Mark Arteaga

I’ve been getting a few emails/questions on ‘Leveraging Existing .NET Code’ section of my Platform In Your Pocket session for TechDays so just wanted to share what I’ve been sharing with those emails.

First all credits go to Daniel Moth for his Sharing Assets between Windows Mobile and Windows Desktop he did back in 2006.  Daniel now works for the Parallel Computing Platform so be sure to check out his blog for tips and check out his PDC session here.

I only spent about 15mins on leveraging existing code and is only a small fraction of what Daniel covered in his session.  I always reference his blog posts when responding to emails so I’ll do the same here. His most recent post is on Sharing Assets Between the .NET Compact Framework and the .NET Framework has all relevant links.  There is an article in MSDN Magazine article which also goes through the concepts.

If you are a .NET developer looking at writing a Windows Mobile application make sure you leverage your existing code so you can get your product to your customers faster.

Good Luck and if you have more questions feel free to contact me!

I’ve been consulting for Windows Mobile projects for quite a few years now and know most of the techniques to optimize custom Windows Mobile software.  During my 'Platform in Your Pocket' session for TechDays Canada, I went through some optimizations tips and tricks such as using StringBuilder as opposed to string or List<T> opposed to ArrayList things that you take for granted when developing on the desktop using the .NET Framework.  On Windows Mobile it's more important because you are 'memory constrained' and can't just 'throw more RAM or CPU' in a device to make your application perform better. 

During the session I didn’t have time to cover everything to optimize your code and a common question was ‘what else can I do to optimize my code’.  Here is a page on MSDN that lists a few ways to improve the performance of you Windows Mobile app using .NET Compact Framework which should help when you are developing your software.

Two weeks ago in Vancouver marked the last city in a six city cross Canada developer tour.  I had the pleasure of travelling with the Canadian MSDN team across Canada since October delivering my sessions on developing for Windows Mobile under the Windows Forms track.

Overall I think it was pretty successful and after the sessions got some great feedback from attendees such as:

• “I wish I saw your session before I developed for Windows Mobile”
• “I’ve developed an application and you have really helped fill in some of the gaps that I was missing”
• “I never developed for Windows Mobile but you inspired me to try it out once I get home!”

There is also a nice write up on TechVibes.com by Warren Frey on my Platform in Your Pocket:Windows Mobile for Windows Developers. 

I have a few draft follow up posts on the sessions coming soon but if you need to get in contact with me email me at info [@] markarteaga.com 

Thanks to everyone coming out to the sessions and if you have any feedback on TechDays or have ideas for next time (like an entire track dedicated to Windows Mobile development :) ) make sure to let me or John Bristow (Windows Forms track lead) know!