Create WinRT in Blend? Is this a blend of icy goodness? Or is it just weird to write C++ in Blend?

And just what the heck does this have to do with building quality apps?  Well, first of all a quality app don’t get hung up and freeze.  If you use WinRT, then WinRT can help you prevent freezing.  So no, this isn’t about a blend of icy goodness it is to prevent freezing and other issues of “calls” to things outside of your program.

With Blend, a check list:

c HTML 5 generation, check. 

c XAML, check. 

c Sketchflow, nope. 

c C++, check.  Oh wait a minute, C++.  C++?  Yep.

Well let’s get completely unfocused:

Jerry Nixon, who wrote the excellent blog entry (which I assume he incapable of writing anything different, unlike me) at:

https://blog.jerrynixon.com/2012/05/windows-8-top-10-reasons-why-metro.html

So he gets the numbers in the title today.  And Jerry mentions WinRT, but not in Blend, wonder why.  But there is what WinRT is all about.

Reason 10 – WinRT

Metro applications access system devices and services through WinRT (Windows Runtime). Not only does this deliver identical functionality to JavaScript, C#, and C++, but it also protects the system through brokered API access. As a result, language choice is no-compromise, and users can trust apps they install. The bet part? WinRT projects system resources in local data types, so developers don’t have to mess around with converting pointers and enumerable like with pinvoke.

And what does it have to do with Blend?

You can use Blend to build WinRT components.  But I am not sure why you would.  It shows up as a template in Blend.  Anyone with input on this let me know via the comments.  Just seems really strange to be able to write C++ in Blend.  Or it could just be me.  Check out these two screen shots.  So Blend must be a real IDE, because like a party (which doesn’t start till the cops show up, you guys at CSUDH know what I mean : ) it isn’t a real IDE till it supports C++.  SO that is now the case for BLEND!

And here it is: C++ in Blend