C# Express RSS Screen Saver Starter Kit

RSS Screen Saver Starter Kit in C# Express

One of my favorite features of C# Express is the built-in RSS Screen saver Starter Kit. If you’ve never built a screensaver before, or if you have never written code that uses RSS, then you’ll find the RSS Screen saver a great way to start programming.

In a nutshell, the RSS Screen saver is a screen saver that lets you select and validate an RSS feed, select a background directory for images to loop through, and the screensaver will loop through the items in the RSS feed.

The Screen saver displays the list of RSS items and loops through each one and shows the contents of the feed in the right hand side.  It's got lots of cool GDI+ transparency features that you can take and use in your application as well as a simple library to read RSS feeds. If you have feedback on what features you want added to the screen saver, submit your suggestions to: the new MSDN Product Feedback Center.

Comments

• Anonymous
  June 29, 2004
  Very cool sample...

• Anonymous
  June 30, 2004
  RSS Screensaver

• Anonymous
  June 30, 2004
  BTW: The screen saver was written by Luke Hoban http://blogs.msdn.com/lukeh
  A awesome PM on the C# team.

• Anonymous
  July 13, 2004
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  July 15, 2004
  Dan Fernandez writes: One of my favorite features of C# Express is the built-in RSS Screensaver Starter Kit. If youve never built a screensaver before, or if you have never written code that uses RSS, then youll find the RSS Screen saver a great way to start programming. In a nutshell, the RSS Screen saver is a screen saver that lets you select and validate an RSS feed, select a background directory for images to loop through, and the screensaver will loop through the items in the RSS feed....

• Anonymous
  July 20, 2004
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  July 29, 2004
  where can i download the screen saver ?

• Anonymous
  July 29, 2004
  Andy,
  
  The screen saver is included inside Visual C# 2005 Express Edition. To download C# Express, go to: http://lab.msdn.microsoft.com/express/vcsharp/default.aspx and click Download Now.
  
  Once you have C# Express installed, simply click File...New Project...and select "Screen Saver".
  
  -Dan

• Anonymous
  August 22, 2004
  C# Express RSS Screen Saver Starter Kit "One of my favorite features of C# Express is the built-in RSS Screen saver Starter Kit.

• Anonymous
  September 03, 2004
  Whenever you are working with a computer language for a while you want to get a bit creative or sazzy to say something and do new things with it, so in order to do that you need to get inspiration...

• Anonymous
  October 26, 2005
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  March 07, 2006
  Some relation with this?: http://www.nuparadigm.com/Products/Toys/RssScreensaver/

• Anonymous
  March 07, 2006
  Hey Leandro,
  
  Good find :)
  
  I can't be sure, but it looks like NuParadigm uses the same codebase given the similarity in appearance and the fact that they are both managed code screensavers.
  
  Thanks,
  -Dan

• Anonymous
  April 12, 2006
  I would love to play around with this code, but it looks like it only comes with the Express edition.  Since I've already purchased the Professional edition and given the fact that Microsoft won't provide a download link, I can only assume Microsoft doesn't want its paying customer to have it.  
  
  I started to get a bit irked  but then I realized who I was dealing with here.  Microsoft has been championing the cause of making simple tasks more difficult for years now.  Why should this be any different?

• Anonymous
  April 12, 2006
  Hey Dave,
  
  I saw your comment here:
  **I started to get a bit irked  but then I realized who I
  **was dealing with here.  Microsoft has been championing
  **the cause of making simple tasks more difficult for years
  **now.  Why should this be any different?"
  
  I'm glad you left a comment, the RSS Screensaver ships in every copy of Visual Studio 2005. To create the RSS Screensaver starter kit, hit File...New Project...expand the "C#" tree, select "Starter Kits" and select the RSS Screensaver starter kit.
  
  If you have a question, feel free to ask, we have dedicated forums on http://forums.microsoft.com and I'm sure someone could have answered this question really quickly without jumping to the conclusion that our goal is "making simple tasks more difficult".
  
  Thanks,
  -Dan
  

• Anonymous
  April 22, 2006
  PingBack from http://flipsidereality.com/blog/?p=63

• Anonymous
  June 26, 2006
  How can I desing a date selector pop-up for VS Web Express?
  
  Need same as orbitz.com
  
  Thanks

• Anonymous
  June 26, 2006
  How can I design a date selector pop-up for VS Web Express?
  
  Need same as orbitz.com
  
  Thanks

• Anonymous
  July 05, 2006
  I like rsssaver for this better. Cleaner look and feel + 3d stuff too
  
  http://www.rsssaver.com/

• Anonymous
  August 29, 2007
  How to load the background images from a url instead of the local directory? Thanks

• Anonymous
  January 20, 2008
  PingBack from http://websitescripts.247blogging.info/dan-fernandezs-blog-c-express-rss-screen-saver-starter-kit/

• Anonymous
  March 26, 2009
  **Updated 3/26/09 with preface [The following article is authored by one of the Windows Embedded MVPs

• Anonymous
  May 24, 2009
  Does anyone know why i get the following error: Namespace Manager or XsltContext needed. This query has a prefix, variable, or user-defined function. The tag in the rss feed is <content:encoded>, and it doesn't like it for some reason.