RIA Services – ADO.NET Data Services and WCF
I’ve had a chance to look at RIA Services over the last few months and thought it would be good to clear up some of the confusion over where RIA Services stands in relation to other related technologies like ADO.NET Data Services and WCF. In some respects RIA Services are similar to WCF Services. You write the service code, host it on a server, create some proxy classes on your client and away you go. In fact, if you look at how you implement the same service in each technology it’s almost identical. In WCF, [ServiceContract] public class SpeechService : ISpeechService {

Learn About RIA Services
If you can make it to Wellington next Wednesday (6:00pm @ Xero) come  along and hear all about RIA Services at the next Silverlight User Group (SLUG). I’ll be covering some of the stuff I presented this year at TechEd but also adding a few new things. I’m also keen to hear what people think about RIA Services compared to alternative approaches – is it something you’ll use? If not, why not? If so, what’s so great about it?

Intergen at Tech.Ed 2009 – More Movies
Intergen were there in force this year and here’s the proof… Windows Azure for High Availability [TTK155] (Chris Auld) Windows Azure, the Microsoft Cloud Computing Platform with particular reference to high scalability and availability the platform offers and how this can benefit NZ businesses.

Silverlight Adoption – The Movie
TechEd 2009 seems so long ago now that I had thought Microsoft had made an editorial decision to scrap my Tech Talk with Nigel on Silverlight adoption. I was sure I hadn’t said anything to offend but I was beginning to wonder. So it was with relief that I finally found it… check it out. 

ButtercupReader is on CodePlex
If you’ve been following the work we did on ButtercupReader (a Silverlight application for reading DAISY formatted digital books) then you might be interested to get your hands on the source code to see how it was done. We’ve just published the code to CodePlex - http://buttercupreader.codeplex.com. So, check it out and we’d love to hear your feedback and hopefully get some help to drive the project forward.