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Big Screen BlogOpinions, News, Rants and Developer Bits for Media Center, Vista and .NETv3
April 02 Launched : Big Screen Headlines v2(April 2 - not April fools day anymore down here)
Headlines v2 (which for those new to this product - is a RSS + Rich Media viewer for Vista Media Center) - is pretty much a complete rewrite of v1 - and contains a truckload of new features and enhancements from the original release (many of which have been detailed on this blog in the past). You can check out the full product details online (which includes detailed feature list and loads of screenshots) - with some pictures below to wet your appetite.
What's New :- Apart from the core functionality provided by v1 (such as RSS Browsing and Content viewing, IE7 Subscriber Feed System support, Parsing of RSS HTML content to Media Center friendly text) - some of the major enhancements in v2 include : - new main menu system - with direct access to all your content via the left/right sliding panels (which reveal several menu items when selected) - and direct viewing of 'latest' updated items and feeds without further menus. The main menu system is similar to that found on Big Screen Weather v2 - however has been enhanced to better support and accommodate mouse/touch control. - loads of new presets with substantially updated video and audio section of new Web Media designed for Media Center (WMV Video etc). - Enhanced Parsing of RSS based blogs / HTML Content (with Inline Image support - allowing you to view images contained with the content) - Supports and recognizes and watch a whole range of new content types (where 3rd party codec support is available) - and even caters for the additional codecs on the new PIKA 2.0 Extenders (by allowing you to watch MPEG4, H264, DivX based content). For media center PC's - you can install additional Directshow compliant video filters and add support for numerous popular codecs (such as Apple Quicktime, Flash FLV Video, DivX/XVid, MPEG4 etc). - Highly customizable viewing/browsing experience for RSS Feeds, presets and Articles with sorting, filtering, text size control and view styles. Your settings are also automatically saved (per user). - Full Media Center Extender Support - with auto device detection/configuration for PIKA 2 (Linksys, DLink etc) extenders + XBox 360's - with customizable display/usage options (such as filtering out codecs etc). Display options can also be adjusted - such as disabling background animations for slower/lower powered machines) manually. - Includes the Feed Synchronization Tool (which runs as a scheduled task) - which preprocesses and summarizes your Subscribed feeds (incorporating any recent updates made) - so they are ready for instant viewing when you load Headlines 2. The synchronized feeds (and any auto downloaded enclosures) are also then made available to extender users via the synchronization tool. The synchronization tool also creates 'best of' style feeds internally so you can quickly view lists of 'latest' items from the main menu - without substantial processing time (by media type or online/offline status). - User Interface is available in 5 languages : English, German, French, Spanish and Italian. Headlines v2 also features the new Activation/Trial/Unlock system found on the other v2 products (Weather v2 and Photos v2) - and allows you to upsize your existing trial to a full version if you decide to buy it.
Take it for a spin :- If you want to try Big Screen Headlines v2 out for yourself - download a free 30 day trial version or purchase the full version - at these links below. Please note that you will need to sign up for a free account on bigscreenglobal.com if you don't already have one. Trial + Download page : http://bigscreenglobal.com/bgproductdownload.aspx?PID=BSHV2 More screenshots : http://bigscreenglobal.com/bgproductscreens.aspx?PID=BSHV2 March 06 Silverlight 2 Beta 1 + Expression 2.5 Preview Now Available
As mentioned over past couple of blog posts - Silverlight v2 Beta 1 is being launched at Mix 08. I just noticed that the downloads have now been launched to the public - and are available at the following links : - Install Microsoft® Silverlight™ 2 Beta - Microsoft® Silverlight™ 2 SDK Beta 1 - Source Code for Silverlight 2 Beta 1 Controls - Microsoft® Silverlight™ 2 SDK Beta 1 Documentation - Silverlight Tools for VS2008
The new Beta/Preview version of the Expression Products (which has the bits required to create/edit Silverlight 2.0 projects) is also available at : - Microsoft Expression Blend 2.5 March 2008 Preview
but wait there's more... These are of course previews/beta's so expect lot's of pain (and crashing) whilst test driving these new tools and SDK's.
