Rob has posted a description and a couple of work-arounds to a problem some folks are having w/ 100% CPU utilization after an Avalon project is compiled in Visual Studio 2005 beta 1 + the Nov. ’04 Avalon CTP + C#.

If his solution doesn’t work for you (it didn’t for me, but I think I have a weird build), under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\8.0\CSharp\Options\Editor, try setting the UpdateRegisterDesignViewOnIdle value to 0 instead of 1. I don’t know what this turns off, but it makes the problem go away. If you trust me, I’ve put together a reg file that sets this value for you here.

BTW, if you’re wondering what happens when you turn the UpdateRegisterDesignViewOnIdle option off, it’s the feature that notices if you take a random code file and add a System.Windows.Forms.Form as a base class so that when you open the file, it’s opened in the Windows Forms Designer by default. Without this flag, VS will never notice a new Form in a code file and they’ll be no way to edit the Form in the Windows Forms Designer (not even Open With [even though every other editor is in the list…]). If you add a new Form by choosing to Add->Windows Form to the project (as most folks do), all works as expected.

However, if you absolutely need to turn a code file into a file that will open in the Windows Forms Designer, you can close the project in VS, open it in notepad and change the following:

<Compile Include=”Foo.cs”>

or the following:

<Compile Include=”Foo.cs”>
    <SubType>Code</SubType>
</Compile>

to the following:

<Compile Include=”Foo.cs”>
    <SubType>Form</SubType>
</Compile>

Thanks to Cyrus Najmabadi and Izzy Gryko — hard-working MS employees answering my emails on New Year’s Eve even when they’re officially Out Of Office — for this tips!

Not only has Daniel Moth implemented the Windows Forms 2.0 BackgroundWorker component for the .NET Compact Framework, but he's also ported my pi calculation application to use this new implementation as an example of the savings in code that the BackgroundWorker component provides.

“Aurora is a graphical designer developed to create and edit Avalon Windows, elements, and controls. Aurora is built on top of Avalon and renders using the Avalon API. Aurora is designed for use with the November 2004 Avalon Technology Preview Community for Windows XP (CTP).”

Cool!

Karsten has some tips on converting a stand-alone Avalon application into an application that can be hosted in IE.

“The Adobe® Illustrator® SVG Edition of XAMLConverter is now available for free evaluation. The process is as simple is running XAMLConverter, dragging an SVG exported from Adobe® Illustrator® onto the application and the file is automatically converted to XAML. In addition, XAMLConverter runs the XAML file so you may view the results.

“This edition can convert SVG created by tools other than Adobe® Illustrator®. But SVG exported from Adobe® Illustrator® is the only fully supported subset of SVG.”

I said that animation in Avalon is simple. Ian said that it’s hard. We’re both right (I was talking about the programming model and Ian is talking about the nuts and bolts of the implementation), but Ian seems more right because of those fabulous example pictures that explain why wagon wheels look like they’re going backward. Now if he could only explain why computer screens in movies always look like they’ve been engineered to invoke seizures, we’d have something!

John Montgomery wants to know:

“[W]hen it comes to Avalon and Windows Forms interop, I’m curious: how many people will use it and what will they use it for? What are the scenarios that we’ll see? I have my own opinions, of course, but I’m curious about what you think. I’d like to be able to have a conversation with both teams about what scenarios we should optimize for.”

Don’t be shy! Let him know what it is you’re looking for from Avalon and Windows Form integration!

Kevin Schuler and Drew Robbins have compiled a list of dozens of the best VSTO blog entries in 2003 across seven categories ranging from architecture to troubleshooting. If you're into VSTO, this should provide some pleasant holiday reading for you. Enjoy!