Create a draggable windowless WPF in Expression blend

1. Open expression blend and design your WPF
2. Follow this tutorial to create a windowless WPF with a close button:
   http://expression.microsoft.com/en-us/cc188959.aspx
3. Follow this tutorial to create a windowless WPF with a minimize button
   http://blogs.msdn.com/danteg/archive/2008/01/16/getting-the-vista-minimize-with-windowless-applications.aspx
4. Then to make your windowless WPF draggable type this into your XAML:

Designer and coder or Designers and coders?

I am at a web development company that splits up the work flow thus: Illustrators, Designers, Front End coders, Developers, Producers, Beggar man and Thief. I am contracting as a Front End coder. I spend my days coding XHTML, CSS and a little JavaScript. I miss being involved with the design aspect of developing a web site but have little to complain about as the position was clearly advertised for what it was when I applied.

The power of taking notes

I advise to always take a notebook and pen into meetings and take notes. It helps to keep focused and the ink will not fade unlike memory. The notes can be a great tool to help review the meetings content and as a reference should you become unsure of anything. Taking notes also helps to maintain an efficient work flow as you will not have to interrupt other peoples work with questions about what was agreed in a meeting that you attended.

Hashtags on twitter

Twitter is a free social messaging and micro-blogging utility. It allows users to send and read other users updates know as tweets. Tweets can be about anything from what chocolate bar you are eating at that moment to the latest breaking news. Tweets are being used for many things from conferences attendees commenting on what is being said to celebrities updating their fans about what they are thinking and doing. Ashton Kutcher twittered whilst at the Oscars letting his fans know his thoughts on the big event.

A challenge to do better inspired by Stefan Sagmeister

I was in The Museum of Modern Art New York looking at a design exhibition when I came across a couple of posters that slapped me in the face, yanking me out of my torpid day dream. They were by a designer called Stefan Sagmeister. The first, called Fresh Dialogue was designed to advertise a debate taking place as part of an AIGA lecture series in1996. Sagmeister bought two tongues from a local market which he then photographed and set against a white background with the information hand written in black text. The wet red fleshy tongues both revolt and intrigue drawing you in to see what the poster is all about, challenging the view to look and investigate further. The second poster was produced to advertise another AIGA lecture Sagmeister was giving. The text is scratched in bloody cuts into a his torose. Blood beads up on the cross bar of a T and it is hard not to think of the pain that he must have endured and wonder if he was left physically scared. It is a committed piece, violent and a little scary made all the more powerful by the brutality of it’s execution.

Listening saves time, understanding saves more.

I was asked to attend the second meeting with a client and perhaps this fact alone should have rang alarm bells. This first requirements capture meeting had taken place without me as it was overseas and was going to be more concerned with thrashing out the contract than the design of the site. In hindsight I realise that it was here that I made my first mistake and it was a basic, school boy error. I did not provide the attendees of the meeting with a list of basic questions to ask. Better still I could have emailed the questions directly to the client and got the answers straight from the horses mouth.

The pencil is more timely than the PC

For churning through many different ideas quickly use a pencil and paper. It is a quick and direct route to getting ideas out of your mind and into the world where they can be scrutinised.

Why?

I have been designing and building Web sites for a little over ten years with varying degrees of success. I have been learning the whole time and will continue to do so for as long as I am alive. I have acquired skills in new technologies and methodologies as well as learning from more traditional practices and techniques. I have borrowed heavily and stood on the shoulders of giants in an attempt to achieve my goals. I have learnt from books, tutorials, managers, colleagues and teachers who were all generous enough to share there thoughts with me and now I would like to give something back to the web design community by sharing my thoughts and experiences in the hope that there may be something in them that will be of use to others.