While it hasn’t been announced yet , most people are expecting a Silverlight 2.0 beta at MIX and the beta should have a whole bunch of new features. However the big question has been when Silverlight 2.0 is actually going to ship. According to a source that I got last week it sounds like Silverlight 2.0’s current internal ETA is in August of this year.
via ZDNet Blogs
Long Zheng dug up a job description for “a new Framework that will enable new UI experiences in future versions of Windows” and is wondering if this means Windows Presentation Foundation is taking a backseat. Performance issues with WPF have been talked about often and the comments in Long’s post show a bit of that. I do find it hard to believe that Microsoft would be rolling something entirely new. WPF has a lot of people excited about building Windows applications again and with Silverlight 2.0 becoming more WPF-like it would be odd to see full blown Windows development move in a different direction. My hunch (like a lot of the commentors) is that this is something else that will go along with WPF. The job description could just be a way to get people excited about applying.
Then again, this new UI framework could be the one that ultimately combines both browser and desktop applications into one. If it’s being developed right now it’s safe to assume we won’t see it for Windows 7 so perhaps this is the next-next generation of building applications on the Microsoft platform. Something that can more easily go between browser and desktop than even Silverlight and WPF do today.
via ZDNet Blogs
This week we bring you two videos by J. Michael Palermo to help you when things go wrong with Silverlight 1.0 applications.
Mozilla may have some new leverage over Microsoft. The Redmond, Wash.-based software giant has made its Silverlight web-development technology a big part of its web services and future .NET strategy, but a pesky little warning when it meets up with the Firefox browser at times is highlighting a potential achilles heel for Microsoft.
Microsoft Technical Evangelist Jaime Rodriguez puts it this way: “The warning is prompted by Mozilla’s heuristics to check on long running scripts (details on these heuristics way below). The problem is that for silverlight or any plug-in that makes Javascript calls, Firefox some times does not reset the timer for the scripts called from plug-ins: If you fire multiple events from a plug-in the events are obviously handled sequentially, if a new event happens while an event handler is executing, then Firefox does not reset its counter for the script time out; it measures the time from these two events as a single script.”
What happens next in that scenario is that a Silverlight-based page with the scripts in question gets jammed up, and a warning ensues. Rodriguez suggests ways to work around the problem on the part of those building stuff using Silverlight. The workaround appears straightforward, but it means some extra steps for someone developing with Silverlight.
“FYI, the issue has been reported to Mozilla and they seem to be on it, but of course given ship cycles, priorities, etc. . . we might not see a change for a while,” Rodriguez writes.
It does not appear as if the Firefox warning impacts every Silverlight page, but Mozilla now has an interesting dilemma. With limited resources and many demands as it works to move Firefox into its version 3 final release, as well as create a mobile platform, how much of Mozilla’s limited resources is set to work on Microsoft’s problem?
Silverlight is Microsoft’s attempt to compete with Adobe’s Flash technology. In the battle to control eyeballs and platforms, the ability for each to work smoothly with the popular Firefox browser will be critical.
This is one poker table where Mozilla is holding some interesting cards.
Via CRN
NBC announced today that they are working with Microsoft and MSN to build NBCOlympics.com
. That announcement alone is a snoozer. What’s interesting is that they’ll be using the Microsoft Silverlight platform to “deliver deeply immersive user experiences.”
The partnership was announced by Bill Gates at the CES keynote this evening in Las Vegas. The new site will host 2,200 hours of live event video coverage, with more than 20 simultaneous live video streams at peak times. An additional 3,000 hours of on-demand video will be available, including full event replays and highlights.
Watch Bill Gates’ keynote presentation at CES and get the latest from Microsoft at CES with this latest Showcase entry.
This video explores the relationship between Silverlight objects declared in XAML and objects declared programmatically in C#, demonstrating the isomorphic relationship between the two and the ability for C# event handlers to reach into declared objects and modify their properties.
In Silverlight 1.0, HTML applications set values directly on a Silverlight control. In Silverlight 1.1, the Silverlight control can become a listener to events on HTML objects and can reach into the HTML document to retrieve information. These differences are explored in this video.
Understanding the event handling model is vital to building interactive experiences. In this video, you’ll see how events are hooked up to controls.
Silverlight supports seamless transition to a fullscreen mode - ideal for media playback. This screencast shows you how!Using Silverlight for Full Screen Experiences