No Training = No Developers = No Apps = No Hardware sales

[Bill Badger]

Over the years whenever I wanted to learn a new technology, I have usually gone to Amazon and bought the relevant books or gone to Lynda.com or Pluralsight and got the training videos.

Since Windows 8 phones arrived back in October 2012 there have been ZERO books about developing the new Windows 8 phones on Amazon or anywhere else.
Amazon.com: window 8 phone development: Books
Nothing available until May 2013

As for training videos....forget it.

And please don't tell me to visit that tangled mess of an MSDN developer center, where it is assumed you have been developing Windows 7 phones from birth and just want to change to Windows 8 phones.

I would have thought that Microsoft would have put out a multitude of books about programming Windows phone 8 first steps after it's release in October 2012.

Instead we have nothing

Microsoft investors are asking why aren't people buying Windows 8 Machines, phones, tablets in great numbers? and the answer is that the Metro type apps are NOT as good as the desktop apps that preceded them. That's because the bulk of the older type desktop apps were mainly written in VB which is far more widely known than C#.

Another thing that irks me is why are Microsoft concentrating on C# when we all have huge legacy code bases in VB. Instead we are enthusiastically told by MS that you can "program in your favorite language C#, C++, VB, HTML" to write Windows 8 programs. Yeah right as long as it is C#. Nothing much for VB programmers. Why throw all that easily convertible legacy code away, and start from almost scratch again? I'm afraid it will be years before there are enough programmers fluent in C# (the favored language) to produce the apps that will make Microsoft Windows 8 phones popular with the consumer.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vhh_GeBPOhs

Meanwhile No developers means no apps. No Apps means no sales of WP8 phones.

 

[stmav]

I did a search on Amazon on writing apps for Windows 8 and found 7 books on the first page alone. While none mentioned VB. There were books for C#, XAML, HTML5 and JavaScript.

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=writing+apps+for+windows+8

 

[ammarmalik2011]

 

[spaulagain]

VB? Really...?

 

[Bill Badger]

I did a search on Amazon on writing apps for Windows 8 and found 7 books on the first page alone. While none mentioned VB. There were books for C#, XAML, HTML5 and JavaScript.

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=writing+apps+for+windows+8

NOT "WINDOWS 8 Books" but WINDOWS 8 PHONE Books!!!

 

[Bill Badger]

VB? Really...?

Thank you for your reply but this might change your mind.

Visual Basic is a better programming language than Visual C#. Who says so? This article! Here are 10 reasons why you should always choose VB over C#.

https://www.simple-talk.com/dotnet/.net-framework/10-reasons-why-visual-basic-is-better-than-c/

 

[Bill Badger]

Someone else want to know
Seriously, where the **** are the apps?
http://forums.windowscentral.com/surface-windows-rt/218278-seriously-where-****-apps.html

http://forums.windowscentral.com/developers-corner/209893-windows-phone-8-book.html

 

[Daniel Ratcliffe]

Someone else want to know
Seriously, where the **** are the apps?
http://forums.windowscentral.com/surface-windows-rt/218278-seriously-where-****-apps.html

Surface RT = Windows RT != Windows Phone 8. Also that thread was nothing but a flame-fest resulting in an epic response from my colleague!

By the way, Windows Phone 7 developer books are still MOSTLY relevant. There may be a few things that aren't relevant but they'll be easy enough to work around :smile:

 

[stmav]

NOT "WINDOWS 8 Books" but WINDOWS 8 PHONE Books!!!

Windows Phone 8 is built on the same shared core as Windows 8, and this means that developers have the opportunity to deliver applications to both, leveraging much of the same knowledge, tools, code, and assets. The application itself is not compatible, but most of the code is. So I would say that a book for Windows 8 could provide help for writing apps for Windows Phone 8.

 

[a5cent]

Windows? Phone 8 Development Internals
Essential Windows Phone 8 (2nd Edition)
Windows Phone 8 Training Kit
Nokia Windows Phone 8 Developer Wiki

Doesn't seem like much of an issue to me???

 

[SoloXCRacer]

Thank you for your reply but this might change your mind.

Visual Basic is a better programming language than Visual C#. Who says so? This article! Here are 10 reasons why you should always choose VB over C#.

https://www.simple-talk.com/dotnet/.net-framework/10-reasons-why-visual-basic-is-better-than-c/

After reading this article, and you previous posts, I've come to the conclusion that both you and the author do not know what VB.NET is under the hood. I'd also take a guess that you don't understand that VB6 and VB.NET are two completely different programming languages. The VB.NET vs C# debate will live forever. No bother trying to convince one to abandon the other. Though the developers that understand .NET and how VB.NET and C# relate to each other think that the debate is silly. What it's important is that developers have the option to choose their syntax of choice. Those who prefer VB6 syntax can choose VB.NET. Those with a C/C++ and/or Java background can choose C#. It's all just syntactical sugar over the .NET framework. Choose the one you like and be done with it.

I do agree though that literature for WinRT and Windows Phone 8 are severely lacking. My suspicion is, though this is purely speculation on my part, that MS will be converging WinRT/Windows Phone 8 so that one code base can run on both devices. Much like how iOS and Android apps run both on phones and tablets. If that's the case, then the current frameworks out there will probably not apply. That's my speculation though because I don't see WinRT and Windows Phone 8 succeeding by themselves.

 

[a5cent]

^ It appears to me, that the OP is talking about VB6, but linked to an article listing completely irrelevant reasons why VB.NET is supposedly better than C#.

