Develop Reference

Where is Microsoft.Phone.UserData in Windows Phone 8.1?

I am using Windows 8.1 and Visual Studio 2013. As far as I know, everything is update to date. So what I wanted is to fetch contact list, but I am not able to the that even after googling.
According to MSDN, all I have to do is put using Microsoft.Phone.UserData and after that I can happily get contacts. The problem is, I can't, because there is an error which says that Microsoft.Phone.* doesn't exist.
Am I missing something or what. According to site above, it applies to Windows Phone 8 and Windows Phone Silverlight 8.1 | Windows Phone OS 7.1.
P.S. It's about blank app (Windows Phone) project

You are looking at the tutorial for Windows Phone 8 as against the fact that most probably you are using WinRT for Windows phone 8.1
You need to use the ContactStore class by using the ContactManager class.
Here is a code snippet from MSDN
public async void FindContacts(string searchText)
{
ContactStore contactStore = await ContactManager.RequestStoreAsync();
IReadOnlyList<Contact> contacts = null;
if(String.IsNullOrEmpty(searchText))
{
// Find all contacts
contacts = await contactStore.FindContactsAsync();
}
else
{
// Find contacts based on a search string
contacts = await contactStore.FindContactsAsync(searchText);
}
MyContactListBox.ItemsSource = contacts;
}
In case you want to target older versions of windows phone you might want to read this
In case there is a confusion in regards to what version of SDK do I use for targeting a specific version of windows phone , here is the help.

I have had the same issue, think it might be because if I look for the Microsoft.Phone class, I find it in a 8.0 directory. In my case
C:\Program Files (x86)\Reference Assemblies\Microsoft\Framework\WindowsPhone\v8.0\
I then just referenced it by browsing for the file. I'm not sure what you're intending to use it for, and if the classes will be compatible with 8.1. But I hope this helps.

Get Unique Device ID (UDID) under Windows Phone 8

Is there any unique device ID (UDID) or any similar ID I can read out on Windows Phone 8 (WP8) that doesn't change with hardware changes, app-reinstallation etc.?
In older Windows Phone versions there were such IDs:
WP7: Device Status for Windows Phone
WP7.1: DeviceStatus Class
But they doesn't work anymore with SDK 8.0.
Why I ask:
The idea is that a user gets some free credits with the first start of the the app and I want to avoid that the user just re-installs the app for getting new free credits. A registration with email or phone number could solve this, but if I can, I don't want do bother users at the first start with a registration.
---///---SOLUTION----------
I can confirm that DeviceExtendedProperties.GetValue("DeviceUniqueId") still works in WP 8.0. Got a little bit confused when I read the following text:
In Windows Phone OS 7.0, this class was used to query device-specific
properties. In Windows Phone OS 7.1, most of the properties in
DeviceExtendedProperties were deprecated, and the new DeviceStatus
class should be used instead. However, where appropriate, you can
still use any of the below properties that are not deprecated.
MSDN:DeviceExtendedProperties Class
I can run the following code, delete the app and re-install it and get the same ID:
byte[] myDeviceID = (byte[])Microsoft.Phone.Info.DeviceExtendedProperties.GetValue("DeviceUniqueId");
string DeviceIDAsString = Convert.ToBase64String(myDeviceID);
MessageBox.Show(DeviceIDAsString);

I haven't yet started to develop for Windows Phone 8, still on 7, but you still should be able to use the original DeviceExtendedProperties class to pull back the Device Unique ID.
DeviceExtendedProperties.GetValue("DeviceUniqueId")

I've had this issue with returning the null value. Then remembered that it needs to be switched on.
In WMAppManifest.xml -> Capabilities tab -> switch on ID_CAP_IDENTITY_DEVICE

There's a twist to this DeviceUniqueId - it is unique only for one publisher. So it is not really device-wide unique identifier but unique device id for one publisher. We have noticed when we worked on some customer project where we tried to identify the same phone from different accounts (customer publishes under two different accounts).

You can get your own wp8 device Id by DeviceExtendedProperties.GetValue("DeviceUniqueId")
Here is the simple way to get deviceId as a string
byte[] id = (byte[])Microsoft.Phone.Info.DeviceExtendedProperties.GetValue("DeviceUniqueId");
string deviceID = Convert.ToBase64String(id);

By not providing DeviceUniqueId in Windows Phone 8 and Windows 8, Microsoft tried to avoid User Tracking but with increased pressure from Dev community, they are bringing it back again.
In Windows 8.1, Microsoft has introduced a new AdvertisingId API and may also bring similar Id to identify a unique user across apps in subsequent Windows Phone 8.1/9 versions.

I used this:
private static String getDeviceId()
{
byte[] id = (byte[])Microsoft.Phone.Info.DeviceExtendedProperties.GetValue("DeviceUniqueId");
return BitConverter.ToString(id).Replace("-", string.Empty);
}
But the key is to Check the ID_CAP_IDENTITY_DEVICE in WMAppManifest, or else it throws error.

