Windows Apportals – Developers Training Course Edition 1.0 (Pilot) Disclaimer: TEKsystems obtained written permission from Inviso to use the following copyrighted materials: _____________________ Trademark Inviso or TEKsystems. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by an means—electronic, mechanical,, photocopying, recording, or otherwise—without the prior written permission of Inviso or TEKsystems Windows Apportal – Developer Training | 1 Table of Contents Table of Contents ............................................................................................................................ 2 About the Course ............................................................................................................................ 3 Audience ..................................................................................................................................... 3 Chapter One: Introduction to the Windows Apportal .................................................................... 4 What is a Windows Apportal? ........................................................................................................ 4 Windows 8.1 Application ............................................................................................................ 4 Why Windows Apportals? .......................................................................................................... 5 Portal Content Structure ............................................................................................................. 5 Windows Apportals in the Enterprise ......................................................................................... 5 Anatomy of an Apportal ............................................................................................................. 6 Hubs, Groups, and Tiles ..................................................................................................... 7 Navigation ................................................................................................................................... 8 Report View Types ............................................................................................................... 9 Drill Up and Drill Down ............................................................................................................. 11 Other View Considerations ....................................................................................................... 13 Chapter Two: Building an Apportal ............................................................................................... 15 In This Chapter .......................................................................................................................... 15 Hub and Groups ........................................................................................................................ 16 Tiles and Tile Sets ...................................................................................................................... 23 Appendix A: Resource Files ........................................................................................................... 27 Appendix B: Global Filters ............................................................................................................. 28 Appendix C: Offline ....................................................................................................................... 31 Offline Challenges ..................................................................................................................... 31 Loading Data into Memory ....................................................................................................... 32 Downloading ............................................................................................................................. 33 Filters Persistence.................................................................................................................. 33 HTTPHandler ......................................................................................................................... 35 Windows Apportal – Developer Training | 2 About the Course Audience Commented [HC1]: 1) Introductions Whether you’re an established professional or new to the field, this training will give you 2) This is a Pilot. the guidance you need to develop a fully functional Windows Apportal. Built on top of Windows 8.1, Windows Apportals organize and reveal data and apps needed for a 3) You are qualified, and a big part of making this successful – orient specific role or task. them to the resource files and feedback document. 4) Standard schedule and logistics discussion To get the most out of this course, it is highly recommended that you have a practical understanding of the following technologies: Familiarity with developing Windows 8.1 applications C# XAML for Windows 8.1 (or previous experience in any of the XAML-based frameworks) Using the MVVM Pattern in Windows 8.1 Familiarity with Visual Studio, WCF Data Services, and Active Directory is recommended A Microsoft Developer account is required for developing and publishing Windows 8.1 applications. Windows Apportal – Developer Training | 3 Chapter One: Introduction to the Windows Apportal What is a Windows Apportal? A Windows Apportal is a Windows 8.1 application that mimics the Windows 8.1 Start screen presentation of tiles (which are rectangles of various sizes) that display information (such as icons, images, or data) and perform an action when clicked or tapped. Built on Microsoft technologies, third-party tools, and code that aggregate data from diverse sources, an Apportal is a tailored application that runs in Windows 8.1 (that is the ”app” portion of the name). The concept of specific control of presented data is very similar to that of an Intranet Portal (that is the “portal” portion of the name). Windows 8.1 Application An Apportal interface looks and feels very much like the Windows 8.1 Start screen, which is exactly the point—the hub screen of an Apportal is a single application presenting its data in the familiar groups and tiles of Windows 8.1. Similarities to Windows 8.1 Start screen and tile behaviors include the following: 1. Apportal tiles can display hierarchical data in a navigable dashboard. 2. Tiles can launch native Windows applications like Outlook, Notepad, and Control Panel. 3. Tiles can open URI targets using a browser (e.g., Dynamics CRM Online). 4. Rotating data points can be displayed on the tile, or the tile can display a picture or another media file. The Apportal tiles also have behaviors that are different than those in the Windows 8.1 Start screen: 1. Tiles in the Apportal are not user-configurable in any way (such as size, position, style, or data displayed). The size and position of a tile within an Apportal is created by the code. Users cannot add or remove tiles. 2. The size of Apportal tiles are static, and will not change based on the screen resolution or window size. For this training class, the examples show a grid size that is optimized to fit well on most monitors, and will not adjust dynamically. One of the goals of ongoing development is greater flexibility of tile sizing, placement, and user adjustment. A. The distance between groups is 80 pixels (MSFT standard). B. The distance between tiles is 5 pixels (MSFT standard). C. 3x2 rows/columns of tiles within groups are based on the MEDIUM Windows 8.1 tile size. Windows Apportal – Developer Training | 4 D. 6x4 rows/columns of tiles within groups are based on the SMALL Windows 8.1 tile size. Why Windows Apportals? Windows Apportals address a long-missed insight in professional organizations: businesses use software from many vendors. Windows Apportals were built in response to numerous requests to create an “on the glass” integration for the wide variety of heterogeneous LOB apps in organizations today. Those applications include legacy Windows 7 desktop applications, newer Windows 8 Modern apps, and web applications. Enterprise IT professionals began realizing the variety of apps, applications, and services in an organization require a loosely coupled structure. In today’s diverse work environments, a single, monolithic application is not realistic or desired. Windows 8.1 OS gives businesses the flexibility to create a UI-based virtual integration, and continue to gain value from existing legacy technology investments. Windows Apportals are the solution to this need. Portal Content Structure As companies compile financial, sales, product, and other types of data, that data needs organization, structure, and logical presentation in order to be useful. Familiar presentation methods include Intranet portals, application dashboards (Excel, Salesforce, Dynamics CRM, etc.), and printed reports. An Apportal provides a dashboard-like set of behaviors with a Windows 8.1 Start screen look-and-feel. The heart of an Apportal is the presentation of hierarchical data from a data set, arranged beginning with a single tile at the top level. As this tile is clicked or tapped, lower layers in the branch show the graph, grid, or list view details further down. The presentation of these branches of the data set is done through tile sets. Data Sets In an Apportal, a data set contains the data needed to support one or more tile sets, and, typically, resides in a database. Tile sets can display the entire data set or subsets of the dataset determined by a query. These