I’m leading a workshop at ISECON 2011 in Wilmington  on Creating Windows Mobile Phone Apps.  The workshop will be held on Friday, November 4, from 9:30 am to 11:55 a.m.  This post is primarily intended for participants, as it contains instructions on what to bring, read, download, sign up for, and do to prior to the workshop.

Learn how to create mobile applications for the Windows Phone 7 platform using Visual Basic and C# in just a few hours. By the end of this workshop, you will create and customize a phone app template developed by the presenter that combines information from your school’s Web site, RSS feeds, and other online sources to create a phone app for your school. Best of all, you don’t need to write a single line of source code to do this! You will also learn how to submit your apps to the Microsoft Marketplace. For those with some programming experience, we will review application code to interact with RSS feeds, display maps, and invoke Web services. We will also introduce Silverlight markup for designing a mobile application’s user interface. For those with no programming experience, we will also present web-based development tools to create mobile applications on iPhone, Droid, and Windows Phone 7 platforms.

Details about software and setup after the jump.

We will be creating two different phone apps together, one using AppMakr, an online app development platform that requires no coding, and another using Visual Studio 2010 Express for Windows Phone. You will need a PC running Windows to fully participate in this workshop.  Be sure your battery is charged!  I’m told there will be wifi available, but it would be really nice if people weren’t all sitting in the back corner of the room because  that’s where the only electrical outlet is located.

For the Visual Studio 2010 Express activity:

• Please download Visual Studio 2010 Express for Windows Phone and install it.
• Please download MySchoolApp (the original, that I posted to Codeplex in VB and C#) and the C# version that Microsoft’s Chris Koenig adapted from mine, and is now included in the Microsoft Windows Phone Starter Kit for Schools.  You can read more about my original version and what Chris did to make it look a whole lot better.
• There are tons of code samples online to get you started as well.  This is a good Map tutorial. We’re going to modify it to center the map at various landmarks. You’ll need this code.

private void Plot(double lat, double lon, string descr)

        {
            GeoCoordinate mapCenter = new GeoCoordinate(lat, lon);
            int zoom = 15;

            // Create a pushpin to put at the center of the view
            Pushpin pin1 = new Pushpin();
            pin1.Location = mapCenter;
            pin1.Content = descr;
            map1.Children.Add(pin1);

            // Set the map style to Aerial
            map1.Mode = new Microsoft.Phone.Controls.Maps.AerialMode();

            // Set the view and put the map on the page
            map1.SetView(mapCenter, zoom);

        }

You’ll also need lat-long’s of some famous places.  Here are a few examples, or use Bing Maps to find your own.

• Statue of Liberty: 40.6892471313477, – 74.0445327758789
• Eiffel Tower: 48.8579292297363, 2.29525995254517

• Here are some sample banners and splashscreens if you don’t want to take the time to make your own, should you submit your app to the Microsoft Windows Mobile Marketplace.

For the AppMakr activity:

• If you have time  before the workshop, create an account on AppMakr. It will be one fewer thing you’ll have to do when you get there!
• We’ll be following these steps for the AppMakr part of the workshop, so if you want a printed copy, please download and print one, and remember to bring it with you!
• Here are some sample banners and splashscreens if you don’t want to take the time to make your own.

Windows Phone Development Tools

• These tools let you copy files to an unlocked Windows Phone.
• To deploy apps to a Windows Phone, you need to install Zune software on your PC.

To upload your apps to the Microsoft Windows Phone Marketplace:

Please complete these steps before you get to Wilmington

• It would be great if we actually got to create an app and submit it to the Microsoft Windows Phone Marketplace by the end of the workshop. To facilitate this
  • Please create a Dreamspark account. You’ll need a windows LiveID for that.
  • Then register for App Hub using your Dreamspark account. Dreamspark gives you access to Microsoft Development tools at no charge as long as you’re a student (or can convince Microsoft that you are one!  An .edu email address usually does the trick.)  Edwin Guarin posted the steps for creating both of these accounts on his blog. You can follow steps 1-7 to register for Dreamspark, and steps 8 -10 to register for AppHub. Signing up for AppHub allows you to waive the $99 registration fee to post your apps on the Marketplace.

For those who teach VB, check out Corinne Hoisington’s online chapter about Creating Windows Mobile Phone 7 Applications using Decision Structures.

Any other questions? Feel free to email me before the workshop!

Mark