To create a Windows Store app there are a number of options:
Firstly you can create a Store App using HTML5 as the frontend and JavaScript as the backend. If you intend doing so have a good look at TypeScript to get around the Software Engineering issues with JavaScript. It is not the intention of this Blog sequence to look at HTML-JavaScript at this stage. I can though see a strong case for it from an interoperability perspective.
Secondly you can create a Store app with the frontend as XAML and C#, VB and/or C++ as the backend. The XAML UI is essentially what was previously Silverlight. C++ as a coding option with XAML is new in Windows 8 although it was the only way to code for Silverlight (XAML) in Windows Embedded Compact 7 (CE 7). The project templates on offer for the Store Apps are essentially the same in all three languages. The XAML is the same….just the code behind is syntactically different but conceptually the same. Where there is much processing the news on the airwaves is that C++ Store apps/components perform better ( are we back to the future/past?).
New Project C# Windows Store (VB and C++ are similar):
With C++ you get a couple of more project templates:
Static Library (Windows Store apps0
This template contains one page with no UI elements on it (its starts up blank when you run it), a generic splash screen, the standard XAML styles (most commented out, you uncomment the ones you want), the App class .xaml and .cs for getting the application going, a manifest file and the basic references required for a Windows Store app.
Click on a group title to get:
Click on an item in a group to get.
From the main page (the grid) you can select an Group which will then show information about the group as well as a link to each item in eth group and a summary for each such item. You can then select an item in the group to get detail about it. Alternatively, items are listed under their groups in the grid on the main page. You can select an item directly from there. This grid-groups-items is essentially what the Start Menu is in Windows 8.
Rather than use a database, the data is provided as a set of classes with some sample data to populate them.
The data consists of groups. Groups contain items:
The GridApp data classes and public properties and methods
To be continued for other Project Templates