I found this a new HostInformation.PublisherHostId property
More info at
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windowsphone/develop/windows.phone.system.analytics.hostinformation.publisherhostid.aspx..

string myDeviceID = (byte[])DeviceExtendedProperties.GetValue("DeviceUniqueId");
string DeviceIDAsString = Convert.ToBase64String(myDeviceID);
I have used this for windows phone unique device Id.

The answers above work for Windows Phone 7 and 8 Silverlight. However, they will not work for Windows Phone RT (Universal) or Store Apps since the SDK does not have this dll library (Microsoft.Phone).
This is how you get the device ID and Name (and possibly other info) on Windows Phone 8.1 RT (Universal/Store Apps).
private string GetHardwareId()
{
var token = HardwareIdentification.GetPackageSpecificToken(null);
var hardwareId = token.Id;
var dataReader = Windows.Storage.Streams.DataReader.FromBuffer(hardwareId);
byte[] bytes = new byte[hardwareId.Length];
dataReader.ReadBytes(bytes);
return BitConverter.ToString(bytes);
}
More details about reading the device info on Windows RT can be found here

Open extern SQLite-Database in a Windows 8 Metro-App?

I use the "Sqlite for Windows Runtime" and sqlite-net (just as described at http://timheuer.com/blog/archive/2012/08/07/updated-how-to-using-sqlite-from-windows-store-apps.aspx) to develop a Windows 8 Metro-App, just . If I want to open a Database at the Program-Directory is no problem:
var dbPath = Path.Combine(Windows.Storage.ApplicationData.Current.LocalFolder.Path, "db.sqlite");
using (var db = new SQLite.SQLiteConnection(dbPath)) {
...
}
But when I want to use an extern Path like this:
var dbPath = "C:\\Users\\xxxxxx\\db.sqlite";
then an error occurs with "Cannot open database file". Why? Here I am using C#, normally I use C++, but for this problem I am sure it doesn't matter ;)

You cannot select arbitrary files on the file system. See here for details.
By default you can access these locations:
Application install directory
Application data locations
User’s Downloads folder
and
Additionally, your app can access some of the files on connected
devices by default. This is an option if your app uses the AutoPlay Device extension to launch automatically when users connect a device,
like a camera or USB thumb drive, to their system. The files your app
can access are limited to specific file types that are specified via
File Type Association declarations in your app manifest. Of course,
you can also gain access to files and folders on a removable device by
calling the file picker (using FileOpenPicker and FolderPicker) and
letting the user pick files and folders for your app to access. Learn
how to use the file picker in Quickstart: Accessing files with file pickers.
If you have the right capabilities declared you can also access:
Documents Library
Music Library
Picture Library
Videos Library
Homegroup Library
Removable devices
Media server devices (DLNA)
Universal Naming Convention (UNC) folders
A combination of the following capabilities is needed.
The home and work networks capability:
PrivateNetworkClientServer
And at least one internet and public networks capability:
InternetClient InternetClientServer
And, if applicable, the domain credentials capability:
EnterpriseAuthentication
Note You must add File Type Associations to your app manifest that declare specific file types that your app can access in this location.

In windows metro application...
It support only sandbox property of an application.
So you cant use
var dbPath = "C:\\Users\\xxxxxx\\db.sqlite";
U can only store data in local storage or application installed directory.
Please avoid to use any other path . it will not work .

windows phone 7 Download files and save it in phone storage

am developing an application which can fetch files from internet.. how do i download and save a "docx" or "wav" file from internet within the application and use it later with other application likes office or windows media player.

You can download files in the background (ie. they will continue even when your application is not running).
Having said that, you should research the types of files you need to support. For example, you can play an audio file (if the format is supported) or add it to Music hub but you cannot open a file in Office. Very few filetypes can be integrated with, so do some research before you start writing your app otherwise you might be disappointed.

place an image control in your page. here im1 is controls name.
it is working for me
string imgurl="http://.........";(path)
Uri addrs=new Uri(imgurl,UriKind.Absolute);
BitmapImage bitmap = new BitmapImage(addrs);
im1.Source = bitmap;

Play audio url on windows mobile

I'm going to write a function to play a mp3 file from an URL on Windows Mobile 6.0 without downloading all the stream to mobile. I read some documentation and faced some problem that.
Using NAudio.dll
: The dll is not compatible for Windows Mobile
Using DirectShowLib.dll : have not found way to get from audio stream.
Is it true that we can't get an audio Url Stream in Windows Mobile 6.0? Is there any way or any dll else to help me?

Which windows mobile? 6.5 or 7?
7 uses Silverlight so it should be really easy to do smooth streaming (never tried it).
6+ I'm not so sure, maybe use a WCF filestream to get the stream?

I find out Bass library work well on my specific issue - play mp3 audio from url on windows mobile 6.
Add bass_cp.dll to your solution. And make sure to copy the bass.dll to your execute directory.
And what you need to do is very simple:
int stream = Bass.BASS_StreamCreateURL(strUrl, 0, 0, null, IntPtr.Zero);
Bass.BASS_Init(-1, 44100, BASSInit.BASS_DEVICE_DEFAULT, IntPtr.Zero);
Bass.BASS_ChannelPlay(stream, false);
Of course after you register for the dll. Then add this code line at first:
BassNet.Registration(string email, activated key);