I should have blogged on this beforehand... but on Saturday I gave a talk about Windows 7 for developers at the Iowa Code Camp, and last night I gave another similar talk to the Cedar Rapids INETA group.   There are lots of neat new features to take advantage of.   The taskbar alone offers peeks and previews, custom buttons on preview, alerts/progress, even icon overlays (something that would have really come in handy with Notification Icons!).   The intent is to move away from the notification area now and they've really provided some good tools for it.

I always have fun showing the Sensors and Location API's.   The are user-mode driver-based so it's much easier to create your own implementations.   The API's are pretty easy to use.   Enumerate a type of sensor, register for events, and read your reports as they come in.   Much better than dealing with data formats and wire protocols.   Unfortunately, not much to look at with the Location API yet.   I have a feeling we'll be seeing some open-source implementations for various GPS devices and other concepts.

The RC is well-worth downloading.   It's been rock solid for me and really performs well.   Time to start developing for it!