To go along with the recent release of Windows 10, version 1511 update, we have released a Windows 10 SDK build 10586 update along with Visual Studio 2015 Update 1 this week. The update contains enhancements for developers to build, distribute, and monetize apps. Clint Rutkas takes a deeper look at some of the specifics of the update in a separate blog post. Next week, we’ll publish posts on developing for Continuum and using the Windows.UI.Composition API.

I’d also like to tell you about two other tools to help developers adopting the Universal Windows Platform (UWP):

General Availability of Mobilize.Net’s Silverlight bridge

I’m pleased to announce that the Silverlight bridge that accelerates bringing Windows Phone 8.1 apps to UWP, built by our partner Mobilize.Net, is now released and can be downloaded here. This free Visual Studio add-in analyzes source code, automatically converting code to use UWP APIs. Right now, the bridge has 2300 mappings and additional helpers to help with the migration.

Here are a few quotes from developers currently using the bridge:

“I was able to migrate 95% of the code for my application using the technical preview. Other than having to tweak a couple of references to the new Windows Storage model, the tool worked flawlessly”

“Using a new build of the tool, I had 18 errors on my solution. Fixing those 18 errors only took a few minutes rather than hours if I had to do the full port by hand.”

“I was able to convert 3 projects with minimum manual changes, related to image resolutions that are needed for Windows 10. We are ready to continue migrating our full portfolio of Windows Phone Silverlight apps”

Highlights include conversion of embedded SQL to SQLite and Windows Storage libraries, optimization of the error notification process and Improvements for the conversion of async methods that require additional logic. Their GitHub repository which has their conversion mappings, including over 800 mappings and semantic translation helpers, which can be customized and improved by the community. In addition to the mappings, helpers have been added or enhanced in the following areas: networking, UI navigation and elements, contacts and tasks, device properties, phone storage and GPS.

Evaluation Virtual Machines for Windows 10 development now available

If you are interested in developing for Windows 10 and want to test out the Windows Bridge for iOS or just general UWP development, we have released 60-day evaluation developer virtual machines (VM) on Windows Dev Center. These VMs have the latest snapshots of the tools for Azure and Windows IoT Core as well. Additionally, the VMs contain the Windows UWP samples from Github. These VMs will be released in multiple virtual hard disc formats as well: Hyper-V, Parallels, VirtualBox, and VMWare. If you have feedback on the VMs, please provide it over at the Windows Developer Feedback UserVoice site.

Thank you

Thank you to our Windows developer community for your passion and creativity – we can’t wait to see what you come up with next! My team and I love to hear your feedback, and we use it to guide platform investments. Please keep the feedback coming using our Windows Developer Feedback UserVoice site.