Chapter 13

Creating XAML Applications for Windows 8

What's in this chapter?

Differences in Windows 8 XAML from earlier XAML platforms

UX and UI conventions in Windows 8

New elements and new features in Windows 8 XAML

The Visual Studio 2012 designer for XAML

Application templates in Visual Studio 2012 for XAML apps

Implementing Live Tiles

Implementing contracts to work with Windows 8 charms

Wrox.com Code Downloads for this Chapter

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In chapter 12, you looked at XAML in a general way. That chapter covered capabilities and syntax that work exactly the name, except for minor details, on all three XAML platforms: WPF, Silverlight, and Windows 8 / WinRT. This chapter looks more deeply at XAML in the Windows 8 environment. The objective of the chapter is to build on general XAML expertise so that it can be applied to the creation of Windows 8 apps.

This chapter is aimed at those who have already absorbed enough about XAML to at least write simple applications on earlier XAML platforms. Chapter 12 was designed to assist those who have not yet used XAML in production on earlier platforms by presenting foundational XAML concepts. This chapter assumes that, at a minimum, the reader is familiar with all the concepts presented in Chapter 12.

For the benefit of those with more extensive experience in XAML, you'll begin by looking at a few significant ways in which Windows 8 XAML differs from that on earlier platforms. This section isn't intended to be comprehensive. Rather, it highlights differences that you are likely to encounter early in your attempts to create Windows 8 apps.

Then, you'll take up some of the user interface and user experience conventions you are expected to satisfy in Windows 8 apps. Some of these are advisory, but a number of them are required to place your app in the Windows Store for deployment. Chapter 20 covers how to use the Windows Store, including how to check your application to see if it satisfies necessary conventions.

Windows 8 contains a number of new visual elements, and some of them are designed to fit well within Windows 8 conventions. The chapter includes an overview of the most important of these new elements. You'll also need to look at several elements that existed in earlier XAML platforms, but have some special usage or significance in Windows 8 XAML, such as Frame and Popup.

The chapter also includes some discussion of the visual designer for XAML in Visual Studio 2012, particularly the associated Properties window, primarily to highlight differences from previous versions of Visual Studio.

Then, you'll get an overview of how to use the application templates for Windows 8 XAML apps offered by Visual Studio 2012. These templates are much more extensive than equivalents in earlier XAML platforms, and learning to use them is correspondingly harder.

Finally, you'll look at how your app fits into Windows 8 overall, including having your application expose an ActiveTile, and implementing a contract for search functionality.