Top 10 Things You Should Know About Using Isolated Storage in Your Windows Phone Application

Introduction

Isolated storage for the Windows Phone
platform works a little differently than Isolated Storage for Silverlight. Here is a compilation
of the top 10 things Windows Phone developers should know about using isolated
storage in their application.

  1. Application update – When an application is updated, its isolated
    storage location is not changed. For that to take effect, you need to ensure
    you build your application and submit the application as if it was an upgraded
    version. Astute developers should test the upgrade scenarios to ensure
    successful data migration.
  2. Quota limitations – Unlike Silverlight applications, Windows
    Phone applications do not have a quota for the isolated storage. This allows
    applications to take up a lot of space. Be deliberate in your application
    design when you use disk space on the phone.
  3. Application uninstall – When a Windows Phone application is
    uninstalled, its isolated storage data will be deleted.
  4. Temporary cache – For data that is short-lived, make sure you store
    it in a temporary folder inside the isolated storage, which is cleaned up upon
    application exit. This ensures that your application does not gobble up disk
    space unnecessarily.
  5. For user generated data, if possible, store it in the cloud with Azure platform.
    This ensures that when the user formats the device, he/she does not lose the
    data. If cloud storage is not possible, make sure there is a dedicated folder
    in the isolated storage for that.
  6. IsolatedStorageSettings is not threadsafe and can throw
    IsolatedStorageException when Save is called.
  7. Data binding – Since the Save method on the “IsolatedStorageSettings”
    class throws an exception, if there are any data bound objects in
    IsolatedStorageSettings, and they need to be saved, create a clone of the
    object and save that.
  8. Always call all isolated storage API calls inside a try/catch
    block, so you can handle any exception throws without taking down the
    application and can inform the user.
  9. When the phone begins to run out of disk space, it will give the
    user a warning.
  10. Do not use isolated storage to store high-value secrets, such as
    unencrypted keys or passwords, because isolated storage is not protected from
    highly trusted code, or from unmanaged code. On an unlocked device, that could
    mean your application can be susceptible.

Summary

In this article, we saw various
best practices about using isolated storage in your windows phone application.
I hope you have found this information useful and will be able to use the
knowledge to write better Windows Phone applications.

More by Author

Get the Free Newsletter!

Subscribe to Developer Insider for top news, trends & analysis

Must Read