Microsoft Surface Blog

Microsoft® Surface® 2.0 SDK and Runtime Update

Luis Cabrera - Surface — Sun, 05 Feb 2012 21:10:00 GMT

We have updated our SDK and runtime bits to include improved support for Windows Touch Enabled devices. There were some issues in the Microsoft Surface Input Stack handling of reports sent by a digitizer in serial mode. These issues caused the input stack to not report all touches reported by the digitizer reliably. The new build handles input from serial and parallel/hybrid digitizer more robustly.

We encourage you to use this update, especially if you are building applications that will run on Windows 7 touch enabled PCs. With the Microsoft Surface 2.0 SDK, you can easily create applications to take advantage of the next generation Surface computing device. The applications you create can be adapted for other Windows 7 touch enabled devices as well.

You can find links to the bits at the Microsoft Surface Design and Development Center http://msdn.com/windows/surface

Note that no public APIs were changed in this release. Enjoy!

Luis Cabrera
Development Platform Program Manager
Microsoft Surface.

Surface Solution Showcase invites retailers to get hands-on at NRF 2012

James Maki [SURFACE] — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 13:00:00 GMT

Samsung SUR40 for Microsoft^® Surface^® (“SUR40”) is at this year’s National Retail Federation (NRF) Conference where retailers are getting hands-on with a showcase of new solutions developed for the Microsoft Surface 2.0 platform. Swing by Javits Center Hall 1A17 to experience the Samsung SUR40 and see new, never-before seen, retail solutions from over 15 of our development partners.

Samsung SUR40 is available for purchase through Samsung channel and reseller partners. This award winning product results from a Samsung-Microsoft collaboration delivering the unmatched Surface 2.0 experience with a thin Samsung 40” HD vision based touch PC. Its innovative design means retailers can choose horizontal and vertical deployments by simply attaching optional legs or a compatible VESA mount.

Retailers and consumers demand technology that delivers visually dynamic information in an engaging way. Samsung is energizing the retail space with SUR40, creating an all new approach to customer engagement.

Retail customers ready to roll out the Samsung SUR40
Major consumer brands and technology partners are readying Samsung SUR40 to create engaging retail experiences, professional services, and marketing tools. Here are a few examples of how businesses convert their visions to reality with the Microsoft Surface 2.0 platform:

Fujifilm
The Fujifilm retail solution enables customers to easily create custom photo books using their own digital photos. It helps people take advantage of digital photo editing, guiding even the most inexperienced person step-by-step through the design and order process. The application encourages friends and families to gather around the SUR40 and collaboratively rediscover their photos. This solution will roll out in Australia, with plans for later global expansion.

Industrial Color
The GLOBALedit application for the Samsung SUR40 provides creative production teams with the missing piece in a fully digital work flow: the digital light table. GLOBALedit brings photo review and approval, image markups, layout creation, and real time creative review sessions to life by fully utilizing the collaborative capabilities of the Microsoft Surface 2.0 platform. The innovations provided by the GLOBALedit solution will satisfy the needs for efficiency and ever increasing demands on content delivery and communication.

Le Métier de Beauté
Le Métier de Beauté’s new solution creates true synergy between luxury products and the luxury counter experience. Neiman Marcus customers will have their first glimpse of Samsung SUR40 this February as it launches at select stores across the country.

PepsiCo Beverages Canada
PepsiCo Beverages Canada will use Samsung SUR40 in upcoming consumer engagement programs. SUR40 will help deliver a revolutionary interactive consumer experience for the Pepsi brand. Innovative Pepsi applications designed for Microsoft Surface offer consumers an unforgetable experience.

Availability and pricing
Samsung SUR40 for Microsoft Surface is currently available in 23 countries. Estimated Street Pricing (MAP) for U.S. customers starts at $8,400 USD for the device, and $9,049 USD for the device with matching stand. Pricing in other countries and/or regions may differ.

For more information or to find out how to order, call 1-866-SAM-4BIZ or visit samsunglfd.com/solution/sur40.do

Bing Maps Windows Presentation Foundation Control Version 1

Luis Cabrera - Surface — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 12:09:00 GMT

The Bing Maps team delivered yet one more time! Last year we approached them to see if they could write one of the most requested features we heard from our WPF developers: A map control that was touch enabled, that could be rotated in a ScatterViewItem...(read more)

Samsung SUR40 for Microsoft Surface Receives Best of Innovations Award at CES

James Maki [SURFACE] — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 15:54:00 GMT

Hot on the heels of our recent Popular Science Award, we are pleased to announce that the Samsung SUR40 for Microsoft Surface has been selected as an International CES “Best of Innovations 2012” award winner. The awards recognize and honor outstanding design and engineering in cutting edge consumer electronics products across 32 product categories, at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, which is currently underway.

Sponsored by Consumer Electronics Association (CEA)®, the producer of the International CES, the world’s largest consumer technology tradeshow has been recognizing achievements in product design and engineering since 1976. The “Best of Innovations” honor is awarded to the products with the highest judges’ scores and will be featured in the Innovations Design and Engineering Showcase at the 2012 International CES.

