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I do not know if this type of question can be asked on this site, please let me apologize if it is not relevant.
I'm currently thinking about starting the migration of an application developed in Visual Foxpro to VS. NET. I'm looking at Windows Forms and WPF, and I'm clear about the basics like the differences between them.
My specific question is whether, as of today, is WPF is an active and growing technology or another tool that died and will have no future support?
I am very interested in this information because I have some experience windows forms; studying WPF seems interesting, but I would not invest my time in a dead end.
I appreciate any information you can give me.
Of course it's suitable for LOB apps (much more so than the WinForms), and it is a growing technology being updated with every new version of the .NET framework, and with all the control vendors investing heavily into developing and updating their WPF controls.
Future is impossible to predict naturally, but WPF most certainly has a much better future than WinForms and it is, in my opinion, a number one choice for any new thick client project(s) on the Windows platform.
WPF is in so many ways vastly superior to WinForms but even if it was for data binding only it would still be easy to recommend over Winforms.
As a matter of fact, choosing WinForms over WPF at this time would be very similar to choosing VB6 over C# and the .NET Platform.
I used to work for an investment bank on Wall Street and many of the applications on the trading floor were WPF. And before I left, they were creating whole new suites of applications in WPF. This was in 2011.
Where I currently am, WPF is where all of the non-mobile projects are or are headed. And the applications are extremely critical; used worldwide.
Hope that helps answer any questions you had about whether people actually use it in the "real world".
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I'm starting making new game engine from scratch (for learning purpose, later mayby for something more).
I stuck on choosing which GUI Technology pick.
I wonder between WPF and Qt, I collected some pros and cons of them:
WPF:
Advantages:
C# faster development
Rich set of ui widgets
Visual Studio ecosystem
Disadvantages:
WPF is dead now ? It's not improving in last years
One platform
Not so fast ?
Qt:
Advantages:
Multiplatform
It's improves
Probably faster then WPF
Disadvantages:
For my not good visual editor
C++, I think development in C++ is slower then in C#
I'm not very familir with gui development, and I don't know what is trend now.
Which is better choice in you opinion and why ?
WPF:
"C# faster development" - wrong. It depends on developer programming
skills.
"Rich set of ui widgets" - wrong. Qt has a log of widgets. Including
third-party.
"Visual Studio ecosystem" - wrong. Qt has addon for MSVS and
intergates pretty good.
"WPF is dead now" - wrong. When technology is "dead" than it means,
that it is ready for business applications and quite stable.
"One platform" - wrong. It's is cross-platform.
"Not so fast" - wrong. It depends on developer programming skills.
Qt:
"Multiplatform" - true, same as WPF. It is not an advantage.
"It's improves" - true, same as WPF. It is not an advantage.
"Probably faster then WPF" - wrong. It depends on developer
programmming skills.
"For my not good visual editor" - wrong. Editor is good (for me).
"C++, I think development in C++ is slower then in C#" - wrong. It
depends on developer programming skills.
IMO. . Every technology has its own pros and cons. Don't spend much time on that part. Instead, try to have good developer team in any of these technology. It is purely depends on the team and the technology they are familiar with.
If you are new to both then I prefer you to go with WPF as it will provide us great User Interface framework. Also, you need to learn some part of C# or VB along with WPF.
If you are familiar with C++, then stick with Qt.
Similar question for your reference: Choosing between WPF/C# and Qt/C++
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We know that Silverlight currently in 3.0.x version - very fast transition from Silverlight 2.0.x. For those using Windows and Mac, it will not be an issue since the runtime supports those platform. The problem is with Linux users. I know that Mono guys (through Moonlight project) are doing their best to keep it up to date with Silverlight, but unfortunately they are too much behind.
How do you offer Silverlight to clients considering that facts?
If your client base has "full support for Linux on the desktop" as a pre-req, you're really in an interesting niche -- one I'd love to learn more about, btw, but not one I've ever encountered. If you're REALLY in such a situation, I guess your only viable silverlight strategy is to limit your silverlight use to not much more than is currently available via moonlight, clearly document to your Linux-rabid clients what's missing on Moonlight for them to be able to use your latest release, and endeavor (via clients involvement, involvement of your tech people, bounties for developers that add each missing features, etc) to get Moonlight up to the level you absolutely need it to be!-)
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I am looking for some guidelines or standards for XAML GUI design... or even a very good set of examples that show nice GUI that I can use as a starting point.
