as text comes off as a crappy way to communicate, my question isn't as forceful as it seems, but, why hasn't microsoft come up with a way to give us a "what you see is what you get" designer for media center? see, compared to wpf, media center has been around longer, and they already are in their third edition of expression blend. why isn't there a version that ties into media center, or a stand alone UI designer? maybe a UI plugin for visual studio?
i, for one, am a noob. i know this, and readily admit it. and right at this moment, i'm crawling into my flame suit from the impending flame war...
in expression blend i can quickly and easily create animations, applications, etc, without coding one single line of wpf. i know some of you purists are thinking that's not a good way to program, but it gets the job done. i've just started to teach myself how to program (i'm 31, VERY late in the game compared to some), and...i can hear the purists footsteps behind me...quite frankly, i don't have time to learn another language, between kids, work (obviously not related to computers), balancing time with your wife so she doesn't feel like you've left her for your computer...
and i know some of you are thinking,"well, maybe programming isn't for you", but i think that with a UI kit for something would ease the pain of learning mcml, because you can see how things are implimented easily.
so, how bout it, charlie, have you guys looked into it? i guess i can't speak for everyone else, but i have at least 10 good ideas for media center, but between trying to learn c#, c++, objective c, a UI kit would SIGNIFICANTLY streamline development for me.
personally, i love media center and the way the extenders handle it. with the beta of the new version, media center's damn near perfect (i wish i could add things to the stock MC components, ie. Zone controls to a multi zone music system in the Music tab). i think the "resume" function to the Videos system is a long needed change. i recently converted to the ati cablecard system in my house, ripped all my music and dvds, and i couldn't feel happier with my current setup. i'd like to add more lifestyle apps into MC, and like i said before, a UI kit would streamline things unbelievably for me.
again, i'm not trying to set a tone of picking a fight with anyone here, but i'm asking why this hasn't been implemented? is it because wpf apps can run on all versions of vista and media center is limited to 2 versions? is it becasue media center has a smaller percentage of users? is it because windows is targeting more of a business market than an entertainment market? is it because the people who learn mcml come up with higher quality apps? guys, am i alone in feeling this way?
mcml nub