Silverlight

Angela Ward gives an Introduction to Silverlight

1. Introduction to Silverlight
BiTWISE
June 24, 2011

2. About Angela Ward
•Independent consultant since mid-90s on
Microsoft platforms
•OODB, WinForms, XML, .NET
•Business Analyst, QA Test Lead

3. Presentation Overview
•What is Silverlight?
•How does it relate to other client-side
technologies?
•How important is it?
•Silverlight app development walk-through

4. What is Silverlight?
•One word definition: Flash
oBrowser plug-in: cross-browser, cross-platform
oUse case today: Animated ads, Video
oUse case tomorrow: Applications (Flex)
oBenefits: Adds functionality + write-once-run-everywhere
•Why Silverlight not Flash?
•More words: Flash + .NET
•More words: WPF-subset + .NET-subset

5. This is a big deal
•Once-every-20-years event
•Existing client-side web technology has
reached the peak of its life-cycle
•Fresh start of a new client GUI technology
•Web is where the action is
oThe network is the computer

6. Comparing client platforms
HTML / CSS /
JavaScript / AJAX
Desktop:
Win16
Win32
WinForms
WPF SilverlightFlash /
Flex
Web:

7. Competing technologies
•Desktop based “smart clients”
oWPF on high end
3D, Hardware acceleration
oWinForms: (Mature, proven)
•Web-based:
oASP.NET - HTML + CSS
oASP.NET - HTML + CSS + AJAX
oAdobe Flash / Flex
•Desktop-web hybrid (?):
oAdobe AIR

8. Demo – Yahoo Finance Charts

9. Demo – Picnik.com Photo Editor

10. Feature Details

11. WPF / Silverlight – Positives:
•Vector based vs. pixel based
oScalable – Looks good at multiple resolutions
•XAML – Similar to HTML
oDeclarative
oDesigners and programmers work in parallel
•Rich customization is possible in a well-
designed way

12. WPF - Negatives
•Windows only
•Requires 50 / 200 MB .NET 3.x runtime
•Steep learning curve

13. Early Versions of Silverlight
•1.0
oRTM in Sept. 2007
oCode behind – JavaScript only
•1.1 / 2.0
oAlpha introduced in Spring 2007.
oBeta at MIX08 in March 2008.
oRTM maybe Q3-2008.
oCode behind - .NET languages C#, etc.
oPartial .NET class library

14. Silverlight - Positives
•Lightweight at 4-6 MB, quick download
•.NET based
oWrite in C# or VB.NET
oUse familiar class libraries
•Rich state-of-the-art GUI
oVector based
oAll types of content handled uniformly
•Secure - sandboxed

15. Silverlight - Negatives
•Not quite here yet
o“Pig in a poke”
•Sandboxing limits functionality
•Conflicting products within Microsoft?

16. Demo: Silverlight Airlines

17. Demo: MS Download Center

18. Demo: 3
rd
Party Control Vendor

19. Silverlight 5.0 Features:
•Won’t know details until August 2011
•Controls:
•Data:
•Communications:

20. Silverlight 2.0 Features:
•Controls:
oExtensible control base classes
oCommon controls:
Textbox, Checkbox, Radiobutton, etc
TabControl, Slider, ScrollViewer, ProgressBar, etc
oLayout controls:
Grid, StackPanel
oData controls:
DataGrid, etc

21. Silverlight 2.0 Features:
•Data:
o2-way data binding
oMore LINQ support: LINQ to XML

22. Silverlight 2.0 Features:
•Communications:
oREST, POX, RSS, and WS-* communication
oCross domain network access
oSockets

23. Feature Unknowns (?)
•Local client integration?
oRead and write local files?
oRead local mic and webcam?
•WCF?
•Depth of class libraries?
oPay-for-play

24. Silverlight
Development
Walk-through

25. Silverlight Tools
•Expression Blend:
oGUI builder
oGraphic designers
•Visual Studio 2008/2010:
oIncludes a more limited GUI builder
oProgrammers