Programming with Ink

I've only recently started programming applications that have a GUI. I've spent most of my time working on the web. However, I have had a recent obsession with programing with Ink on Tablet PC's. It is only logical, I'm already a Tablet PC nut.

At first I found it difficult to get started. I am running Vista Ultimate with Visual Studio 2008 so I expected it to work without any problems. Well, apparently I should have read the fine print when I stumbled across some Digital Ink Sample Programs on Microsoft's website. I have been able to compile these are make some small modifications to them to start to learn about the ink support. Baby steps... compiling examples is a good start.

I have also run across Stefan Wick's Weblog - Development with Silverlight, WPF and Tablet PC. There are a number of very useful code samples posted on his blog that I will definitely be playing with soon. This also raised my interested in programming for the Ink on a Tablet with Silverlight.

While I haven't made much progress making any programs of my own, I have learned that I will be needing to study up on XAML. I realized it was used in making the interface for many Windows applications, but I didn't realize how extensively it was used when dealing with Ink. Basically, you can have an inking application with only XAML code and no actual C# written.

I'm not sure what direction I'm going to take with this new obsession, but the rate at which I've been making progress is exciting. However, I should probably get back to the homework I've been ignoring.