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Silverlight 4 Guitar Tuner
One of the cool new features of Silverlight 4 is raw access to the camera and microphone. This opens up a whole bunch of cool possibilities for software development. One of them which we explored was creating an online guitar tuner.
Microsoft unveiled a beta version of Silverlight 4 at PDC, you can grab it here if you don’t have it installed
I remember looking for something like this a few years ago when I couldn’t find my real guitar tuner. All I found were a bunch of tools which simply played back the right pitch, they would not analyze the actual recorded pitch from your guitar, which is what I was used to using. I found some shareware tools that would do this but I really wanted something quick that I could just browse to and tune my guitar, and not risk downloading some viruses or waste time installing something only to realize it doesn’t do exactly what I wanted.
With Silverlight 4, we can now do this. We simply calculate the spectogram of the frequencies comprising a short period of time (currently half a second) to find the fundamental frequency of the sampled sound.
My favorite tuner lately has been the one on my POD XT Pro, so we designed this to look like that.
To speed things up, we used a good FFT implementation found on CodeProject and simply adapted it to work with Silverlight.
We also added a little bit of silence detection which helps the Tuner show when there’s no input, ideally you’d have some settings for this and some more input feedback with something like a volume meter. This is disabled in the demo above, you can enable it at compile time. Grab the source here, and feel free to implement these things yourself!
by Danny Riddell
Microsoft Publishes Case Study on Azure and the Archetype Media Platform (AMP)
Check out the case study here: Archetype Media Platform (AMP) Case Study
by Danny Riddell
Archetype’s Chief Creative and Technical Officers Selected for Microsoft’s ONE.NET Campaign
Luigi Rosso (CTO), Guido Rosso (CCO), Archetype, and the Archetype Media Platform (AMP) are all being showcased on www.dotnetstories.com in Microsoft’s worldwide ONE.NET digital campaign. The campaign features Archetype’s use of .NET to build Rich Internet Applications on Azure. The AMP system will also be featured in online ads as part of a month-long campaign and are being showcased on various web properties like MS.com, Information Week, CNet.com, Engadget, and MSDN. For more information on Archetype’s participation in the ONE.NET campaign go to www.dotnetstories.com.
Archetype’s Silverlight 4 Applications Showcased in PDC Keynote
As part of the keynote presentation at Microsoft’s Professional Developers Conference, Scott Guthrie, Microsoft’s Corporate VP, .NET Developer Platform, showcased two of Archetype’s innovative Silverlight 4 applications . Taking advantage of Silverlight 4’s new webcam and audio capabilities, Archetype created photobooth and barcode applications. The photobooth application allows users to record and playback video and still images via webcam, as well as apply a series of pixel shader effects, including bulge, chromakey, cartoon and emboss. The photobooth application also includes publishing capabilities, allowing users to share video and images via sites like Twitter and Facebook. During the photobooth application presentation, Scott captured a picture of himself with the bulge effect activated and published it to his Twitter account, making for an interesting profile picture.
Scott demonstrated the barcode scanning application by holding up in front of the webcam the barcode of a book he coauthored. After scanning and recognizing the barcode, the application then searched for the book and brought back a list of online retailers who carry the book, along with a picture of the book, prices and other details. Dramatically speeding up the purchasing process, the barcode application has myriad uses including finding products of all types.
Both of these demonstrations highlighted new, powerful capabilities in Silverlight, as well as Archetype’s commitment to being at the forefront of emerging technology. Through partnering with the Silverlight team, Archetype produced a set of compelling and useful applications that demonstrate the power of Silverlight 4 and its webcam support.
Archetype International, Inc. Announces the Archetype Media Platform (AMP)
Media Management, Production, Analytics, and Playback on Windows Azure Platform
Archetype, an interactive solution provider, announced today the release of the Archetype Media Platform (AMP). AMP relies on Microsoft platforms, specifically Microsoft Silverlight, Microsoft .NET, and the Windows Azure platform, to create a dynamic and scalable experience.
AMP is a complete media management solution and includes a set of robust applications that enable users to upload, search, browse, select, and publish media to various formats, sizes, and platforms. The AMP system offers highly intuitive interfaces and can be deployed both commercially and in the enterprise.
Together, the AMP Manager, AMP Editor, AMP Portal, and AMP Analytics applications comprise the AMP system. AMP applications can be deployed individually or as an integrated system.
The AMP Portal offers end users an intuitive interface for discovering, viewing and sharing media of all types.
The AMP Manager is a media management and workflow application and allows users to upload, organize, tag, edit and select a given deployment path for a variety of media types.
The AMP Editor is a dynamic video editing solution used for creating, editing, and viewing multiple video compositions. The application combines more traditional video editing functionality with next generation editing functionality such as freeform dragging and dropping for video clip placement, stacking of multiple clips for timeline creation, and a filmstrip view that allows detailed in and out point editing on individual clips.
AMP Analytics provides users, such as business and marketing managers, detailed reporting on specific components of the AMP system. Information is presented in a highly visual manor and includes data relating to usage, ads and performance. Users can drill down into specific metrics and receive alerts and system updates.
The compatibility capabilities with the Windows Azure platform allows AMP to make real the notion of next generation media collaboration and management, and brings together a company’s entire media collection into a single, unified system. Windows Azure increases the scalability of the entire AMP system, enabling a virtually unlimited number of concurrent users, uploads, and encoding sessions to occur at any given time.
“We are thrilled that Archetype has decided to utilize the Windows Azure platform to deliver its solution to customers,” said Doug Hauger, general manager of Windows Azure at Microsoft Corp. “The compatibility and scalability capabilities the Windows Azure platform offers will enable Archetype to seamlessly integrate its media management solution and applications into one efficient and unified experience for its customers.”
