BostonPocketPC

The next meeting of the Boston/New England Windows Phone User and Developer Groups will be held this Wednesday, May 16th, 2012 at the Microsoft offices in Waltham, MA beginning at 6:30pm EDT.

Among the items covered this month, we will talk about the latest on the Windows Phone devices front and upcoming events that will likely shed some light on the future of Windows Phone in TechEd and the Windows Phone Developer Summit.

I look forward to seeing everyone there!

Due to unforeseen circumstances, there will be NO BOSTON/NEW ENGLAND WINDOWS PHONE USER/DEVELOPER MEETING TOMORROW NIGHT (APRIL 18TH). We apologize for any inconvenience and will announce our next meeting ASAP.

Due to unforeseen circumstances, we will not be holding our scheduled Boston/New England Windows Phone User and Developer Group meeting this coming Wednesday, February 15th. We apologize for any inconvenience.

Stay tuned for an upcoming announcement regarding our scheduled March meeting (March 21st). Details are still “to come”, but the featured presentation will be developer-oriented. For a hint, think “Windows Phone” and “cross-platform futures”

The folks at Vonage have stepped to challenge the folks at Skype and Tango with a new Vonage Mobile app for iOS and Android that promises free app-to-app calls, free text messaging, and 30-percent cheaper VoIP than Skype. Also using the Vonage Mobile app you will save 70-percent less than “major mobile carriers” the company claims, with in-app payments via the Android Market and iTunes account.

Users can add calling credits in top-up increments of $4.99 and $9.99 and if your friends and family use Vonage VoIP accounts for their home or business line then you might not need to bother spending a dime. Calls to those numbers are also free and you don’t need to be a Vonage subscriber to use the new mobile app.Vonage users can view their existing credit and look up international rates in the app before making a call which this eliminates the need for credit cards, PIN entries and the need to leave the app when the user wants to make a call. Another cool feature is that your existing mobile number shows on Caller ID, so there is no need to create and share a new username, and friends and family can know who is calling.

Vonage Mobile doesn't limit calls to people with the app, or even to people who have a smartphone. You can call direct from Vonage Mobile to virtually any phone number on the planet. You can dial internationally without needing to activate special services with your mobile carrier. And most importantly, you can do this with the address book on your phone and your existing mobile number.

For more information on Vonage Mobile app, which works on the iPhone and Android smartphones along with the iPad and iPod touch and Android tablets, head here.

Note: for a limited time calls to any phone in the United States, Canada or Puerto Rico** from anywhere in the world will be FREE!!!

The next meeting of the Boston/New England Windows Phone User and Developer Groups will be held this Wednesday, January 18th starting at 6:30pm EST at the Microsoft offices in Waltham, MA.

Note: This month’s meeting will NOT have any developer-specific topics (although the topics presented will likely be of interest to all) -

• CES 2012 Wrap-Up
  The latest edition of the Consumer Electronics Show has just concluded. This year marks the last for a major Microsoft presence, and it had a strong Windows Phone “flair”. We will review all of the highlights from this event.
• 50,000 Apps and Counting – What’s In YOUR Device?
  The Windows Phone Marketplace has reached the 50,000 application plateau. In commemoration of this milestone, we will look at some of our favorite (and essential) applications. This is also YOUR chance to talk about and show some of your favorite applications as well, so come prepared!

I look forward to seeing everyone there!

It’s a special date and time and a different location, folks. Plus – it’s more a “meet up” than a “meeting”…

Once again, it’s the holiday season and, as such, the next gathering of the Boston/New England Windows Phone User and Developer Groups will follow our time-honored tradition of a social event rather than a more formal meeting. The meet up will happen on Wednesday, December 14th starting at 6:00pm. Additionally, we will NOT be meeting at the Microsoft offices in Waltham. Instead, we will be gathering at a location conducive to the season (good food and atmosphere). We will meet at Bison County Bar and Grill (275 Moody Street, Waltham, MA).

If you are curious, you can find out more about Bison County by checking out their web site.

This is an informal event. We’ll be hanging out, enjoying the food and company (and probably be talking tech, including Windows Phone of course). I look forward to seeing people there!

The next meeting of the Boston/New England Windows Phone User and Developer Groups will be held on Wednesday, November 16th starting at 6:30pm at the Microsoft offices in Waltham, MA (201 Jones Road, 6th Floor).

For our featured presentation this month, we will be focusing on developing Microsoft Push Notification Service (“MPNS”) applications.

If you are a Windows Phone developer, leveraging the Microsoft Push Notification Service, or “MPNS”, can add a great deal of additional functionality, including making your application tiles come to life with real-time information. Best of all – adding MPNS capabilities are not as difficult as you might think.

In this presentation, we will add MPNS functionality to an existing application in a step-by-step fashion, making sure that we employ the best practices for creating toast and tile notifications for a Windows Phone client application.

I look forward to seeing everyone there!

Thanks to everyone who attended my Code Camp 16 presentation this morning in Waltham, MA. As promised, here is the slide deck (in PDF form) of my presentation.

Also – for those who wanted the complete sample application used to demonstrate during this session, please visit the “Get to Windows Phone 7.5 #7: Using Push Notifications with Secondary Tiles and Deep Toast” tutorial on the App Hub web site.