March 05 Silverlight announced for Nokia S40/S60 mobile phones (and Internet Devices)
This is quite an interesting (and exciting) development - and hopefully means there's a commitment to get Silverlight into a whole lot of new devices in the future (I'm really hoping it makes it to some set top boxes / or media players). I'm quite surprised that there wasn't an announcement yet for Silverlight on Windows Mobile devices (or even Zune or XBox360) - as one would think that Microsoft's own mobile/pda platform would have been not only a priority - but a far simpler option allowing for a much faster time to market (given that it already runs CF.NET - a more feature rich version of the framework offered in Silverlight 2). Nokia have mentioned that the first S60 devices with Silverlight will be available 'late 2008' and Series 40 + Internet Devices to be available after that (2009?). There's a few challenges, caveats and unknowns with the announcement and how it would actually be deployed/usable on the mobile phones - although the press release hints that it will be rolled out/available via the Web Browser. I personally would have liked an option that gave it a 1st class citizen treatment on the device (as non browser hosted standalone apps) - and directly launchable from the devices main menu/display (similar to how J2me Midlets worked - but more directly accessible to end users without all the sub-menus/hoops in between currently found in j2me). Given the extensibility/customization available on Series60 (which is a more complete 'O/S' than S40) - it's probably going to be possible to expose it via shortcuts on the phone's menus - but unlikely to be the same on S40. One of the big problems in the past with J2me (apart from the challenging development aspect), was that it was too difficult for consumers to actually find the applications on their phones once they had been installed (and hence they never really took off 'en masse - despite the capabilities and power offered over standard mobile web browser sites and Flash lite). Another big issue, and a reason why it might really be 2009/2010 by the time we can actually expect anyone to have Silverlight on their Mobile Phones (and even then it would generally be early adopters only) - is that the runtime needs to be deployed to the phone's O/S (which generally equals firmware). This means that users need to purchase brand new phones (once they become available) - update their O/S if possible (if Series 60) - or at bare minimum update their firmwares if such a thing is offered (given the cost/downtime/hassle of this process - which generally involves visiting a phone repair place - it's a highly unlikely scenario). Given that Flash Lite (now at v2.1) - is already available in many of these devices - Silverlight has a lot of catching up to do. (and hopefully it has some success out on the web so that Nokia doesn't have a change of heart). Given this - I would predict its more likely 2010/2011 timeframe that we'd see Silverlight enabled devices in the hands of an average consumer. (who generally have the less powerful Series40 based devices). Apart from these above mentioned 'reality checks' - it is indeed an exciting announcement - and hopefully means Silverlight is here to stay (and will be taken more seriously out in the real world with a chance of survival). I'm looking forward to seeing what other Silverlight announcements appear over the next few days at Mix. (and playing with the Beta if that appears as hinted). March 01 Silverlight 2.0 is coming... (and Microsoft isn't just 'listening to your feedback')
Although this news is a little old (announced last week) - it's hard not to get really excited by the new developments happening over in the Silverlight camp at Microsoft for the upcoming Beta 1 release of Silverlight 2.0. (which I believe is being scheduled for launch at Mix '08 next week). Silverlight 2.0 (formerly known as Silverlight 1.1) is essentially the cross platform technology trying to give Flash a run for it's money in the RIA space - but leverages the 'developer' focused tools, technologies and audience that Microsoft has by using .NET and XAML - which in turn means you get great tools like Visual Studio 2008 to work with coupled with design tools like Expression Blend (which are starting to take shape - although still quite a way to go there). While a lot of 'designers' out there will just say Microsoft are simply playing 'catch up' with Adobe - I think Adobe never quite understood the whole 'developer IDE' thing (and I know I was pretty put off Flash everytime I had to do any project work involving more than 10 lines of code - as the ActionScript etc experience is really quite disturbing for anyone spoilt by Visual Studio - or just about any other Developer IDE such as Borland's, Eclipse etc etc).
