Monday, July 28, 2008

Deep Zoom with Silverlight 2

Deep Zoom is the thing which is now days people on their toes to know what it is, Deep Zoom we can say part of Technology which comes under arena of Silverlight Technologies.

Here I will demonstrate a quick way to design, develop and deploy DeepZoom Application.

For this you need 4 Things :

1. DeepZoom Composer : can be downloaded from here ,

 http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=457b17b7-52bf-4bda-87a3-fa8a4673f8bf&displaylang=en

2. Collection of Good Quality and High Resolution Images.

Once you download and Install DeepZoom successfully, just need to run that, The IDE [Well, IDE here is just buzz word I am using, It may not give all features.] is pretty close to the Interface that is provided by Microsoft Expression Blend.

dz1

This gives a formal template to choose the existing project or go for new one, Well point to be noted here that the extension of these projects will be *.dzprj

dz2

Once you all set with the New Project or opening the existing project, well now let's only focus to newly created project. So once you set the new one just see the following screen.

dz3

Now carefully observe the top of the DeepZoom Composer, you will find 3 options below the menu bar as :

1. Import 2. Compose 3. Export

On right and side you can see "Add Image..." option, by clicking on this you will find Normal Open Dialog where you can select one or more Images.

Once you load set of images you can browse through them on right hand side panel, you also have buttons on status bar of DeepZoom Composer to navigate through that collection.

It supports *.tiff,*.tif,*.jpeg,*.png types of images, Once you import those images you can Drag-drop those on work area in middle part, Now choose Second Tab from Top as "Composr" and see this :

dz4

If you observe carefully, Image which are grayed out on right hand side are already on working area, You observe 2 Tabs above "Add Image.." as "All Images" and "Layer View", Layer View is similar to the layers you see in normal Adobe Photoshop, Layer View helps to adjust image layers one above the other and vice versa.

You can very well resize images and also will be able to set all alignment properties for the same from the various alignment and Zooming option given on bottom side toolbar, Also you will observe a small preview window with a white reference box inside that, This is to give you feel of overall how its going to be work. Either now you choose Zoom option or just adjust images and move the mouse wheel, The necessary code will be automatically get generated behind the scenes. After this much of work, Now all you need to do it to deploy this application.

So now you need to take help of "Export" Tab on the top side toolbar, and you will see the following options :

dz5

Now you also see the Output Preview window next to this export template, Well Now carefully observe "Regular Export" tab, where you will find several option, Firstly you need to set some name for the project else it will not allow to move ahead to export. It will show you export location, you can very well change that,Then there are two option, either you Export Images or export as full fledge project, If you wish to export as Collection you can set Image format there.

We are here more focused on "Output Type" option, We are going to export this as Images and Silverlight Project. So our responsibility is over as far as Exporting is concern, Once you click on Export button you will see the following popup kind of template where you will have several options :

dz6 

Export gives you 4 options :

1. Preview in Browser 2. View Image Folder 3. View Project Folder

4. Edit in Expression Blend

"Preview in Browser" will directly render the output in browser and then just matter of moving mouse wheel and DeepZoom will start working.

"View Image Folder" and "View Project Folder" will basically throw you to the actual physical location of the project and image collection.

"Edit in Expression Blend" will allow you to tweak this project in Expression Blend if you want to do some modification especially in design part.

I hope this article will help you to know what is this latest buzz word "Deep Zoom" is all about. Still more to come for DeepZoom, so keep watching this place.

-Vikram.

Monday, July 7, 2008

I am talking on Silverlight 2.0 on next weekend.

We do have Monthly Community Day where we all come together and share our thoughts and practical experiences on latest technology, so for July, PUG have Silverlight, Expression Blend and Managed Applications on Windows Mobile, Here are details below for same : Its totally free for all, So those who are in Pune, Its going to be good discussion for them.

PUG Community Day - 19 July 2008

presents

Developing Silverlight 2.0 based Web Applications

Speaker :

Mr. Vikram Pendse.

Microsoft MVP [ ASP.NET ]

Time : 3:00 to 4:00 PM

Lap Around Expression Blend

Speaker :

Pradnya Naik

Microsoft SP, Pune

Time : 4:10 to 5:10 PM

Managed Application Development in Windows Mobile

Speaker :

Mayur Tendulkar

Microsoft Tech. Intern,MSP Lead, Pune

Time : 4:10 to 5:10 PM

Date: Saturday, 19 th July 2008

- Venue -

Microsoft Corporation (I) Pvt. Ltd.
202, 2nd Floor, Phoenix,
Bund Garden Rd.,
Opp. Pune Residency Club
Pune Maharashtra 411001
India

Vikram.

Thursday, July 3, 2008

I am Microsoft MVP now..

Happy moments :)

On July 1 2008, I got mail from Microsoft that I have won the Microsoft Most Valuable Professional Award for ASP/ASP.NET for Year 2008 and ahead.

logoMVP

This I won because of my online and offline activities.

I am part of one of the leading .NET user group in India called as Pune User Group (PUG)..you can find that here

http://groups.msn.com/puneusergroup

This is the most amazing platform for all people who are passionate about Microsoft Technologies, its immaterial who they are..they might be college students, developers, testers, IT Pros or seniors in IT..The group is for all and all equally contribute to it to make it better and better day by day.

I am very much thankful to following people who help me a lot and given me guidance everytime to get this MVP credentials :

1. Mahesh Mitkari [PUG Manager, MVP]

2. Dhaval Faria [MVP]

3. Sarang Datye [Consultant, Microsoft India.]

4. Mayur Tendulkar [Tech.Intern,MSP Lead,Microsoft India.]

and thanks to all my friends and people who always given me encouragement for my all activities.

Vikram.