Entries are judged based on the following criteria:

Engineering qualities, based on technical specs and materials used
Aesthetic and design qualities
The product’s intended use/function and user value
Unique/novel features that consumers would find attractive
How the design and innovation of the product compares to other products in the marketplace.

If you are attending CES this year, please be sure to stop by and check out the Samsung SUR40 for Microsoft Surface at the Innovations Showcase in the Venetian Ballroom at the Venetian Hotel.

For more information about the “Best of Innovations 2012” award winners including the Samsung SUR40 for Microsoft Surface, and the full press release, please visit the CES website at www.CESweb.org/Innovations, which lists product categories, as well as each product name, manufacturer information, designer, description, photo and URL.

Samsung SUR40 for Microsoft Surface Now Available for Pre-order!

James Maki [SURFACE] — Thu, 17 Nov 2011 14:00:00 GMT

Today we are excited to announce that the next generation of Surface, the Samsung SUR40 for Microsoft Surface, is now available for pre-order through Samsung resellers in 23 countries worldwide, including the United States. Automotive, education, finance, healthcare, hospitality, and retail are just some of the industries that will soon be able to take advantage of Samsung SUR40’s PixelSense technology, new, sleeker form factor and horizontal and vertical orientation options. Many new and existing customers, such as Dassault Aviation, Fujifilm Corp. and Royal Bank of Canada, have big plans for the Samsung SUR40 and are preparing to deploy units in locations early next year.

Countries eligible to pre-order the Samsung SUR40 include: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Ireland, Italy, Korea, the Netherlands, Norway, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom and the United States. Stay tuned for product availability in additional markets coming soon. Check out Microsoft News Center for more information about the pre-order announcement. For details on how to pre-order the product, please visit the Samsung website at www.samsunglfd.com/solution/sur40.do

Samsung SUR40 for Microsoft Surface Receives "Best of What's New" Award from Popular Science

James Maki [SURFACE] — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 17:00:00 GMT

Recognized as “a thin tabletop computer that sees and responds to whatever is placed on it” the Samsung SUR40 for Microsoft Surface has been awarded an esteemed “Best of What’s New” Award for 2011 from Popular Science magazine.

“For 24 years, Popular Science has honored the innovations that surprise and amaze us − those that make a positive impact on our world today and challenge our views of what’s possible in the future,” said Mark Jannot, Editor-in-Chief of Popular Science. “The Best of What’s New Award is the magazine’s top honor, and the 100 winners − chosen from among thousands of entrants − represent the highest level of achievement in their fields.”

Each year, the editors of Popular Science review thousands of products, in search of the top 100 tech innovations of the year; breakthrough products and technologies that represent a significant leaps in their categories.

Popular Science praises the Samsung SUR40 for its object recognition and content possibilities stating that “developers are free to program custom games and more.” Though not explicitly noted by Popular Science, the Samsung SUR40 is available for commercial purchase only.

For more information about the “Best of What’s New” award and full press release, visit the Popular Science website at popsci.com

Microsoft Surface Quarterly Showcase - Fall 2011

James Maki [SURFACE] — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 16:00:00 GMT

From search-and-rescue robots to social media streaming, Microsoft Surface continues to make a big splash for customers, partners and talented developers worldwide! Check out what Microsoft Surface has been up to lately.

...(read more)

A word on WPF4 manipulations.

Luis Cabrera - Surface — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 22:13:00 GMT

You may be able to perform most of your manipulation needs by using the manipulation related members WPF4 added to UIElement (IsManipulationEnabled property and events such as ManipulationStarting, ManipulationDelta and ManipulationCompled). This walkthrough...(read more)

New York Times uses Microsoft Surface to imagine countertop reading experience

James Maki [SURFACE] — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 23:36:00 GMT

A recent article by Megan Garber of the Nieman Journalism Lab shows how the New York Times Company R&D Lab is using Surface to envision the not to distant future where reading the newspaper on a tabletop is commonplace. According to the article, they...(read more)

nSquared shows a vision of seamless computing

Luis Cabrera - Surface — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 18:40:00 GMT

Dr. Neil Roodyn (nsquared), one of our MVPs, just posted a video showing integration between multiple devices and Microsoft Surface. I personally liked some of the scenarios he describes, and how interactive objects (in this case phones and tablets) are...(read more)

Bing™ Maps WPF Control available today!