What's so good about Silverlight 2.0 - didn't 1.0 tank? While Silverlight 1.0 didn't get a lot of traction against Flash last year (and the fact that most of the Microsoft sites still use Flash instead of Silverlight is proof of that) - it was a great 'start' and a sign of MS moving forward from WPF/.NETv3 (which 'sported' a pretty buggy, incompatible and clunky runtime platform - and made it pretty unusable/un-deployable in the vast majority of scenarios). After WPF - Silverlight 1.0 came back - reduced the feature set (substantially) - but offered a mean/lean runtime which was (sortof) cross platform - and actually made it a serious contender in the RIA space. The really promising thing with Silverlight 2.0 (and the team behind it) - is that after initially announcing 1.1 (which was essentially the addition of a cross platform version of .NET - but not much else - where 1.0 used javascript from the HTML layer) - they appear to have 'reinvented' themselves and added a whole bunch of things developers were asking for. (well according to this post at least) - including some of these things :
Although not directly mentioned - I really do hope some of these other things get improved/sorted (either for this BETA 1 release or at least for the full release) :
While it's still early days - the really great thing about Silverlight is that it's a sign the team (and thinking) behind it are :
Will Silverlight be the future of 10 foot Development instead of MCPL? I asked this question about a year ago for SL 1.0 - but there was a few things missing from the spec to make this a reality (video codec support and fulls screen keyboard/remote handling) - and of course some enhanced cross platform support (ie. Flash has made an appearance on platforms like the Wii and Windows CE - whereas Silverlight hasn't). Since Vista was released (in November '06) - and during the Beta phase - the Media Center team has been feeding us the "we're doing all these great things - but just we can't 'talk about it yet'" line. (this isn't just on the development front - but on the platform as a whole). But anyone who's been involved in this market for a while - will have heard this line a million times before - and on the odd (and rare) occasion that updates actually do appear - there's so few improvements/changes that it's easy to be completely underwhelmed each time - and more dubious and suspicious each time this line is peddled. The PIKA 2.0 extenders - which were touted as being the holy grail of Media Center home use (well at least pretty much the only thing being talked about in 2007 apart from OCUR) - mostly turned out to be a big disappointment. So it's hard to be anything other than dubious about what we will see in future updates (that's if they are ever made available - with RU1 being long long overdue ). While MCPL was a big improvement on the HTML Addin model (offered for 10 foot development in MCE2005) - the lack of transparency and 'visible' progress hasn't been promising ('developer lockout' is a phrase the springs to mind on the PIKA 2.0 front). It's clear to see that the 'big brands' (the ones that were supposedly going to flock to the inbuilt Online Media section) - have all stayed well clear so far - since the initial handful (4 tiles I think) that showed up for the US CES 07 launch. (and it's highly questionable whether these companies invested their own funds to make these products happen). Luckily (or perhaps 'unluckily') there was legacy support for the MCE2005 addin technologies - otherwise this Online Media section would have been completely blank/empty (as the ones written in MCPL available outside the US). While there are companies (like mine) who have been trying to build and popularize products using the MCPL development model - so far - its a 'members only' night - so unless you're a big brand name you 'don't' exist in terms of access to the general public (so the 'other' 30 million odd Media Center users doesn't get to see the benefits of MCPL - nor use the products that have been created with it). There's also no proper development tools for MCPL. - and hence it's a black belt technology (with no intention by Microsoft to make it any easier) - which only those willing to go through significant amount of pain have made any progress with it. (and those that do make the plunge get that 'this isn't being supported or taken seriously' feeling all the way through - due to lack of appropriate documentation, update/change notices etc being produced - and other things normally associated with technology platforms). Silverlight on the other hand has a great set of tools available (and lot's more to come) - and the entire Design through to Development through to Deployment scenario has been well though out - and will continue to be really well supported. (although it's not 100% - it's still a huge improvement on productivity for everyone concerned - and substantially reduces the learning curve)
And the winner will be..(not the public just yet) ? So - it's going to be an interesting time over the next couple of years in the world of Web 2.0/3.0/RIA/IPTV etc. Microsoft are currently really suffering from the 'self inflicted' fragmentation caused by offering a lot of different developer platforms to the public - Silverlight for the Web, WPF + WinForms for desktops, CF.NET + XHTML for Mobiles, XNA for XBox360 + Zune, MCPL for MediaCenter - and the list goes on and on (and most of these are reliant on Windows being used for the development and proprietary devices/platforms being used for the runtime). There's simply no unifying technology (other than .NET) in the Microsoft camp just yet - so makes it quite a poor value proposition for companies who want to invest in this new world. (and want some reuse across platforms with their investment) In this respect - companies like Adobe and Apple are clearly winning - and via their 'lack of options' on offer - they are making the choices a lot simpler and clearer for both companies and consumers. Hopefully technologies like Silverlight 2 (which are more developer friendly) can make it's mark and get some inroads on Flash. (and it's looking like the best bet so far out of all the Microsoft technologies on offer). All we need now is a release date for the full version (which is the real date when it can start to make this traction). February 28 MCPL Tutorials taken offline (another sad day in the life of Media Center Development)..Myself and fellow Media Center 'Community Developer Expert' Steve Harding (aka. IgnoranceIsBliss) both made the decision over past few days, to take down some MCPL related programming materials (including tutorials and a LGPL licensed open-source project) - which we had jointly (and individually) produced between Sep-'06 - Jan '07. (Sadly and Regrettably) These were taken down for the following reasons -
Reason #1 : Others Developers simply weren't doing the 'right thing' - and in fact did some pretty malicious acts instead.
