My way from FoxPro to Silverlight

• General things
  • Why Silverlight? (Non-Darvin evolution.)
    • Paleogene. Personal computers
    • Neogene. Local networks and GDI.
    • Quaternary. Public networks and markup languages.
    • Our Era. Local and public networks merge. Markup+Code.
      • NET applications.
      • Click-once applications.
      • SilverLight applications
  • In honor to FoxPro
  • To wait? Or not to wait? It's a question!
  • This book...
• Lowest-level Silverlight dissection as "My bills" example rewriting from VFP to Silverlight.
  • Creating "My bills" example in Visual FoxPro

    	Data structure
    	Creating directories
    	Creating project
    	Creating base classes library
    	Creating MyClasses library
    	Creating MyApplication and MyBillsApp classes Creating Init method Creating Login method Creating DataConnect method OS Security and directories Creating procedure file and data access functions Creating DataCheck method Creating Fox_Environment_Save and FoxEnvironment_Restore methods Creating SetMyEnvironment method Creating system menu Creating CleanUp method
    	Creating main program file
    	Creating MyFlat class to working with flat tables Creating InitObject method Creating Select method Creating SetGridSource method Creating means to modify data in tables Creating MyScrollBar class Creating MyScrollContainer class Creating MyEdit_Control and child classes for various data types Creating MyEditContainer class Creating MyEditModal form Creating New method of MyFlat class Creating Edit method of MyFlat class Creating MyFlatModal and MyFlatModeless forms Calling MyFlatModeless form from system menu to create and edit flat tables
    	Creating MyQuery class to working with reference-books. Creating MyFilterContainer class and set of MyFilter_Control classes to represent fields Creating MyQuery class Creating MyQueryModal and MyQueryModeless forms Calling MyQueryModeless form to edit MYBILLS_Services and MYBILLS_Clients
    	Creating means to work with bills Creating set of controls for document. Creating MyDocument class Creating MyBill class Creating MyDoc_Form class and MyBills form

  • Creating "My bills" example in Silverlight.

