Use the free web app gallery to build an ecommerce site in a matter of minutes and deploy online, using nopCommerce and Web Matix. You really don’t have to be an experienced programmer to build a really polished site – in fact there is no programming at all! It’s super easy – just go to the Web App Galleryand choose the eCommerce category. I used nopCommerce as my framework of choice, but there are many other fantastic templates to choose from.

Watch the presentation: How to build an ecommerce site in 13 minutes

Beyrouth, Liban. American University of Science and Technology. Mars 2011. La semaine dernière, j'ai prononcé un discours pour plusieurs dizaines d'étudiants en informatique sur l'impact des médias sociaux sur la stratégie marketing. Comme un morceau de matériel bonus, j'ai également fourni 7 carrière renforcer conseils de cette session. S'il vous plaît télécharger la présentation des ressources gratuites pour les étudiants ci-dessous (merci à mon collègue, Sekna Khanafer, pour mettre ca ensemble)

Beirut, Lebanon. American University of Science and Technology. March 2011.  Last week I gave a talk for several dozen marketing and computer science students on the impact of social media on marketing strategy.  As a piece of bonus material, I also provided 7 career enhancing tips in this session.  Please download the presentation, and review some free resources for students below (thanks to my colleague, Sekna Khanafer, for putting these together). 

FREE Microsoft Certification for Students

Microsoft is offering FREE certification exams for students.  Get a head start on your IT career!  Hurry, this offer is available on DreamSpark only while supplies last.

Hear what other students are saying about being certified in today’s competitive job market and how it can make the difference in getting that dream job.

PluralSight is a Microsoft partner that is now offering access to high-quality online training solutions for Microsoft .NET developers and its FREE for students!  Click here to find out more.

Announcing YallaApps

Yalla Apps is the new Windows Phone 7 developer portal for the Middle East and Africa region.  You can start right away by unlocking WP7 phones for testing and then submit your applications to Windows Phone Marketplace.  Now you have the opportunity to actually earn money from the apps that you develop and registration is free for students!

Contests and Competitions

Dev Unplugged - IE9 Developer Contest invites web developers to submit amazing web applications and games using HTML5 – a world without plug-ins!  There will be a total of 9 featured prizes and 9 honorable mentions. 

Grand Prize winner is featured on the front page of the Beauty of the Web, receives $9,000 USD and a fully-loaded VIP package to MIX 2011 in Las Vegas. 

The MEA Windows Phone 7 Challenge is a special opportunity for students to design and develop applications compatible on Windows Phone 7.  Students are required to submit applications to compete.  Prizes include a trip to Microsoft headquarters in Redmond, netbooks, notebooks and more!  There is a competition held every two months, with the last round ending May 31, 2011. 

Please find the presentations for HTML5 and the Web Matrix tutorial here.  Here is a short list of all the HTML5 demos that I showed today.

Join the MEA Facebook group
Follow the ArabNet twitter
IE6 Countdown clock
Nike Mosaic project – inspiration for using the Canvas zoom functionality in HTML5
Performance Test with the Fish Tank demo
Only online Arabic Musical – written in HTML5
TimeOut Dubai Peronalized Restaurant Butler
Importance of using Vector based graphics
View the source code (it’s just HTML after all) and great your own audio player
Hit F12 and use the developer tools – Select Network, press Start Capturing, and see the results
And most importantly, enter our contest and submit your own HTML5 app to win a trip to Las Vegas!

  We welcome you to compare the capabilities of HTML5 rendering in Internet Explorer 9 with any browser that’s on the market –past or present. Your feedback is extremely encouraged – just post into the comments.