How to disable Accelerators Feature in Internet Explorer

I know this is not a big deal but I wanted something to learn how to record my screen using new version of Communicator (now called “Lync”). Hope it will help someday somebody!

Vacation, Just a few days away..

Both I and Khushi (My wife) are going to India (Ahmedabad) for a long vacation. I recently visited India on an official trip but Khushi is going to India for the first time after our Marriage. So, lot of excitement. Hope to have a great time with Family and Friends. I will hopefully get enough time from there to write about activities there.

Best way to view and edit XML files

I have been using FirstObject XML Editor from quite some time and thought of sharing it here. Few of its features which I like the most are,

• FirstObject XML editor is free for download
• Its very fast in loading (even huge files). This is what I like the most about it.
• It has syntax highlighting
• It has ability to view XML data in tree
• Change fonts
• It does not depend on MSXML or Java so, no dependency.
• Very small footprint
• Portable

Download the tool from here

Icons for Windows Phone 7 Application (Metro style!)

Bil Simser posted a very nice article on his blog about more than 500 Metro Style Windows Phone 7 icons, it’s a very nice collection. But the main problem with those icons is, they are in black color. You might already know that icons for Windows Phone 7 need to be white colored icons. So, I took the original PNG icons and converted them to White color. Below is the preview of all the icons (You may see the preview of icons with black fill, but the icons in the package has white fill in it and it works with Windows Phone 7 application for both light and dark themes – I have tried some of them personally). Also, Notice all the icons have transparent background and ready to be included in your project!

 

For developer’s convenience, I have created different sized icons from the source because there are different resolution icons needed for different purposes. More information here.

• Download the Application Bar Icons here (If you want to use the icon on your application bar / inside the UI) – They should fit fine in 48x48 application bar icon.
• Download Application icons here (Which will be shown on the application list on WP7) – They are 62x62 resolution.
• Download icons for App Marketplace here (Which are different sized icons shown on the application marketplace search results, you will need them when you submit your application to marketplace) – They are 99x99 resolution.
• Download Application Tile icons here (Which will be shown if user pins your application to Start) – They are 173x173 resolution.
• Download high resolution icons here (In case if you want to resize the high resolution icon yourself, this package contains them) – They are 255x255 resolution and white fill.
• If you want icons with Black fill for any reasons, download them here (They are also high res 255x255).

 

Few more places around the web where you can find more icons.

• On Windows Phone team Blog
• On Roger Peters blog
• On WindowsWiki

 

How to write using computer keyboard in Windows Phone 7 emulator?

You may have noticed while working in Windows Phone 7 emulator that it does not accept input from your computer’s keyboard, you have to type using the SIP (soft input panel). This is sometimes annoying if you are testing application which has a few input fields. Good news is, there is a way to enable computer’s keyboard so that machine’s keyboard input is accepted by Emulator.

 

The key is to hit Pause/Break OR PageUp key when you are inside any textbox/edit control. Once you do that, SIP (soft input panel –  soft keyboard inside emulator) will not pop up whenever you go to any editbox unless you hit PageUp OR Pause OR PageDown key again.

 

Following are few more shortcuts that you can use with Emulator.

 

Hope it will save some time and reduce the frustration for testing application which requires keyboard input.

Windows Phone 7–Useful blogs and website

Here is the list of Blogs and Websites (more than 80), I follow to keep up to date with what’s happening in Windows Phone 7 world (Both Windows Phone 7 news and Developer related information). If you also want to follow them, click on “Subscribe” button on the bottom of the list (It will redirect you to Google Reader and add subscriptions to all the sites). If you don’t know what is Google Reader look at short video here.

Advantage of Subscribing to the Bundle through Google Reader : You will not have to open all the websites to get updated articles, all the new articles will be collected in your Google reader. So, Google Reader will be the only site you will have to open to read all the news. Try it out and Click on “Subscribe” at the end of following table.

Also, If you know any good and informative site about Windows Phone 7 which is not included in the list, please add it in the comment.

Hasya ni rangat (હાસ્ય ની રંગત)–Comedy Show

By Shahbuddin Rathod, enjoy!

Get your Windows Phone 7 applications tested (for FREE)!

Are you developing Windows Phone 7 application? Don’t have any plans for testing your application? You've come to right place.

We've seen many developers developing Windows Phone 7 applications single handed or in a small team. What they do typically is put their application in the marketplace without extensive testing and wait for "real user's" feedback about bugs and issues. What this does is, negatively impacts few initial reviews on the marketplace and you may lose users plus spread negative comments around potential users. If you are also one of those who worry about this, you can engage with us to make sure your application is functioning properly. We will make sure we hunt down as many bugs as possible before you push your first release to Marketplace.

 

• Who we are:
  We are a bunch of high passionate testers, our goal is to make sure any piece of software that passes through our eyes, has least amount of defects. Our end goal is to make a positive difference.

 

• Can you trust us?
  Of course, be assured that we will never misuse any information we acquire during our engagement. If you want, we can even go through NDA process.

 

• What do we charge?
  ABSOLUTELY NOTHING right now. The engagement is totally free, during the promotion period (which we are planning to end in near future, and you will be notified about it well in advanced. We will make sure we finish all the existing assignments for free before ending the promotion). So, it is totally FREE!

 

• Why should you make sure application is tested thoroughly?
  Microsoft’s phone marketplace team (who approves your application before it goes live) is very focused on giving high-class experience to end-user. Because of that, they have long list of policies set. Any application that does not follow those guidelines may get rejected. If you ask, what bad will it do if an application gets rejected, please go through this page (In a nutshell, it can cost you as much as 20$ for each bug found by marketplace team!!)

 

• How to engage with us?
  All you do initially is, send us some information about your application and XAP file(s). We will provide systematic feedback (in terms of bugs, feature requests, suggestions, ideas) to you after thoroughly testing your application. We will get in touch with you if we have any queries.

 

• I am planning to push an update to Marketplace for existing application, can I engage with you?
  Yes, please.

 

• Why are we doing this?
  We have some bandwidth after our full time/part time jobs (We all are highly qualified software engineers) which we want to spend such that it makes difference.

 

• Do we accept engagements for testing iPhone/iPad/Android applications?
  No. That’s not our expertise. We know a bit about Windows Phone application platform and we want to do what we can do best.

 

• Any other questions?
  Please send us an email here.