Mint

So, I took a short break from Mint to learn some WPF. I find it to be a bit harder than Windows Forms, but I think it is for the better. The XML based syntax makes it easier for screen readers and (I hope) improved accessibility. You should check out the System.Windows.Automation namespace. It seems to hold all the tools for both unit testing your application and letting screen readers understand a Windows GUI. Now we have the tools, lets find a way to use them.

I will dig deep into that another time, and most probably do a talk about  it, but I’m going to leave it for now. Instead I will present my first WPF project ever, Twitty. I made this program both for learning WPF and to solve a specific problem of mine.

I like this idea about micro blogging, but I’ve never gotten around to get serious. Sure I have a Twitter account and a Facebook account, but the micro blogging in these have one flaw. It is tedious to actually update your status. First you have to have a web browser, and next you need to login to a site. You need to find the tool for micro blogging and then you can actually update your status.

So, I tried various windows tools like TwitBox and Twitteroo but they weren’t simplistic enough. When I want to update my status, I don’t want to start a fully featured IM client. I don’t want to see other peoples statuses. I just want to write what I feel, or what I’m doing and be done with it. That is why I wrote Twitty.

Twitty screenshot - bokmal likes pie

With Twitty running in the background you just press CTRL+SHIFT+SPACE and the Twitty input window will be brought to front. You write your new status and when you press ENTER, your status will be sent to Twitter and Twitty will vanish so you can continue with what you were doing.

My Facebook status is synced with Twitter and the status here on my blog is also updated. So with a few simple key strokes I can update them all, and the whole world will know what I’m doing. Isn’t that practical?

Go here to download the latest version of Twitty or to get the source.