Feb 4 2015 / Michaël Hompus

Make pull-down-to-refresh work with a Windows Phone virtualizing list control

ListBox, Performance, ScrollViewer, WP8, WP8.1, Xaml

The other day I was working on a Windows Phone app. I wanted to add a "pull down to refresh" panel to a large list of images. Just like the Facebook and Twitter apps have. As Microsoft does not provide this functionality in their default controls I started searching the web if somebody else has build something like this already. I found a blog post by Jason Ginchereau where he provided this functionality for Windows Phone 7. In my app I use an ItemsControl with a VirtualizingStackPanel to prevent memory issues. After I added the PullDownToRefreshPanel control to my list and started testing it on my phone, I ran into some issues. In this blog post I will describe my contributions to fix these 2 issues and I will supply the source code for you to use.

Full article…

The other day I was working on a Windows Phone app. I wanted to add a “pull down to refresh” panel to a large list of images. Just like the Facebook and Twitter apps have.

Pull-to-refresh in the Twitter app animation. Showing a text to encourage the user pull down further to refresh the list. When pulled down far enough the text changes to let the user know the list will be refreshed after the user releases his finger from the screen. — Pull-to-refresh in the Twitter app. Image by David Washington

As Microsoft does not provide this functionality in their default controls, I started searching the web if somebody else has built something like this already.

I found a blog post by Jason Ginchereau where he provided this functionality for Windows Phone 7.

In my app I use an ItemsControl control with a VirtualizingStackPanel control to prevent memory issues. After I added the PullDownToRefreshPanel control to my list and started testing it on my phone, I ran into some issues.

Backup your Azure SQL Database to Blob Storage using code

Azure, Backup, DAC, Database, SQL, Worker Role

With Windows Azure we can use Windows Azure SQL Database service (formerly known as SQL Azure) when we need a Relational Database. Microsoft offers a 99.9% monthly SLA for this service. But Microsoft doesn't provide you with the service to restore your data to a moment back in time when you (accidentally) delete of corrupt data. To have a backup in time I wrote some code to allow a Worker Role to backup my Windows Azure SQL Database every hour. Most solutions you find online are relying on the REST Endpoints but the address of the endpoint is different depending on which datacenter your database is hosted. I found a different solution where you only need the connection string to your database using the DacServices.

Full article…

With Windows Azure we can use Azure SQL Database service (formerly known as SQL Azure) when we need a Relational Database. Microsoft offers a 99.9% monthly SLA for this service.

But Microsoft does not provide you with the service to restore your data to a moment back in time when you (accidentally) delete of corrupt data.

Speaking at the Dutch Techdays 2013

Presenting, Serious Request, Slides, Speaking, TechDays

I am invited to speak at the Techdays 2013 in the Netherlands. The event is held on the 7th & 8th of March at the World Forum in Den Haag.

Full article…

I am invited to speak at the Techdays 2013 in the Netherlands. The event is held on the 7^th & 8^th of March at the World Forum in Den Haag.

My session, in Dutch, is called “Serious Request met Windows Azure” and I will be talking about my experiences using Windows Azure to build a high available and scaling platform for the various applications used during “3FM Serious Request”, the annual charity event organized by the Dutch radio station 3FM for the Dutch Red Cross.

If the schedule does not change, I will be speaking in the Africa Room on Friday between 13:15 - 14:30.

Update

I have uploaded my slides for this session (PowerPoint PPTX, 6,83MB).
You can also view my presentation on SlideShare (but the fonts get messed up):

Feb 25 2013 / Michaël Hompus

DotNed Podcast: “Michaël Hompus over Serious Request en Windows Azure”

dotNed, podcast, Serious Request, Speaking

dotNed is the Dutch .NET user group and organizes several meetings each year for the .NET community. Maurice de Beijer interviewed me about my experiences using Windows Azure to build a high available and scaling platform for 3FM Serious Request.

Full article…

DotNed is the Dutch .NET user group and organizes several meetings each year for the .NET community. They also run a regular podcast covering several .NET development related topics like Visual Studio, Mono, ASP.NET MVC, Windows Phone and Windows Azure.

Triggered by my scheduled TechDays 2013 presentation, I was interviewed a few weeks ago by Maurice de Beijer about my experiences using Windows Azure to build a high available and scaling platform for the various applications used during “3FM Serious Request”.

Jan 21 2013 / Michaël Hompus

Filtering on a tinyint with Entity Framework

CAST, Contains, LINQ, tinyint

When writing .NET code to access a SQL database we often rely on the Entity Framework (EF). The EF makes it very easy to retrieve data from the database by generating a SQL Query for us. But we should not trust it blindly, as the EF can also generate a bad query. It will return the correct data yes, but at what performance cost?

Full article…

When writing .NET code to access a SQL database we often rely on the Entity Framework (EF). The EF makes it very easy to retrieve data from the database by generating a SQL Query for us. But we should not trust it blindly, as the EF can also generate a bad query.

It will return the correct data yes, but at what performance cost?

Update

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