If you don't already know the basics of .NET's Code Access Security model, you shouldn’t wait any longer. Not only is CAS key to No-Touch Deployment today, but it's key to ClickOnce deployment in Whidbey, which will also be a huge part of the Longhorn deployment story tomorrow (or maybe the day after tomorrow : ).

Kenny Lim posted an article about Visual Trees in Avalon that was down right inspirational. In fact, I spent all morning building a little app that will dump the <VisualTree> portion of a <Style> so that when you're customizing the visual tree of an existing control, you have some place from which to start. As soon as I figure out how to get property aliasing and data binding info at run-time, I'll post my app for real but the current version is available here for the adventurous.

If you care about Longhorn, start first with Whidbey. According to Scott Guthrie, the first Whidbey beta will be available in June.

[via Kent Sharkey]

Jason Nadal builds a useful smart client application in Longhorn for language translation. It’s a simple front-end to a web service, but it’s the first real custom app for Longhorn I’ve seen that doesn’t have to do with demonstrating or building for the platform.

Nathan Dunlap and Jonathan Russ work together as designer and coder to build splitting bars in Avalon:

“Boy was I happy when he got back to me with a really simple solution that I have found is really easy to reuse in a lot of scenarios. I love experiences that really show me that the designer/developer split is going to be really graceful. It’s pretty cool when the design can start with me mocking up something and handing it off to the developer who can then build logic into it. It’s even better when the developer logic isn’t so intertwined with my styles and layout that I can hardly touch it without breaking something. This way I get to use my design skills at the prototype stages and early skeletal stages, and I also get to get my hands dirty in the real code at the fit and finish stages. All you designers who have spent hours refining your designs only to have your designs mangled when they get implemented in real code… your day is coming.”

BTW, if it seems like a list a lot of community Avalon pieces on my site, it’s because there’s a lot of community activity in Avalon. If you’re doing WinFS or Indigo work and I’m not seeing it, please let me know!

Ironically, his page is filled with bugs…

[via Stuart Celarier, the real Longhorn Stuart]

Ian Griffiths posts the beginnings of a XAML editor (it supports squares and elipses and saving, but not loading XAML, so no source yet). Especially interesting, however, is how he handles zooming. He wrote an explanation with source on that bit.

BTW, if you haven’t figured it out yet, Ian is quite the Avalon boy. If you’re into such things, you should subscribe to his blog.

This Avalon Bezier Spline Designer looks *very* cool. Can't *wait* to see the source code. Hurry up, Nikhil! So long as it compiles and runs, we'll be forgiving. : )