Top 10 WPF resources

As a minor intermission while I put a bit more effort into the WPF article series, I thought I’d list my top 10 favourite WPF and .NET tools.

Ok, here goes!

1. The amazing free resource that is MSDN
   For top quality articles and all the WPF information you can eat, there is no better place than MSDN (Except of course this blog ;))
2. A List WPF Bloggers
   There’s always tons of useful WPF and .Net goodies on the WPF Blogosphere – Check out big names like Rob Relyea , Karl Shifflett, Andrew Smith, Josh Smith, Tim Sneath, Ashish Shetty, Adam Nathan, Chris Anderson, Greg Schechter, Nathan Dunlap and Bea Costa are but a few of my favourites. Many of these guys have great WPF books out on the shelves, and their blogrolls are well worth checking out.
3. Direct access to the SDK team
   Yes, the WPF SDK team are online, and you can comment on the articles and entries directly on the SDK teams blog!
4. Expression Blend
   Ok, you can use VisualStudio to edit your UX, but seriously, VS can’t compete with Blend. Download, Learn It, USE IT.
5. Visual Studio 2008
   By the same token, you can edit code in blend, but you’d have to be a serious masochist. Get hold of VS2008, nothing else comes close. Be amazed at the new feature sets this coding powerhouse gives you. Buy It, Learn It, USE IT with BLEND!
6. Content Presenters free video resources
   They’re big, they’re excellent quality, and best of all, they’re free!
   Download them and watch them now!
7. Snoop, Mole and XamlPadX, Kaxaml
   Four absolutely must have tools for helping with the WPF coding experience. While Devstudio does most things, you just cant do without these fantastic four.
8. The WPF Forums on MSDN
   Absolutely the best place to get your questions answered, and a huge archive of previously solved problems. Before posting remember to search the forum.. most questions have been well covered before!
9. The Daddy of all WPF sites, WindowsClient.Net
   what doesn’t this site contain. Nothing that’s what. If its not here, you probably don’t need it. ( Even my blog’s on here. Ok, I lied.)
10. Finally, Nukeation
    Great content (although sometimes corny dialog!) but plenty to digest, and available as podcasts too. Nice job!

 

Well, that filled a little gap for me, while i think about the amount of content i’m going to have to come up with for the next WPF article! <sigh>!

 

Enjoy!

Rob