eases the task of collecting management-related data. It allows you to use the SQL Server Agent and SQL Server Integration Services (SSIS) to create a framework that collects and stores your data while providing error handling, auditing, and collection history.

Another new feature, Hot Add CPU, lets you add additional CPUs to a database server without affecting the availability of the databases residing on that server.

SQL Server 2008 also introduces sparse columns, which allow NULL values to be stored without taking up any physical space on the disk. Because sparse columns do not consume actual space, tables that contain sparse columns can actually exceed the 1,024 column limit.

You can access tutorials for SQL Server 2008 at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms167593.aspx and can see the details for various editions of SQL Server at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms144275.aspx