    Creating solution Creating client-projects (Silverlight) and interface (without data access) Creating MyBills blank main project and solution Creating MyClassesSL blank project Creating MyBaseClassesSL project and base classes Code file structure, Namespaces, Assemblies and class definitions in C# Class members and code syntax in Visual C# Constructors Creating MyButtons classes #region ... #endregion constructions and outlining Content-controls and controls with children-collection "new" initialization if ... else construction in C# Arranging controls using Grid class and Margin, HozizontalAlignment, VerticalAlignment properties Using methods as operators (operator overload) Referencing pictures and other resources included into projects Creating project references inside solution Creating images and adding into projects Application class XAML code extracting Events and handling in C# New operations in C# Using delegates to create user-events Main Page developing XAML syntax base Object instances as tags in XAML Referencing namespaces in XAML TreeView class in Silverlight Creating Silverlight MyClasses blanks (without data access) Adding namespaces and references Creating MyChildWindow class Coloring, Colors and Brushes ARGB color format, Color class and Colors structure Brushes Colors in XAML Creating MyFlat class blank Creating MyScrollContainer, MyEditContainer and MyFilterContainer classes blanks Using SctollViewer class to create objects with scrolling Virtual methods and overriding in C# Creating MyQuery class blank Creating MyDocument class blank Creating MyBillsClasses blanks (without data access) Creating MyBillDoc class blank DatePicker control MainPage TreeView navigation creating Navigation in Children-collection to move controls before others Updating TreeViewItems Select event handlers Solution first building and launch Creating service-projects (WCF and ADO.NET) to working with data in SQL Server Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) Creating MyDataAccess project to implement common data access classes using ADO.NET Creating MyData class Connecting to datasource SqlConnection class in ADO.NET Connection string syntax in ADO.NET to connect to SQL Server database Security improving with System.Security.Cryptography namespace Creating MyCrypt project (WPF application) Calling system dialogs (Save file, Open file, ...) in WPF application (not Silverlight) instead of GetFile() and PutFile() VFP functions Accessing to files in service directory on site from service inside C# method overloading instead of implicit parameters in FoxPro MyData constructors MyData.Select method "using" statement , IDisposable and unmanaged resources "interface"s in C# SqlCommand class in ADO.NET SqlDataAdapter class in ADO.NET DataTable class in ADO.NET MyData.Update methods Passing parameters for SQL statement (like ? in ODBC) MyData.InsertId method Full MyData class code Creating MyDataService project to implement WCF service and common data access contracts Creating data contracts Creating operation contracts Creating service class Using DataSet class to create XML document try ... catch and error handling GetData operation contract Select operation contract Update operation contract Insert operation contract GatherFlat operation contract InsertFlat operation contract Full code of service class Security notes Building service notes Updating client-projects (Silverlight) to working with data using WCF client Generating WCF client Synchronous and asynchronous WCF client operations Client data types. Passing collections as arrays. WCF client members and other definitions in client code file Creating MyDataSet class WCF client instance as MyDataSet.Client property XDocument class as local in-memory data storage and analog of DataSession in VFP XElement class IEnumerable<XElement> collection. VFP cursors representation. Selecting IEnumerable<XElement> collections using methods. Selecting IEnumerable<XElement> collections using LINQ Scanning IEnumerable<XElement> collection using foreach statement. Accessing to elements of IEnumerable<XElement> using element indexes XDocuments as MyDataSet properties Creating user events to uniform handling of asynchronous executing of all operation contracts MyDataSet constructor and main methods to access data Handling GetData operation contract "completed" event Handling Select operation contract "completed" event Handling Update operation contract "completed" event Handling Insert operation contract "completed" event Handling GatherFlat operation contract "completed" event Handling InsertFlat operation contract "completed" event Binding DataGrid to data Binding DataGrid to data from flat tables ObservableCollection<T> type, INotifyPropertyChanged interface and automatic data refreshing on changing Selective mapping columns and column layout changing (DataGrid.AutoGeneratingColumn event) Binding DataGrid to data with free structure (move of the knight / hat trick ) Creating IMyCursorRow interface Creating MyCursorRow* classes set Creating MyCursorColumn class Creating MyCursor class Reading data structure from XDocument arrived from service. Creating XName using element name and namespace. Creating MyLinkToFlat control to edit links in MyEditContainer and MyFilterContainer Data dictionary fragment with links MyLinkToFlat properties MyLinkToFlat constructors Passing parameters by reference in C# MyLinkToFlat events handling Creating MyTextBoxMasked class to control input using mask like in VFP Creating MyClientData class to help providing operations with SQL Server data Creating MyEdit* controls to represent fields in MyEditContainer Creating MyScrollContainerControl class Creating MyEditControl class Creating MyEditTextBox class Creating MyEditText class Creating MyEditLinkToFlat class Creating MyEditCheckBox class Creating MyEditDateTime class Creating MyFilter* controls to represent fields in MyFilterContainer Creating IMyFilterControl interface and MyFilterControl class Creating MyFilterTextBox class Creating MyFilterText class Creating MyFilterLinkToFlat class Creating MyFilterCheckBox class Creating MyFilterDateTime class Updating MyScrollContainer, MyEditContainer and MyFilterContainer classes Updating MyScrollContainer class Updating MyEditContainer class Updating MyFilterContainer class Creating MyEdit class Updating MyFlat class Updating MyQuery class Updating MyBillDoc class Creating MyDocumentTextBox class Creating MyDocumentLinkToFlat class Creating MyDocumentDateTime class Creating MyDocumentCheckBox class Creating MyDocumentButton class Creating MyDocument class Updating MyBillDoc class exactly Updating MainPage class Creating authentication dialog Updating MainPage code Building and debugging solution Cross-domain access policy Debugging WCF service Running application Deploying application Web.config attributes check Publishing service Change service reference from WCF-client Silverlight application (client-part of solution) deploying

• Sources:
  • VFP example: http://www.dataodyssey.com/downloads/MyBillsVfp.zip
  • Silverlight example:
    • Stage1: http://www.dataodyssey.com/downloads/MyBillsSL_Stage1.zip
    • Stage2: http://www.dataodyssey.com/downloads/MyBillsSL_Stage2.zip

(c) Endrey Evsikov  2010     www.dataodyssey.com