Professional Windows Vista Gadgets Programming covers sidebar and sideshow gadget development each in their own part of the book. Part 1 will cover Sidebar gadgets while Part 2 covers SideShow gadgets. In each part, the book first explains the motivation behind each technology and its features.

Then, the reader is taken on a quick walkthrough of how to develop a simple gadget, using the traditional "Hello World" approach to quickly introduce the key concepts. After the quick walkthrough, subsequent chapters will then dive into each specific API that is relevant to enhancing the gadget.

Finally, when the reader has mastered all the important APIs, each part will end with a chapter covering two or more projects, detailing step-by-step how each is built.

Some of the specific topics covered include:

* Sidebar gadgets architecture and components including XML manifest
* Debugging gadgets in Visual Studio 2005
* Deploying gadgets
* The Gadget system APIs
* Localizing gadgets and sidebar security sidebar projects
* Sideshow devices, UI components, and SDK
* Sideshow architecture, managed code, and classes
* Sideshow simple content format (SCF)
* Interacting with sideshow devices and handling sideshow device events
* SideShow projects

From the Back Cover
Professional Windows Vista Gadgets Programming

As an easy-to-use application that provides information at a glance, a gadget basically takes the concept of portal dashboards and moves them to the more accessible Windows desktop where users can quickly and easily obtain weather information, RSS news feeds, and much more. In Windows Vista, there are two types of gadgets—Sidebar and SideShow gadgets. Sidebar gadgets are mini applications hosted in the Sidebar pane located on the Windows desktop, and SideShow gadgets are applications that send information to SideShow-enabled devices, such as an external LCD display, or even a remote control. With this hands-on guide, you'll discover the simplicity of developing Vista Sidebar and SideShow gadgets that can run onthe Windows desktop as well as send information to SideShow-enabled devices.

This book contains two parts. The first covers Sidebar gadgets and the second part covers SideShow gadgets. In each part, Microsoft MVP author Wei-Meng Lee begins by walking you through the development of a simple gadget, introducing you to the key concepts in the process. Each chapter breaks down the specific APIs that are relevant to enhancing a gadget, and helpful code samples throughout every chapter detail the step-by-step progression of how a gadget is built. By the end of the book, you will beconfidently programming Vista gadgets.

What you will learn from this book

* Components of a Sidebar gadget
* Detailed description and code samples for using the Sidebar APIs
* Tips on using .NET Interop to enhance Sidebar gadgets
* How to Interface Sidebar gadgets with SideShow-enabled devices
* Tips on localizing Sidebar gadgets
* How to debug Sidebar gadgets
* Details of a Sidebar gadget project
* SideShow architecture
* How to use the SideShow managed class for .NET development
* Tips on understanding the Simple Content Format (SCF) content format for sending SideShow data
* Interacting with SideShow-enabled devices
* Step by step instruction on how to develop a SideShow gadget project