These posts/online offerings were initially created and made available for 'viewing' (but not straight out reuse) - for the purposes of 'kick-starting' the Vista Media Center MCPL developer scene - which had a very steep learning curve and lack thereof of real world scenarios for other developers to learn from (which we both felt was preventing people creating products). While 'already coded' MCPL is easy to read + understand (being XML based and only having a small set of available elements/attributes in the specification) - the various techniques/implementations presented are pretty much only obvious "after" you've seen the code of how to do something. (Given the very poor documentation for the Platform this was also significantly more difficult to work out than any of the development technologies/paradigms released in the past few years). It's a bit like the difference between cooking 'from a recipe' vs making a completely brand new recipe and a cooking style up from scratch. (ie. the '11 secret herbs and spices' to making KFC is only obvious to cook and make at home AFTER you've been given the list of herbs and spices and been shown how to use a deep fryer...).
Unfortunately, this has been exasperated by Microsoft providing a SDK/API which was initially developed specifically for what UX features that were required/exposed by their own UI - and then said hey 'here is what we used to create it - see what you can come up with'. Then no 'clear guidance' on where what was actually considered to be 'extending the experience' and 'breeching their branding/trademarks/patents' was given. Then (mostly for '1 pager' addins) - end users and commercial clients wanted products which looked exactly like Vista Media Center UX - hence the #2 most commonly asked question by developers (apart from 'how the hell does MCPL work') - was 'how do we recreate this look and feel'. (hence open source project 'MCML Lookalike' and the 'Pivot Bar' and 'Gel Button' samples).. While a brief list of reasoning was provided a while ago (that was pretty conclusively disputed/disagreed with by every person who made a comment in response) - it's very unclear what exactly is considered to be under copyright, patents and trademarks etc. (is it the color blue? is it the font being used? is it the functions or features, the animations?) A large amount of what we see in Vista MC was derived from or a natural+obvious progression from the many PVR and UX platforms that predated it - ie. Tivo, MCE2005, ShowShifter, Meedio, Webscheduler, WebTV, Settop boxes, WPF, Flash etc etc... (the list goes on and on..). Also - currently with MCPL addins - if you set the background to be transparent - then what you see onscreen is the blue gradient/swirly pattern thats common to Vista Media Center. If you put white or cyan text over the top (pretty much the only colors that are visible with this background scheme apart from yellow) - then it's starts to look very much like Vista Media Center. (and then it becomes clear as mud where patents, trademarks etc start and where they end). If developers need to create a completely new navigation paradigm and theme every time they make an addin product (a skill which the vast majority of developers find impossible/exceedingly difficult) - then it's also a bad outcome for the end users and for the platform as a whole. (when it's not done well it reflects badly on the entire platform). What's ended up happening is that the vast majority of 3rd party addins look completely identical to Vista Media Center (and the ripping off of code didn't help this either) - and the authors are all actually at risk of legal action over the patent stuff as well (if it ever suited Microsoft to do so). By posting these samples - without hugely expensive legal resources - there was also this same risk. This is despite these samples being provided as guidance for development and as components - not as a full implementation/solution to be directly copied line for line (which as per Reason #1 was what eventuated).
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - As I've ranted before (in a previous post) - it was again utterly shocking and astounding to see WHO perpetrated the IP theft and WHERE it was reused. AND that many of these people (and companies) were those that myself and Steve had also spent HUGE amounts of time helping on Media Center Sandbox. AND that they were reusing this help/IP for commercial contracts - or stealing our IP with and bundling it with other ill-gotten IP and then competing against us. AND that when some of them were contacted continued to lie and be completely difficult about the whole thing (some seemed to think that we had some form of 'obligation + duty' to give away things for free and help them out - rather than it being recognized/appreciated we were taking time out to help them???? I cant begin to understand where or how that reasoning came about - or what was going through their heads..) So anyhow - that's the explanation why these posts/projects were removed. It's again a sad day for myself, Steve and those very small % of developers that actually did do the right thing (and i really DO MEAN small % here..).
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