Over the years I have grown into a very good Battleship Grey Dialog designer, but those are old, and ugly now... and I need to revamp a couple of product GUIs.
I know with XAML I can do a lot more, easily, than I could have done with WInForms.. so it is more dangerous now. I would rather my application blend with latest applications that are done right, rather than stand out like an old WinAMP skin.
Any suggestions?
Nice comment w/the WinAmp skin...
I'm not sure if you've come across this resource, but MSFT has put together a pretty comprehensive set of UX guidelines here.
This includes a downloadable PDF, if you're into that sort of leisure reading. While most of the guidelines apply to LOB (Line of Business) applications, you'll find some good information there about what not to do w/WPF (i.e. just because you can doesn't mean you should).
As far as having full-blown showcase GUIs, it's a little light -- it's mostly context-specific screen caps. However, I've found some good example UIs from the patterns libraries that Yahoo offers, and Infragistics has a neat site called Quince which has alot of the same information, but with a Silverlight presentation.
HTH.
One of the sites I love to browse is smashingmagazine.com. It's aimed at web designers, not WPF or Silverlight specifically. But it has many articles that showcase a lot of great ideas for all sorts of things like search boxes, breadcrumb controls, free icon sets, etc.
There are some nice samples http://www.wpftutorial.net
The WPF Application Quality Guide has been indispensible for me; here's a link:
http://windowsclient.net/wpf/white-papers/wpf-app-quality-guide.aspx
Edit:
Didn't see that you were referring to visual design; in that case i'd probably be using many of the numerous resources for web design, since the two areas map quite closely.
There is always Quince of course. This is primarily focussed on Silverlight but it's useful anyway. Especially when you're thinking of your design in terms of UI/UX patterns.
HTH, Stimul8d
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I'd like to reskin a Silverlight app to be more visually compelling. Unfortunately, I went to school for computer science, not design, and I have trouble deciding if two colors even match. How do I get started? Let me add that time and money are both factors so pursuing a design degree isn't an option (though it might be ideal).
EDIT: I also need to learn how to implement good design, so any guidance on the toolsets (Blend or Illustrator?) would be helpful too.
Design is one of those things that is very difficult to teach. Only a small percentage of it can be taught. The rest must be learned through experience and practice. If you have an inclination toward art / expression, your learning curve will be much shorter. Here are some things to get you started:
Color Theory:
http://www.tigercolor.com/color-lab/color-theory/color-theory-intro.htm
http://www.colormatters.com/colortheory.html
Design Basics:
http://desktoppub.about.com/cs/graphicdesign/a/designbasics.htm
http://www.online.tusc.k12.al.us/tutorials/grdesign/grdesign.htm
Software:
http://www.adobe.com/products/illustrator/
http://www.adobe.com/products/photoshop/compare/
Software Tutorials:
http://www.adobe.com/designcenter/video_workshop/
Visit the Cooper site. The books listed there are well worth a read. "About Face" in particular belongs in the library of anyone required to do UI work.
If you're really only interested in making your app look nicer, going with one of the built-in themes from the latest Silverlight Toolkit is probably a smart choice.
Check out the links below.
Toolkit -Themes
Jesse Liberty Blog - Themes
EDIT:
I'm not much of a designer myself, but I know if I wanted some insight on the subject, I would start by going to the Silverlight Showcase page and seeing some of the things that can be done, and drawing inspiration from these apps.
Silverlight Showcase
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The majority of resources that I have for UI design all deal with the web world. There are a number of advantages there because of the dynamic nature of the presentation layer.
However, I would like to design better windows form programs. I want a professional flow to my applications. Right now they look pretty by using WPF, but events seem disjointed (i.e. almost unnatural progression) and I don't really know how to design a good (usability wise) interface. Does anyone blog about that sort of thing?
Try considering WPF as the technology to develop Windows application then you can use lot of vector graphics(XAML) and so lot more than what you can do with windows forms.
There is a great blog comparing both http://joshsmithonwpf.wordpress.com/2007/09/05/wpf-vs-windows-forms/
You may also want to take a look at the "Windows User Experience Interaction Guidelines" or UX Guide available at http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa511258.aspx or in PDF. Here's the goals as listed on the website:
Establish a high quality and consistency baseline for all Windows-based applications.
Answer your specific user experience questions.
Make your job easier!
http://windowsclient.net/ is a Microsoft site for windows forms.