Expression Blend and Design : Expression Web

Expression Studio 3 LAUNCHED TODAY!

xprblog — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 21:35:06 GMT

Today we announced the official launch of Expression® Studio 3 , a suite of professional design tools for creating Rich Internet Applications. This announcement comes shortly after the July 10th Silverlight 3 launch and the availability of the release...(read more)

Expression Web Beta 1, EGD and EID Sept. CTPs (target .NET 3.0 RC1)

xprblog — Wed, 06 Sep 2006 20:00:00 GMT

We are pleased to announce that the Beta 1 release of Expression Web (formerly Expression Web Designer) is now available! For more insight into Expression Web Beta 1, please see the Expression Web team blog.

Additionally, September CTPs of Expression Graphic Designer and Expression Interactive Designer are available and target the Release Candidate 1 (RC1) of .NET Framework 3.0.

Found a bug? Report it to us.

Have something to say about the Betas and CTPs? Join a discussion group:

Webcast: Introduction to Microsoft Expression

xprblog — Sat, 26 Aug 2006 02:44:00 GMT

This webcast describes the powerful features and capabilities of Microsoft Expression Graphic Designer, Microsoft Expression Interactive Designer, and Microsoft Expression Web Designer, and includes a 40 minute demonstration of Expression Web Designer.

The first twenty minutes cover concepts of user experience, the .NET 3.0 and WPF (Windows Presentation Foundation) platforms and how they enable the next generation of user experience, and designer and developer collaboration using XAML (Extensible Application Markup Language). The discussion about Expression products and CSS begins around minute 21, and the Expression Web Designer demo begins around minute 27.

http://msevents.microsoft.com/cui/WebCastEventDetails.aspx?EventID=1032306063&EventCategory=5&culture=en-US&CountryCode=US

New Training Videos for Expression Web Designer!

xprblog — Fri, 23 Jun 2006 01:10:00 GMT

Five (5) new Expression Web Designer training videos are now available for viewing and download at http://www.microsoft.com/products/expression/en/demos.mspx. Simply click the Web Designer tab near the bottom of the page, and then click one of the video links under Training Videos.

Enjoy!

New CTPs available for Expression Graphic Designer AND Expression Interactive Designer!

xprblog — Tue, 23 May 2006 23:46:00 GMT

We are pleased to present new CTPs of Expression Graphic Designer and Expression Interactive Designer that target Microsoft WinFX Runtime Components Beta 2--the latest release of WinFX. Follow the links below to start downloading the May CTPs... Remember...(read more)

Expression Web Designer CTP is now available!

xprblog — Thu, 18 May 2006 05:08:00 GMT

Download for free the first-ever Expression Web Designer CTP now via the Microsoft Expression Web site.

Also, you can discuss Expression Web Designer in the forums as well as send feedback or report a bug to help us make a better product!

How do I choose between ASP.NET, Atlas, Windows Forms and WPF?

xprblog — Fri, 24 Feb 2006 19:34:00 GMT

In his blog post [1], Tim Sneath answers the following questions about considering when and where to use the most appropriate presentation layer technology:

How do Windows Presentation Foundation, XAML and ASP.NET fit together? I've heard you can build web applications using XAML - does that mean that ASP.NET is dead?
I've seen comments about "Atlas forever changing the way web apps are implemented", how does Atlas fit into the whole WinFX picture?
So WPF is the new rich client technology for building web and standalone applications in WinFX. Where does that leave DirectX and Windows Forms?
Windows Forms, ASP.NET/Atlas, DirectX, WPF, Win32 - that's five UI technologies to choose between. How do I decide?

[1] http://blogs.msdn.com/tims/archive/2006/02/23/538189.aspx

Imagine Cup Competition 2006

xprblog — Tue, 07 Feb 2006 05:14:00 GMT

You'll be interested in this if you (or someone you know) currently attend school/college/university, are 16 years or over, like to imagine, would be keen to earn a few thousand dollars in prize money and a free trip across the world to see the Taj Mahal, want to make friends and contacts in different academic communities globally, and wouldn't mind learning a lot about technology in the process.

