Product Description

Get the definitive guide to the Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF), the new client programming interface for the Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0 and Windows Vista. Award-winning author Charles Petzold teaches you how to combine C# code and the Extensible Application Markup Language (XAML) to develop applications for the WPF. You’ll get expert guidance and hundreds of practical, hands-on examples—giving you the skills you need to exploit the new interface and graphics capabilities for Windows Vista. Discover how to: •Create and enhance controls including menus, toolbars, tree views, and list views •Use dynamic layout to automate the positioning of controls and graphics •Work with dependency properties and routed input events •Use XAML resources, styles, and templates to alter the appearance of your UI •Use data binding techniques in XAML to help simplify and streamline your applications •Create and publish XAML Browser Applications •Develop visually-stunning UIs with interactive graphics, media, and animation PLUS—Get code samples on the Web 

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #363157 in Books
• Published on: 2006-08-30
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 1020 pages

About the Author
Charles Petzold was honored in 1994 with the Windows Pioneer
Award, presented by Microsoft founder Bill Gates and Windows Magazine. He
has been programming with Windows since first obtaining a beta Windows 1.0
software development kit in the spring of 1985, and he wrote the very first
magazine article on Windows programming in 1986.

Charles wrote the classic Programming Windows, which is currently in its
sixth edition and one of the best-known and widely used programming books
of all time. He is also the author of Programming in the Key of C# and
Code: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software.

Customer Reviews

Not a practical guide
The lack of screenshots is challenging. If code "looks" like it might do what's required I have to type it out - this makes for a lot of typing when an example from the book doesn't quite fit the bill. Makes me think of the UNIX command-line junkies of the 90's - everything's got to be written out by hand to see what it'll do on the screen.

The book lacks practical examples such side-by-side code/XAML comparisons and how they'd work together to, say, load a .jpg from the file system or a web service for use as a tiling brush.

It's probably quite useful to propeller-heads that like theoretical breadth rather than practical application.

S_OK
It's a good book. You need to sit at your computer and work through all the examples to get the most from it. I wouldn't have been able to stay awake just reading about the WPF anyway.
You can download the code to save you typing it. I prefer typing it out anyway as it helps me to learn. I didn't notice the lack of screenshots as I was running the samples.
It's well written, there aren't many mistakes (see the errata), it introduces new concepts slowly and it covers a lot of ground.

No Pictures!
I'm sorry, but for a book on User Interface programming, I was astonished to find that this book lacks ANY screenshots! Therefore although the explanations and theory are coherently explained in prose, the book would be a lot less dry with some illustrations to show the WPF in action.