Updated: October, 2011 — If you're ready to expand your developer skills to mobile and wireless applications, then this learning guide is for you. It's chock full of articles, tutorials, tools, sample code and much more. Browse the resources below to help transfer your existing skills beyond the desktop.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
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- Mobile and Wireless Articles
- Tutorials and Learning Aids
- Essential Downloads and Tools
- Other Mobile Developer Resources
Quickstart
If you feel like you're ready to dive right into developing mobile apps on the Windows
platform, take a look at the following guides. Most of these resources come directly from Microsoft
and are a great place to get started with actual mobile development projects. If you'd like some
more information about mobile application development and about using Windows mobile development
tools, please see the sections below.
- Tutorial: Hello World with Windows Phone 7 (Microsoft)
- Tutorials: More quickstart guides for Windows Phone 7(Microsoft)
- Overview: Learn Windows Mobile (Microsoft)
- Article: What's New for Developers in Windows Mobile 6 (Microsoft)
- Guide: Free 61-page guide introduces Windows Mobile 6 (windowsfordevices.com)
- Guide: Windows Mobile Programming for Symbian OS Developers (Microsoft)
- Guide: Windows Mobile Programming for Palm OS Developers (Microsoft)
- Article: Mobile/PocketPC Development Jump Start (developer.com)
Mobile and Wireless News and Information
These articles are hand-picked to give you a sense of the state of Windows mobile application
development and help you gain the insight you need to make decisions about mobile development
with Windows tools. Check these out if you're still evaluating mobile application development
platforms. Skip to the next section for in-depth tips and tutorials to better utilize Windows
development tools.
- Article: Microsoft starts roll-out of Mango update for Windows Phone 7 (ComputerWeekly.com)
- Article: Microsoft and Nokia launch toolkit for porting Symbian apps to Windows Phone (ComputerWeekly.com)
- Article: Microsoft ships Windows Phone Mango and prepares handset updates (ComputerWeekly.com)
- Article: Microsoft offers webOS developers free tools and phone to migrate to Windows Phone 7 (ComputerWeekly.com)
- Article: Microsoft promises 'biggest launch of the year' for Windows Phone 7 (ComputerWeekly.com)
- Article: Mobile app dev trends: Making life easier for developers (SearchSOA.com)
- Article: Rating Windows 7 mobile device encryption (SearchSecurity.com)
- Article: Comparing Windows Mobile 5.0 and Windows Mobile 6 (Jim Wilson)
- Article: What's New in Visual Studio 2005 for Native Developers (Microsoft)
- Article: Device Debugging and Emulation in Visual Studio 2005 (Microsoft)
- Webcast: Smart Clients and N-tier design (Microsoft)
Tutorials and Learning Aids
This section brings you a wealth of practical mobile development
knowledge, from broad overviews of developing for the mobile space to nitty-gritty,
step-by-step guides specific tasks common to the Windows Mobile developer. Check these out if you
or your team are developing mobile apps for the Windows platform. Also, if you're new to Windows
mobile development, you might want to jump down to the next page for links to some of the key tools
for mobile development with Windows.
- Guide: Mobile development resource guide (SearchSOA.com)
- Article: Mobile application interfaces: Three tips for meeting user demands (SearchSOA.com)
- Article: Security tools that can boost Windows mobile security (SearchSecurity.com)
- Article: Using Visual Studio 2005 to Design User Interfaces and Data for Device Applications (Microsoft)
- Article: Getting Started with Visual Studio .NET and the Microsoft .NET Compact Framework (Microsoft)
- Article: Building Mobile Web Apps with .NET Mobile Web SDK & ASP.NET (Wireless Developer)
- Step by Step: New Native Windows Mobile Development Features in Visual Studio 2005. (Microsoft)
- Step by Step: Building a .NET Compact Framework Application for a Windows Mobile-based Device Using Visual Studio 2005. (Microsoft)
- Step by Step: Step by Step: Introduction to the New Windows Mobile Managed APIs (Microsoft)
- Step by Step: Step by Step: Developing Multithreaded Applications with the .NET Compact Framework 2.0 (Microsoft)
- Step by Step: Step by Step: Incorporating COM Objects into Your .NET Compact Framework 2.0 Application (Microsoft)
- Step by Step: Step by Step: Developing a SQL Mobile Application with Visual Studio 2005 and SQL Server 2005 (Microsoft)
- Step by Step: Step by Step: Program Microsoft SQL Server CE 2.0 Merge Replication Using .NET Compact Framework (Microsoft)
- Step by Step: Step by Step: Developing Orientation-Aware and Resolution-Aware Windows Mobile-based Applications in Native Code (Microsoft)
- Book Excerpt: Programming Visual Basic for the Palm OS (O'Reilly)
- Video: Windows Mobile 6.0 (Channel 9)
- Webcast: What's New in Visual Studio 2005 for Devices (Microsoft)
- Webcast: My First Mobile Application with Visual Studio 2005. (Microsoft)
Essential Downloads and Tools
Here are the tools of the trade for Windows mobile application developers. These are the
current tools from Windows. Top of the list, of course, is the Windows Phone software developer's
kit (SDK), but there are also other tools that can give you a boost with specific aspects of the
mobile development process. Some of them are focused on specific types of mobile apps, like games
for phones, and some are just examples of rock solid mobile code to work from.
- SDK: WMPStatusPlugin (Today Screen Plug-in) (Microsoft)
- Starter Kit: DexMobile (Game) (Microsoft)
- Starter Kit: Tabbed Web Browser (Application) (Microsoft)
- Download: Windows Mobile tools and downloads (Microsoft)
- Resources: Windows Formsand WPF tools (WindowsClient.NET)
- Resources: .NET CF Code Snippets (Devbuzz.com)
- Resources: The Code Project (Code Project)
- Resources: .NET Sample Page (Mike Woodring)
- Resources:ASP Store Locator Sample for MapPoint Web Service (Microsoft)
- Web site: Mobile Developer Center
- Web site: DotNetBips.com
- Internet Audio Talk Show: .NET Rocks!
- Web site: Smartphone Developer Network
- Web site: ASP.NET
- Web site: Mobidogs.com
- Web site: OpenNETCF.org
- Web site: Pocket PC Developer Network Web site: Dr.Dobb's
CLICK HERE FOR MORE LEARNING GUIDES
This was first published in August 2005