Imagine Cup [1] is an annual Microsoft-sponsored competition that offers contestants the chance to give their ideas exposure, make critical contacts, and experience a true sense of friendship with peers worldwide. The theme of this year’s Imagine Cup is "Imagine a world where technology enables us to live healthier lives".

Also, this year’s competition will have a new track - "Interface Designer". With so many tools and platforms available and emerging that aim to improve users' experiences with hardware and software, the timing couldn't be better!

[1] http://imagine.thespoke.net/

A taste of Cider

xprblog — Mon, 30 Jan 2006 11:01:00 GMT

The next version of Visual Studio is codenamed Orcas. Just as Visual Studio does today, Orcas will continue to integrate well with Expression for teams building applications in the Windows Vista time-frame. The disciplines in such a team include developers and designers, hence the specialization in toolsets. Cider is the codename for Orcas' Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) design-time features. If you'd like to know more about Cider, a great stepping-off point is the Cider Wiki on the Channel 9 web site [1].

[1] http://channel9.msdn.com/wiki/default.aspx/Cider.HomePage

Meet the Expression team!

xprblog — Wed, 25 Jan 2006 09:34:00 GMT

In case you were wondering what we look like, here's a cheerful photograph taken this evening when the Expression team gathered together to relax and share a drink and mark the occasion of the two CTPs being released today. As is natural with a large team, not everyone could be present for the photograph, and regrettably there are one or two notable Expression-ists (pardon the terrible pun) whom we weren't lucky enough to capture on CCD. Maybe we'll correct that in the future.

Welcome to the Expression team blog!

xprblog — Tue, 24 Jan 2006 11:08:00 GMT

Hi, we’re glad to have you visit the Expression team’s blog - we hope you’ll like the resources and information you find here and we hope you’ll return often to see what’s new.

This introductory post will talk about what the Expression family of products is. It will also talk about the blog itself, what it’s for, and what kinds of things you can expect to find here over the coming months.

So, first, what is Expression? Microsoft Expression is a suite consisting of three products each intended for use mainly by the professional designer community. Expression Graphic Designer is a visual arts package equally at home with vector or with bitmap graphics. Expression Interactive Designer gives interaction designers the environment in which to build Windows applications for the Windows Presentation Foundation platform - in other words, to build the new Vista-wave generation of Windows user experiences. Expression Web Designer is the product which offers all the tools you’ll need to produce high-quality, standards-based Web sites.

For lots more information, videos and downloads about Expression, please see the Microsoft Expression product website.

Now, about the blog. The blog’s scope embraces all three Expression products so there will be a great diversity of resources to be found here, all brought together with the intention of being of interest to designers and to the designer sensibility. Although we expect professional designers to be our main audience, if you’re a design dilettante or a Windows or Web developer, please feel free to dive in and experience and enjoy Expression too!

In the Article Categories section of the blog, you will find up-to-date directories of sample applications, tutorials and visual artwork. As the names indicate, these samples are targeted at particular pre-release or Community Technology Preview (CTP) versions of the Expression products.

In the same section there are also articles which contain the ‘readme’ files for particular pre-release or CTP versions of the Expression products.

The types of blog posts you can expect to see include these:

Posts announcing a new sample application or tutorial. By way of documentation, samples will include an overview document if not a tutorial, and any code will have explanatory comments. The overview document might talk about the sample’s purpose and use, how it was written, the design behind the user experience, and any interesting techniques or designer-developer workflow which was experienced whilst producing it.
Posts containing a piece of visual artwork.
Posts showing a tip or trick or relating an interesting experience around using an Expression product.
Posts discussing features of Expression products and gauging interest in them or feedback about them.
Posts containing videos of an Expression product or feature demonstration.

Happy designing!

- the Expression team