Tile Notifications

Tile notifications allow the application tile to be modified periodically, using a data driven template model, with a fixed set of data properties. Each property corresponds to a UI element, with each UI element having a fixed position on the tile. A tile notification can be used to communicate information sent from the cloud, such as updates from an email service, a social networking service, or a weather service.

It is at the user’s discretion to pin an application to the Start Experience, and having the app pinned to the Start Experience is essential for receiving tile notifications.

When an application is pinned to the Start Experience, tile notifications are displayed regardless of whether the app is running.

The template for a tile notification consists of a standard three assignable data properties: a title property, a count property (also called a badge), and a background image property (see Figure 15.7). The three shell tile templates: flip, cycle, and iconic; provide additional updatable properties, which are described in Chapter 13, “Portraying Your App with Live Tiles.” A cloud service may modify the content of an associated tile using tile notifications.

FIGURE 15.7 Anatomy of a standard tile notification.