![]() ![]() This is due to platform limitations as well as Microsoft’s desire to keep the Silverlight runtime environment very small. Silverlight is a subset of WPF, which means that some WPF features are not supported by Silverlight (such as hardware accelerated 3D). Silverlight applications run in browsers such as Internet Explorer and FireFox on Windows, but they also run on other platforms, such as the Safari browser on an Apple Mac as well as on mobile devices. Silverlight is different in that it provides similar experiences cross-platform. You could deploy WPF to a browser through XBAP (XAML Browser Applications), but XBAP applications still require Windows. However, WPF leaves some Web developers out of the picture since WPF is a Windows-only technology. WPF enables developers to build these types (and even drastically more advanced) user experiences. And that success is really due to its awesome user interface. Nevertheless, many users find the device extremely compelling, which so far has resulted in great sales success for Apple. It is plagued by a number of issues from bad phone service and quality, to a browser that lacks support for important Web features (such as Flash or Silverlight), to lack of Exchange e-mail, task, and calendar synchronization, to a bad service provider, and so forth. Many would argue that the iPhone is not a really great device from a functional point of view. If you need a good example of what good design can do for your product, take a look at what Apple has done recently with the iPhone. I have previously discussed the importance of professional UI design. So let me take a closer look at why Silverlight is so exciting. When you take a break and think about this for a moment, you realize that this is a lot to take in. NET Framework 3.0, Silverlight brings many of the WPF concepts to the Web browser, and it does so on various platforms (such as the Apple Mac and Windows Mobile). While WPF aims to build next-generation Windows applications based on the full-blown. So what exactly is Silverlight? Simply, it is a lightweight and scaled-down cross-platform version of WPF. As more and more details emerge (and the first released version is now available), it becomes clear that Silverlight is not just an intriguing concept, but it is for real! I think it is safe to say that the developer and designer communities-even beyond Windows-stood up and took notice of the Silverlight announcement… Silverlight is very intriguing in concept, as it further travels the path previously laid out by WPF (Silverlight’s big brother), and it aims to bring the worlds of Windows and Web development, as well as the worlds of software development and graphical design, much closer together. ![]() At Mix 2007 in Las Vegas, Microsoft announced Silverlight (formerly known as WPF/E) to much fanfare. ![]()
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