Testing Barcode and Qrcode with Emulator of Windows Phone - windows-phone-8

I have developed a windows phone8 app with Bar-code and Qr-code scanning function.
Is there any possibility to test that Bar-code and Qr-code scanning with emulator, Because I
don't have a device to test.
Thank you.

There are Two Cases of applications.
1) Some Barcode/Qr-Code scanner application uses local images to scan and display output.
If your app is of this type, then you can test Your Windows Phone 8 App in the Emulator itself.
2) Some Application uses Camera to scan the Barcode/Qr-Code.
Since emulator just emulates random image (usually a simple colored block moving around corners) you can't test your application in emulator very well.

Related

Windows Desktop app or Windows Store app

My app, basically, needs to do the following:
getting GPS coordinates
calling web services (for accessing, sending info etc)
work in background with no UI for most of the time
The target device is a mobile tablet running with Windows 8.1.
I found out that for this OS I can develop both a desktop app or a Windows Store App.
Please, what do you suggest to use for my needs?
Also, because I dont know Windows Desktop App at all, Please can I get everything done using a desktop app?
Thanks
the main difference between those two is, whether or not you get a window in your old-school desktop (desktop app) or one of those fancy full-screen-app thingies that were introduced in Windows 8... Afaik you can't sell the Desktop apps on the Windows Store, but functionality-wise your average desktop app has no real downside as you can use .NET with all fancy features for both...
Here you can find a detailed comparison between both. But from your description you should be fine with the desktop app (:
Cheers D
I would go with the desktop app simply for the background tasks you mentioned. This is tricky to do in Windows Store apps as Windows tombstones (freezes) the apps if you navigate away for any length of time. As far as I know, only certain apps, such as music apps, can run in the background.
Desktop apps have no such limitation.

How to turn on /off the capabilities through a Windows 8.1 RT app

I am trying to develop an application which will deal with the following hardware and perform the stuff mentioned. I want to know that would it be feasible .
1)
Wi-FI
Scan for wi-fi , provide option to turn it off and on or reboot it .
2)
Bluetooth
Turn it off /on , make it discoverable if its not discoverable.
Apps
Get list of all apps that are installed and provide an option to kill them if they are running or uninstall them. The provision should also list the user the apps which he has sideloaded(need to know which all are the sideloaded apps).
Internet Connectivity
If internet is connected , check whether data is flowing or not.
Battery Status
Find all those apps which are consuming too much battery.Provide the option to uninstall them and lower the screen brightness and decrease the screen lock time
All these have to be implemented in an application that I want to develop.
I would be needing links for answers so that I can provide it in my feasibility report.
thanks
You will need to write a desktop app for this. Most of what you're looking for is completely out for a Windows 8.1 Runtime app. Windows 10 adds functionality for several of the bullet points, but in both versions you'll need a desktop app to manipulate other applications.
Universal Windows apps (aka Windows Runtime apps) run isolated and cannot generally affect the system or other apps. They can make changes only within their own context.
1 and 2: Windows 10 adds the Windows.Devices.Radios.Radio class to address your radio bullets, but this functionality is not available in Windows 8.1 Runtime apps.
3: This cannot be done from a runtime app. A desktop app can enumerate a user's apps with the Windows.Management.Deployment.PackageManager class.
4: You can query connectivity with Windows.Networking.Connectivity.NetworkInformation.GetInternetConnectionProfile
5: This is not available in a Windows 8.1 Runtime app. In Windows 10 see Windows.Devices.Power.Battery

Finishing a Windows Phone 8 app - is it different to WP7?

