Categories
.NET Bluetooth Windows

Buffered Streams and the Courtesy Flush

One of the challenges with 32feet.NET is to try to provide as consistent an experience as possible on multiple platforms even though the underlying implementation varies wildly. One such case is with Bluetooth Classic and the stream used to read and write data over an RFCOMM connection. As it turns out each platform has its […]

Categories
Apps Windows

Improving the Thy Voice AAC Tool

A month on from its original release, I’ve made a number of significant changes to improve the usability of the app. Firstly the app is now a system-wide AAC tool, not just for phone calls but using local audio to conduct conversations in-person. Secondly, I’ve added the ability to select the voice you use with […]

Categories
.NET

DependencyService for all

I was recently looking at migrating some code from Xamarin Forms to Uno Platform and one of the big changes when moving from Xamarin Forms to .NET 6 and later is a move towards using Microsoft.Extensions.DependencyInjection on all flavours of .NET. The key difference between this approach and DependencyService is that you have one shot […]

Categories
.NET Bluetooth

Reinventing the Wheel Again – Bluetooth on Linux

Sometimes it takes a while to realise that an API is lying to you. When implementing Bluetooth Classic support for Linux on .NET 6.0 and above I came to this realisation after going directly to the native API. System.Net.Sockets has been available since the beginning of .NET. Traditionally this was a wrapper over the WinSock […]

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Awards

Insert Disc 20 and Press Button to Continue

I was very honoured to receive the MVP award in July, marking my 20th year. Today I was reminded again as I received the glass disc for this award year. It’s something small but means an awful lot when I add it to the stack and reflect on this milestone. We’ve seen a lot of […]

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Uncategorized

Going Underground

Last week I had the opportunity to go on a Hidden London tour of Charing Cross Underground Station.

Categories
Windows XAML

Styling WinUI Controls and Staying Fluent

In my current Thy Voice app for Windows 11, I wanted to keep the regular Fluent style for controls so that the UI was instantly familiar but I needed to make some changes to differentiate the stored phrases. These are represented by a collection of variable sized buttons, and designed to function like suggested replies […]

Categories
Apps Windows

Introducing Thy Voice

This week I’m launching a new app into the Microsoft Store. Following on from my experiences with enabling hands-free calling in Windows 10/11 for devices not supported by Microsoft’s own Phone Link app, I’ve been exploring this area further. I’d been interested in how the hands-free audio integrates into Windows and discovered how to utilise […]

Categories
.NET Windows

Titlebars and Themes: A WinUI Adventure

I’m working on a WinUI 3 app at the moment and I’ve been trying to match the in-box titlebar behaviour for Windows 11. Anyone who has experience with Windows will immediately respond “Which One?” as various apps within Windows look different due to “reasons”. My starting point is to match the Settings app, as this […]

Categories
.NET Bluetooth

Bluetooth Classic and Low Energy – Different Approaches

I often get asked about the different ways of using Bluetooth Classic and Bluetooth Low Energy with 32feet.NET. This post looks at the two different approaches and a bit of historical context. Separate Libraries The first key point here is that Bluetooth Classic and LE are handled by two different NuGet packages. 32feet.NET originated as […]