A simple developer's journey

You wonder how to to add nice code snippets in your blog posts ? I have configured this blog to insert snippets (following this article): http://www.craftyfella.com/2010/01/syntax-highlighting-with-blogger-engine.html The good tool used is SyntaxHighlighter : http://alexgorbatchev.com/SyntaxHighlighter/ All you have to do now is to insert your code in your post using the following <pre> TAG (in HTML mode): // Comment <pre class="brush: csharp">// Comment public class Testing { public Testing() { } public void Method() { /* Another Comment on multiple lines */ int x = 9; } } </pre> Note that if your code contains '<' or '>' characters, you will need to encode it into HTML format, using a tool like this one: http://www.opinionatedgeek.com/dotnet/tools/htmlencode/encode.aspx Enjoy and write new posts !

If I tell you "ComboBox", you will see quickly of which control I'm talking about. There no control named "ComboBox" in Xamarin.Forms but if you search a little, you will find the "Picker " control. Class: Xamarin.Forms.Picker In the namespace: Xamarin.Forms Doc link : http://iosapi.xamarin.com/index.aspx?link=T%3AXamarin.Forms.Picker The problem is that you cannot bind directly "Picker.Items" property in the XAML file ! For that you have to use the code behind file. xaml (doesn't work): <Picker Items="{Binding MyViewModelList}"... /> So what do we have to do ? 1- Name your "Picker" control in the xaml file (by adding an attribute like x:Name="uiPicker" ) 2- On the parent page in code behind, override the "OnBindingContextChanged( )" method 3- In this method, fill your "Picker.Items" property from your viewmodel's values. 4- On the XAML file, you can onl

For french developpers, you can have a look at my MVVM My Way article . It proposes an end to end solution to developp an MVVM application. This article covers the global architecture, the associated tools & the way of testing the app.

Code I have seen somewhere (in production code) :) Interesting...

Don't wait anymore! Here is a list of kick starters books covering various subjects (Xamarin, Machine Learning, R, AngularJS...): https://www.syncfusion.com/resources/techportal/ebooks Don't hesitate to dowload, it is free!

Your app is almost done? You've done the 'hardest' part while coding your app logic? Well there is still a painful job in the basket: create a wonderful set of icons to have an eye-catching app. If you are not friend with design tools, welcome! this one could save your day: http://www.syncfusion.com/downloads/metrostudio This free tool allows you to browse through a large collection of icons. Moreover, you can create easily your own icon. A must have when developping Windows Phone / Windows 8 apps!  

Don't rush into programming ! If you need a simple tool to prototype the design of your mobile apps before programming, NinjaMock ( http://ninjamock.com ) is a nice tool to quickly create a wireframe containing the interaction logic of a user interface and get a simple representation of the look of the pages you want to build for your app. FluidUI ( https://www.fluidui.com ) does the same job already but is mainly featured for Android and IOS and free version is very limited (one project only). NinjaMock allows to build prototype for many platforms (Android, IOS, Windows Phone, Windows 8 or Web) and it's free.      Be creative ! ;)