I want to create an app (for Windows runtime), that will get data about user preferences, history of downloaded apps and so on. I want to gather that data and analise it to create some kind of App Advisor.
So: Can I get data like installed apps or something of that sort?
Not that I know of from a Windows Store app. You can get some of it through Windows.Management.Deployment APIs, but those are restricted to full-trust processes and thus have to be used from a desktop/Win32 application.
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I couldn't find the exact answer I was looking for. I have two applications - web application built with react and desktop application built in C# Forms. What I want is if the user goes to a certain page in the Web Application, the browser should open (with or without a request) the windows application and send data, like the user's id. Could you guys give me an advice how this can be done?
For that, when installing your windows C# form in the user machine, you need to register a custom protocol in the registery.
See How do I register a custom URL protocol in Windows?
I have multiple windows store apps of a company and all of them have signing in option. What I am trying to do is create a mutual login system for all of my apps. In simple words, If user log into one app then he automatically signed in other apps.
I am using sqlite locally to maintain user's session data. So, I tried to access the one App sqlite file from other app by giving a static path to its installed location. But it won't open the sqlite file.
Can I put this sqlite file in any folder where other apps can access it too?
Is there any common folder/storage space in windows store app where other apps will be able to access this sqlite file?
Any help would be really appreciated, Thanks in Advance!
Although it doesn't help right now, Windows 10 does have a solution for apps from the same publisher sharing data. You can use ApplicationData.GetPublisherCacheFolder(folderName) to get access to one or more folders that you share amongst your apps.
As far as I know there is no common storage between apps. The best you can do is to store the sqlite file somewhere locally (let the user choose) and then hold permission to access that file in the MostRecentlyUsedList
This will allow your app to access it at any time. However, the user will have to manually open the file at least once with each app that needs to use the login.
The only way I can think of to do what you're trying to do without user interaction would be to write your own server backend and use the IP address / user agent string and other variables to uniquely identify a device. When the device logs in then all other requests from that device would be considered "logged in" until the user logs out from one of them.
This would be very insecure and I would not recommend it. Anyone could impersonate the user if they knew enough about the device they were using, and were behind the same router.
I have some user data in my Winstore C# app. I just learnt that local store and app data are being erased after new version of the app is installed (or user reinstalled the app).
How to permanently store the data? Can it be done transparently for the user?
What about enterprise class of apps - how do you guys access more robust data like databases?
Removing all local data when an app is uninstalled is the expected pattern for Windows Store apps.
If you want to store data permanently, my recommendation is that you consider building a back-end data store and services to access them. Then you control the server-side data, and can associate the data with the users when they install your app (note that if you plan to store data and not delete it when the user uninstalls the app, you should probably call that out in your app's privacy policy).
There are several good options in terms of building back-end services, and I explore several of them in a blog series I'm currently working on:
http://bitly.com/bundles/devhammer/2
The series covers building a back-end game leaderboard service which stores data in a SQL Database on Windows Azure (though the concepts are applicable to services you host yourself as well), using one of 3 stacks:
WCF Data Services
ASP.NET Web API
Windows Azure Mobile Services
Any of those three stacks will allow you to create a robust back-end for your apps, and can be leveraged across platforms.
With respect to transparency, you can definitely make the above services functionally transparent to the user, but as noted above, it's a good idea to also be transparent about the fact that you plan to continue to store data after the app is uninstalled, and perhaps even give the user options for deleting their data. Pete Brown recently posted a good overview of traits of a good Windows Store app privacy policy, and addresses this a bit in the post:
http://10rem.net/blog/2013/01/21/traits-of-a-good-windows-store-app-privacy-policy
For more info on Windows Store app development, register for Generation App.
You can use something like Skydrive or Dropbox to store the files.
EDIT*
There is no database access support in WinRT. While you can use something like SQLite to store data locally - it would be used mostly for caching and it would be expected that you persist the data somewhere in the cloud, so you should still upload the data you want stored somewhere outside of your machine.
If you want to store files on your machine that don't get deleted with your app - you can save them somewhere in the documents/pictures/music/videos libraries, depending on where they fit best.
I'm currently writing an application in C# (Windows 8 Windows Store App, .Net 4.5), what would highly rely on one thing I never worked before: user management.
The application to be done has to access a Windows-based server, and parse the login information with that server, then display functions, profile information, etc., based on that user data. Right now I'm stuck at the really beginning, I have no clue how to solve a global user for the whole application (pretty much like the XBox application, it would be nice to have a small user representation on the top right corner in every screen).
About the platform: we use Windows solution for user management in the whole network (there's a Microsoft ActiveDirectory server running), supplying the information for the Exchange and SharePoint servers. What I want to do is to authenticate the user with the AD server, pull the information (full name, role, access, other user data), then using these information, first display the user profile on the top right corner (the XBox Win8 app style), and load the accessible functions (this will be based on role and other domains of the user, e.g. groups).
If anyone knew a tutorial or solution what can get me closer solving this very part of the problem, it would be great!
There are specific libraries included in the .NET Framework for handling active directory requests. Take a look here:
Generic Authentication Call to Active Directory in C#
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/316748
I'm building an app that receives data about events (meetings etc.), and my task is to give the user the possibility for adding them (or some of them) to his device calendar.
Since there is no way in the windows phone API for write access to the user's calendar, how would you guys solve such a problem? Is there any recommended way to offer a file, data set or whatever to the user which he can store/add easily?
You could create a web service that outputs iCalendar (.ics) files and open them on your phone in a collapsed WebBrowser - that could work.