My suspicion is, though this is purely speculation on my part, that MS will be converging WinRT/Windows Phone 8 so that one code base can run on both devices.

This isn't happening. At least so has been claimed at dozens of MS dev conferences world wide.

Apple sees the tablet as an oversized phone. Microsoft sees the tablet as a miniaturized laptop without a keyboard. Each company has OS' that span devices accordingly. Many of the differences that remain between WP8 and W8RT are intentional.

 

[SoloXCRacer]

^ It appears to me, that the OP is talking about VB6, but linked to an article listing completely irrelevant reasons why VB.NET is supposedly better than C#.

Yes, that is why I said he does not understand that VB6 != VB.NET or VB6 <> VB.NET.....or NOT(VB6 = VB.NET).....whatever


Regarding WinRT and Windows Phone 8 not converging, I'm torn. Sometimes, I think it makes sense to keep them separate but other times I think MS would have had a killer concept of one app/code base running on a phone, tablet/PC. That is much easier to sell to businesses to push for WP8 and WinRT. But in any case there will always be code to write.

 

[ImmortalWarrior]

He doesn't understand that VB6 is not VB.NET. All the .NET languages compile to the same code. They all compile to the Common Language Runtime.

Also, the vb.net vs the c sharp.net debate is pointless for two reasons.

1. They compile to the same CLR and therefore have the exact same capabilities and library support.

2. C# follows more closely to modern object oriented syntax designs used by languages such as python, c, c++, Java, JavaScript, PHP and many others. VB.NET syntax is definitely the odd man out.

 

[Bill Badger]

Windows Phone 8 is built on the same shared core as Windows 8, and this means that developers have the opportunity to deliver applications to both, leveraging much of the same knowledge, tools, code, and assets. The application itself is not compatible, but most of the code is. So I would say that a book for Windows 8 could provide help for writing apps for Windows Phone 8.

Thanks! I agree with you

 

[Bill Badger]

Windows? Phone 8 Development Internals
Essential Windows Phone 8 (2nd Edition)
Windows Phone 8 Training Kit
Nokia Windows Phone 8 Developer Wiki

Doesn't seem like much of an issue to me???

Windows? Phone 8 Development Internals (available as a useful but incomplete pdf at the moment Wait until May)
Windows Phone 8 unleashed (Wait until May)
Essential Windows Phone 8 (2nd Edition) (Wait until May)
Windows Phone 8 Training Kit (A good start)
Nokia Windows Phone 8 Developer Wiki (very Good)

 

[hopmedic]

After reading this article, and you previous posts, I've come to the conclusion that both you and the author do not know what VB.NET is under the hood. I'd also take a guess that you don't understand that VB6 and VB.NET are two completely different programming languages. The VB.NET vs C# debate will live forever. No bother trying to convince one to abandon the other. Though the developers that understand .NET and how VB.NET and C# relate to each other think that the debate is silly. What it's important is that developers have the option to choose their syntax of choice. Those who prefer VB6 syntax can choose VB.NET. Those with a C/C++ and/or Java background can choose C#. It's all just syntactical sugar over the .NET framework. Choose the one you like and be done with it.

I didn't take the time to read the article, but my first thought was, "another opinion published as an 'article'...." Myself, I started out learning VB.NET about 10 years ago. I wrote several Windows Mobile and Windows CE applications for the company I used to work for, and then two years ago I started teaching myself C# to write for Windows Phone (before VB support was there). Myself, I agree with the irrellevance of the argument of VB.NET vs C#. Yeah, there are a few things that each can do that the other can't, or can do better than the other, but for the most part, they share the same capabilities. At this point, I prefer C#, and certainly part of that is because there is far more information about it out there and I'm still a relative novice, but really, if you really know them both, it shouldn't make a lot of difference.

 

[theomodsim]

Thank you for your reply but this might change your mind.

Visual Basic is a better programming language than Visual C#. Who says so? This article! Here are 10 reasons why you should always choose VB over C#.

https://www.simple-talk.com/dotnet/.net-framework/10-reasons-why-visual-basic-is-better-than-c/

I hope you're joking by pointing to that article as justification why VB is better than C#. Some of the points in that article are so bad you hope the author was joking when he wrote it (type coercion is a good thing in a statically-typed language? really??).

 

[Gmotagi]

I really don't bother buying books anymore as you can always find more up to date and as good examples on-line. There are a few exceptions for some 'must have' books but on the whole I find I never read the book cover to cover and in a month or so it will be just another book sitting on the shelf gathering dust.

For the OP, if you are serious about programming (and especially if you are working as one) you need to be as cutting edge as you possibly can. Be continuously reading articles and forums in your spare time and become as expert as you can. Books are useful but most just get out of date to quickly to be worth the cost IMO and a lot of the time the basics covered in the books can be found online anyway.

 

[Rich White]

Speaking as teacher and trainer it's hard to justify teaching VB.NET today to newbies. They simply will get more out of learning the C family of syntax when using JavaScript, etc.
I started with Basic and PL1 and COBOL and RPG before moving onto VB 3.0 in 1994. I like VB.Net but its really just adding confusion to the mix these days. There's a market for it given the number of legacy apps written in VB, VBA or VB.NET.

OP was right about Win 8 books. There's all sorts of little stupid gotchas. I installed Visual Studio Pro 2012 on Win 7 but can't run the Win Phone 8 SDK on Win 7. So I set up a virtual machine to run Win 8 and Win Express. Then the Telerik Control Templates won't integrate with VS Express I need to run with the Source Code Versions.. Vaughns book won't be out for a few months etc. .Nothing insurmountable. Just lots of little annoyances.