This may seem an odd question , but I'm just wondering if the process of finalising a WP8 app is different to a WP7 app.
In WP7 when I am ready to publish an app I just go into the Debug/Bin folder upload the XAP top Dev Center. However, when I do this with WP8 apps they never serve ads. Also the XAP is always called something like AppName_AnyCPU_Debug.xap compared to just AppName.xap in WP7 apps (using VS2010).
I know with Windows 8 you do something different, but is it the same in WP8?
Help is appreciated.
Yes, its same in Windows phone 8.
But dont forget to check the project for store requirements.
Here is the link for more info on Store test kit
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windowsphone/develop/hh394032%28v=vs.105%29.aspx
I am not sure about windows phone 7 but in windows phone 8 *_AnyCPU_Debug.xap means that xap is targeted for any CPU architecture(x86 or ARM) currently all windows phone CPU are ARM based. and secondly _Debug means that the xap is build as debug and that is not a good idea to publish the as the xap will contain unnecessary debug symbols and effect app performance. alwasy use build mode release when every you are publishing your app.

Bluetooth Low Energy costum Service device discovery and development for Windows 8.1 Store Apps

I started building Windows Store App, but after I discovered that my device is not discovarable on Windows 8.1 compared to Windows 7 and IPhone on which I can detect this Blutooth LE device.
I am using following PrimaryServices:
Generic Access (0x1800)
General Attribute (0x1801)
Costum service (0x13B0)
Device Information (0x180A)
How can I make this device discovarable and usable later in Windows Store Apps (writing some kind of driver, change some services on device or as a last option write specification for costum service this is too expensive for me at the moment)?
Mutiple solutions for this problem are welcome.
You need to go through Windows 8's UI to pair with Bluetooth Devices. You cannot control the pairing programmatically.
If what you describe is that you cannot discover your Bluetooth device, even on Windows 8's UI, then there must be a compatibility problem:
Your dongle on Windows 8 may be classical (below 4.0) while the device is strictly Low Energy (4.0)
Your dongle's driver was not properly installed

Windows Phone 8 - Simulate touchscreen events

What would be the best approach to simulate a user tapping on a touchscreen of a Windows Phone 8 device?
One approach I could imagine is to use native code to call the Win32 API functions which control the mouse events. This would assume that touchscreen events are more or less the same as mouse events, and that these API functions are accessible. Does anyone know if this is the case on WP8?
Another approach would be to have something like the Android ADB for the Windows Phone. On Android, one can use ADB to control the device from the PC and also simulate touch screen events (e.g. via Monkeyrunner). I haven't found any information if there is a tool like ADB for Windows Phone 8.
The purpose of finding a solution for this is the integration of Windows Phone 8 devices in an automated testing process.
I found out that there is a DLL file named InputInjection.dll in the System32 folder of the Windows Phone 8 (at least in the simulator image I mounted).
This library contains the following functions:
ApiInjectInitialize
ApiInjectTouchEvent
ApiInjectButtonEvent
ApiInjectEnableExclusive
ApiInjectUninitialize
Doing some research, I found out that there are official ways to simulate touch input for Windows 8 development:
http://social.technet.microsoft.com/wiki/contents/articles/6460.simulating-touch-input-in-windows-8-preview-versions-using-touch-injection-api-en-us.aspx
http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/windows/desktop/hh802896(v=vs.85).aspx
However, the functions used for Windows 8 development are not available on Windows Phone 8. But the functions are named similarly to the ones I found in InputInjection.dll:
InitializeTouchInjection similar to ApiInjectInitialize
InjectTouchInput similar to ApiInjectTouchEvent
(...)
I wasn't able to find any documentation on InputInjection.dll and its functions. These functions also don't appear in the header files of the SDK. Maybe Microsoft uses these functions internally for their own tests during Windows Phone development.
The question is: Is it possible to access this library and call these functions somehow? This would be similar to using "Private APIs" on iOS, I guess. I tried several ways to achieve this with a Windows Phone 8 app using native C++ code, but I had no luck so far (the basic reason is that the apps run sandboxed on Windows Phone). Is there any way to get a binary running on Windows Phone (maybe via a debug bridge or something)?
You can access all those API's From Win32 Service/ Kernel Driver. Include the header file to your source code and Library of injection method it will work