Luis Cabrera - Surface — Tue, 23 Aug 2011 17:35:04 GMT

The Surface development community has been asking for a WPF map control. Well, I have good new for you. We brought the request to the Bing maps team and they just got it done! Today, the Bing team posted the Beta release for a WPF version of their Bing...(read more)

Social Stream for Microsoft Surface 2.0 posted

Luis Cabrera - Surface — Thu, 18 Aug 2011 16:11:05 GMT

As part of our SDK we have some samples that help developers understand Microsoft Surface development concepts. The goal of the samples that we post on our SDK is to show how to use a given API. In those samples we favor simplicity and clarity sometimes...(read more)

World meet Patty, Patty say "Hello World"

Luis Cabrera - Surface — Thu, 18 Aug 2011 15:50:00 GMT

When I became part of the Microsoft Surface Team almost 3 years ago, as part of the "New Employee Orientation" I had the chance to see how they used robots to stress test Microsoft Surface. I thought that was the most fascinating thing in the world. Until...(read more)

Using Microsoft Surface to control Search-and-Rescue Robots

Luis Cabrera - Surface — Wed, 10 Aug 2011 16:04:00 GMT

The Robotics Lab at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell (UML) , is exploring ways to integrate Microsoft Surface and its natural user interface (NUI) into search-and-rescue robotics to control robots remotely with more precision and accuracy. Below...(read more)

Links to SDK and Resources

Luis Cabrera - Surface — Tue, 12 Jul 2011 14:10:00 GMT

As I mentioned last week, today is the big day! Today we are releasing the Microsoft Surface SDK and related resources. Below are the links to the development resources we promised. Microsoft® Surface® 2.0 SDK and Runtime " href...(read more)

Microsoft Surface at WPC

Luis Cabrera - Surface — Mon, 11 Jul 2011 14:58:41 GMT

Come visit us at the Worldwide Partner Conference! We are in booth #104, where you can get to play with Samsung SUR40 for Microsoft Surface. We will also have a breakout session this afternoon (4:30 PM - 5:30PM) in LACC Concourse Hall 151/152. Looking...(read more)

Next week: The Microsoft Surface SDK and other Tools and Resources will be available to you!

Luis Cabrera - Surface — Thu, 07 Jul 2011 20:38:00 GMT

Today I’m excited to share with you resources that should improve our partner’s ability to design and develop Surface Applications to support the next generation device – the Samsung SUR40 for Microsoft Surface. We are going to launch...(read more)

The Power of PixelSense™

Luis Cabrera - Surface — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 17:00:20 GMT

Today marks the release of a video the Surface team put together highlighting the power of PixelSense™. Microsoft’s PixelSense, in the new Samsung SUR40 for Microsoft Surface, allows a display to recognize fingers, hands, and objects placed...(read more)

Meet the new Microsoft® Surface® Input Simulator

Luis Cabrera - Surface — Wed, 04 May 2011 16:15:00 GMT

One of my favorite features of the new Microsoft Surface 2 SDK being released this summer is the new Microsoft Surface Input Simulator, because it enables me to write Surface applications on any Windows 7 machine. That means I don’t have to be in...(read more)

MIX Interview with Channel 9 on Surface 2

Luis Cabrera - Surface — Sat, 23 Apr 2011 04:01:00 GMT

This is a 7 minute interview we had with Channel 9 at MIX right after the presentation. Larry Larsen asked Luis Cabrera a few questions about our hardware, our SDK and the feeling at MIX. Thanks Larry! Follow us on twitter at @surface, or read about...(read more)

Surface Present at MIX 2011

Luis Cabrera - Surface — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 22:27:00 GMT

We are having a great time at MIX 2011, and channel 9 has posted the two presentations we had yesterday. I personally enjoyed talking to so many passionate developers and designers just super interested in Surface 2. You could really feel the excitement...(read more)

Real Estate Agent and Twitter by Sevensteps

Eric Havir — Mon, 28 Mar 2011 01:46:32 GMT

Bart Roozendaal is one of the members of our thriving Dutch Microsoft Surface community, CEO of Sevensteps , and a Surface MVP . When Bart was in Redmond for the Microsoft MVP Summit, he stopped by our studio to show me a couple of the applications...(read more)

Mashup: AR Drone on Surface with the DREAM Controller

Eric Havir — Wed, 23 Mar 2011 18:27:38 GMT

There are some great combinations in life. Peanut butter and chocolate. Ernie and Burt. Bacon and Maple Bars. That last one might be a bit polarizing. Here’s one I think we might agree on. Dr. Holly Yanco over at UMass Lowell’s Robotics Lab tipped me...(read more)

Want to control your drone from Surface? Now the code is available on CodePlex!

Luis Cabrera - Surface — Thu, 17 Mar 2011 16:40:00 GMT

Eric posted about the work Nicolas Calvi, one of our MVPs, had done to control his AR Drone from the Surface device. http://blogs.msdn.com/b/surface/archive/2011/01/27/controlling-the-ar-drone-with-surface.aspx . [Video: Flying AR DRONE with Microsoft...(read more)

Microsoft Surface Presentation at MIX 2011

Luis Cabrera - Surface — Wed, 16 Mar 2011 22:25:00 GMT

They posted the presentations to the MIX 2011 website today, and we will have 2 Surface related presentations at MIX! That is very exciting! See you in Las Vegas in less than a month! A Whole NUI World: Microsoft Surface 2 and Windows Touch...(read more)