August 2015

Volume 30 Number 8

Windows 10 - Modern Drag and Drop for Windows Universal Applications

Windows 10 - Modern Drag and Drop for Windows Universal Applications

Alain Zanchetta

Modern drag and drop offers new possibilities, such as various options to customize visual feedback. Learn how to implement drag and drop in XAML applications and leverage the new features to offer a rich user experience without impacting application responsiveness.

First Word - Committing to Cross Platform: The ABCs of iOSColumn

First Word - Committing to Cross Platform: The ABCs of iOS

Chuck Lantz

There are now three ways for developers to create iOS apps on the Microsoft platform: Visual Studio 2015 Tools for Apache Cordova, the cross-platform agent in Visual Studio Online, and the new Visual Studio Code cross-platform editor.

Cloud-Connected Mobile Apps - Create a Web Service with Azure Web Apps and WebJobs

Cloud-Connected Mobile Apps - Create a Web Service with Azure Web Apps and WebJobs

Kraig Brockschmidt

In the first part of a two-part article, the authors explore some of the issues involved in creating a cloud back end that aggregates and processes data and serves it to mobile clients.

Upstart - Games RevolutionColumn

Upstart - Games Revolution

Michael Thompson

Michael Thompson explores how frameworks like Unity, Unreal Engine 4 and Cocos2D have revolutionized game development, making it available to a broader range of coders than ever before.

Cloud Development - Azure Mobile Services: A Great Back End for AngularJS

Cloud Development - Azure Mobile Services: A Great Back End for AngularJS

Jonathan Miller

If you want to use AngularJS on your front end, you don’t have to abandon the Microsoft stack on the back end. Azure Mobile Services integrates with AngularJS seamlessly, as Jonathan Miller explains.

Cutting Edge - CQRS and Events: A Powerful DuoColumn

Cutting Edge - CQRS and Events: A Powerful Duo

Dino Esposito

Any action is a command or a query—but never both. A command alters the system state. A query reports on the state of the system. This is sometimes referred to as the Command-Query Responsibility Segregation, a potentially groundbreaking architecture.

Game Development - Introduction to 3D for Web Games

Game Development - Introduction to 3D for Web Games

Michael Oneppo

In the first of a three-part series on 3D Web game development, Michael Oneppo starts building a simple game using the popular and powerful THREE.js library.

Windows with C++ - Windows Runtime Components with MIDLColumn

Windows with C++ - Windows Runtime Components with MIDL

Kenny Kerr

The Microsoft Interface Definition Language (MIDL) defines interfaces between client and server programs. Kenny Kerr continues his exploration of the Windows Runtime with a look at the MIDL compiler.

Test Run - K-Means++ Data ClusteringColumn

Test Run - K-Means++ Data Clustering

James McCaffrey

Clustering is useful for revealing patterns in huge sets of data. One of the most common clustering techniques is the k-means algorithm. This article explains a relatively recent variation called k-means++, which improves the selection of initial means.

The Working Programmer - How To Be MEAN: Getting StartedColumn

The Working Programmer - How To Be MEAN: Getting Started

Ted Neward

The MEAN (Mongo, Express, Angular, Node) stack is quickly emerging as one of the favored development software stacks for the Node.js platform. Ted Neward introduces MEAN in the first of a series.

Don't Get Me Started - Why Can't We Be Friends?Column

Don't Get Me Started - Why Can't We Be Friends?

David Platt

Developers and IT pros should be staunch allies in an era where ALM tooling and integration blur the lines and blend testing and deployment in a single ecosystem.

Editor's Note - The Importance of PlayColumn

Editor's Note - The Importance of Play

Michael Desmond

From back-end development in Azure to cross-platform development in Unity and Cordova, game developers are facing—and solving—many of the same challenges that vex their business-minded counterparts.