“Users may have hundreds, or even thousands of media assets uploaded to the system. In non-cloud- based solutions, server-side encoding performance can be hampered by the number of servers and bandwidth available. Utilizing the Windows Azure platform,- application tie-ins enhance the server side media encoding process by minimizing the upload and conversion video cue through distributing the entire process throughout the cloud.” - Danny Riddell, Chief Executive Officer, Archetype
“Customers know and trust Microsoft technologies and many of our existing customers already heavily use Microsoft products. The familiarity, integration, and timeframe that come with basing our solution on the Windows Azure platform are all big selling points for us and for our customers.” - Mike Lucaccini, President, Archetype
By working with the Windows Azure platform, SQL Azure, and Silverlight teams and technologies, we are confident in our ability to provide our customers with stable, scalable, and high value experiences.” - Danny Riddell, Chief Executive Officer, Archetype
Coming to a City Near You: The Official Silverlight Gallery Application
Working closely with the Microsoft Silverlight Team, Archetype designed, developed and helped launch the Silverlight Evangelist Kit Gallery Application. Intended primarily for Microsoft’s worldwide Evangelists and Sales and Marketing teams, the Gallery App showcases numerous best-of-breed Silverlight applications that demonstrate key Silverlight features and functionality. Included within the Gallery App are games, RIAs and line-of-business applications all highlighting Microsoft’s partners’ innovative Silverlight-based solutions. And not only do the apps within the Gallery showcase Silverlight’s features and functionality, but features such as dynamic layout and resizing, deep linking and a lightning fast search make the Gallery app itself a lighthouse example of Silverlight.
Within the Gallery app, users can discover and view a wide array of Silverlight solutions, videos and application screenshots, along with browsing key Silverlight feature demos. The app also incorporates advanced searching, sorting, and filtering options. The app is sure to make the rounds at upcoming conferences and Microsoft events, and sourcecode could be made available for download. Stay tuned.
Archetype’s Media Platform (AMP) Highlighted in SQL PASS 2009 Keynote
Archetype’s Media Platform (AMP) featured in keynote at the PASS (Professional Association for SQL Server) Annual Summit in Seattle, WA (November 2nd-5th). PASS 2009 is one of the largest SQL Server focused conferences and Archetype is proud to be a part of the keynote announcements. Archetype has been working closely with the Azure and SQL Azure teams and we are excited to have our AMP system selected as a demonstration of the power of SQL Azure and the synchronization of on-premise and cloud based applications and databases.
The AMP system is a complete media management solution that includes a robust set of applications that help customers manage, edit, and deploy media asset more efficiently and effectively. Together the AMP Manager, AMP Editor, AMP Portal, and AMP Analytics comprise the AMP System.
Happy Halloween (Application) from Archetype!
To get into the spooky spirit of this year’s Halloween, we’ve created our own pumpkin carving application. You can carve your own virtual pumpkin, create a personalized message and share it with your friends. Oh, and it’s a Silverlight 3 application running entirely on Windows Azure.
Check out our pumpkin, then carve and share your own:
http://halloween.cloudapp.net/pumpkin/02a97183-d2c3-4b5f-a692-75c23da13703
Have fun, pass it along and Happy Halloween!!!
- The Archetype Team
Archetype Highlighted by the SQL Azure Team in the Latest SQL Azure Launch
Archetype is proud to be working with Microsoft’s Azure cloud services and SQL Azure team in the testing and launch of their latest release.
“We see SQL Azure as the perfect fit for information that needs to be kept in one safe, well-structured, accessible spot. Partitioning the data helps ensure scalability as more and more users interact with the site, and it also isolates tracking resources, helping avoid single points of failure,” said Luigi Rosso, Chief Technology Officer at leading interactive firm, Archetype. “To establish the kind of default redundant installation we get with SQL Azure, we’d have to purchase at least two dedicated servers and hire IT staff to administer them. A reliable system in place that is managed, efficient, and fast is critical for us. With SQL Azure, we don’t have to buy servers or manage and monitor them for capacity to ensure availability for our customers.”
Find out more about the latest SQL Azure launch at http://blogs.msdn.com/ssds/archive/2009/10/14/9907238.aspx.
Archetype CEO Attends Exclusive Steve Ballmer Web Development Roundtable
Attending Microsoft’s World Wide Partner’s Conference (WPC) is a fantastic experience. The sheer breadth of companies, technologies and people that make up Microsoft’s Partner Group is amazing. Wandering the event hall, you’ll see companies focusing on everything from hosted Exchange all the way to the most esoteric applications, robotics and simulations. It is always great to see how many markets and technologies Microsoft is involved in, not only through platforms and technologies but as business units and areas of market focus.
Needless to say, experiencing all of this in one venue is a great experience. But perhaps even better was talking to the CEO running it all, Steve Ballmer. Along with a few other leading technology firms in the web space, I was invited to an exclusive Steve Ballmer roundtable discussion centered around Microsoft’s Web Development Platform.
Far from a formal presentation of Microsoft’s web dev strategy, this was an open dialogue where the group exchanged ideas and gave feedback on Microsoft’s future web strategies around .NET, Silverlight, SharePoint, Visual Studio and other Microsoft technologies. We discussed with Ballmer the current market trends we’re seeing and experiencing in web and RIA development, as well as our perceptions of Microsoft’s strengths and challenges. Archetype is proud to have been a part of this discussion and have the opportunity to share our perspective with Ballmer and the rest of the group.
For any inquiries feel free to
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