Thursday, October 29, 2009

10 free online Tutorials on Silverlight using Blend

(via techpreacher)

These tutorials are for everyone wanting to get to know Silverlight and Expression Blend quickly.  The tutorials have been created to learn about the features of Silverlight by simply drawing, resizing, dragging and dropping elements on the design surface of Blend. No code or prior Silverlight knowledge needed.

The content is provided at a high-level to cover a wide array of topics in a short time. Links to more detailed information are provided at the end of each tutorial.

1. Drawing an emoticon in Expression Blend
First steps in getting to know the tools and workspace in Blend
2. Element Transformations
Learn to use Scale, Rotate, Skew and 2.5D Transformations
3. Get Started with Animation
A Quick Overview on Creating Time-Based Animations
4. Playing Video with the MediaElement
Using the flexible MediaElement control as a reusable Surface
5. Arranging Pictures to Learn Layout
Use the Grid, StackPanel, ScrollableViewer and Border to position Images
6. A Look at Text in Silverlight
Learn about Displaying Text, Font Properties and Embedding Fonts
7. Import an Adobe Photoshop File into Blend
Convert the assets from a Photoshop file into Interactive Controls
8. Styling and Skinning Controls
Customize the Look by Setting Properties and Building Templates
9. Styling and working with Design-Time Data
Explore how Templates and Bindings are used to display dynamic data

10. Giving Behaviors a Test Drive
A brief overview and walkthrough of the Behaviors included with Blend

Sunday, October 11, 2009

Enable BitLocker without a TPM on Windows 7

Windows 7 Bitlocker can use USB sticks instead of TPMProblem

You receive an error that BitLocker will not work if no compatible TPM hardware is present.

Workaround

Use an USB stick (that always have to be inserted before booting your machine).

Steps

  1. Open group policy editor: Start » gpedit.msc
  2. Navigate to:
    • Computer Configuration
    • » Administrative Templates
    • » Windows Components
    • » BitLocker Drive Encryption
    • » Operating System Drives
  3. Double-click Require Additional Authentication at Startup.
  4. Click Enable.
  5. Done!

More information:

How to Backup and Restore your Windows Live Messenger emoticons?

There are several apps out there that promise you to work with the most recent version of Windows Live Messenger (Version 2009, 14.0.8089.726).

My recommendation:

ConCon Messenger Content Retriever

ConCon backups and restores your Windows Live Messenger 

Download: http://concon.110mb.com/

It saves all emoticons into one .mco (= .cab) file, which makes restoring them very easy.