Book Description

Microsoft Silverlight is a leading cross-platform, Rich Internet Application (RIA) technology that allows you to create more compelling and interactive Web experiences than are possible with simple HTML browser pages. Silverlight 3 includes significant improvements over previous versions, including “out-of-browser” operation, H.264 video, 3D graphics, and real-time effects.

Essential Silverlight 3 is the definitive reference and insider’s guide. It not only covers all the key features of the Silverlight 3 runtime and how to use them but, in Under the Hood sections, explains why each feature was developed and how each one works. These “insider” explanations often lead to concise, practical performance tips that can help you speed up your own Silverlight applications.

Author Ashraf Michail is uniquely qualified to explain Silverlight 3. He is a Microsoft Silverlight architect who has guided Silverlight from its beginnings through the current version. In this book, he Read More ...

Book Description

Accelerated Silverlight 3 teaches you how to get up to speed with the latest version of Silverlight quickly and efficiently. The book assumes you’re already comfortable with the basics of .NET coding and with WPF and builds on your existing knowledge to make your journey to Silverlight 3 proficiency as quick and painless as possible. Where coding techniques are similar to other, more established, areas of .NET, the text says so. Likewise, where there’s a syntax or conceptual “gotcha” that you’re existing coding habits will walk you into, the text points that out, too.

This book provides you with fast-track coverage of all the most important elements of the Silverlight 3 technology ranging from XAML to standard controls, from dealing with media to networking, from testing to deployment. It concludes with a pair of fully worked sample applications for you to follow through, because nothing reinforces your understanding of how concepts fit together as much as looking at finished code.

It is Read More ...

Book Description

Windows® Phone 7 provides an exciting new opportunity for companies and developers to build applications that travel with users, are interactive and attractive, and are available whenever and wherever users want to work with them. By combining Windows Phone 7 applications with remote services and applications that run in the cloud (such as those using the Windows Azure™ technology platform), developers can create highly scalable, reliable, and powerful applications that extend the functionality beyond the traditional desktop or laptop; and into a truly portable and much more accessible environment.

This guide describes a scenario around a fictitious company named Tailspin that has decided to include Windows Phone 7 as a client device for their existing cloud-based application. Their Windows Azure-based application named Surveys is described in detail in a previous book in Read More ...

Book Description

This guide provides everything you need to get started with Prism and to use it to create flexible, maintainable Windows® Presentation Foundation (WPF) and Microsoft Silverlight® 4.0 applications.

It can be challenging to design and build WPF or Silverlight client applications that are flexible, maintainable, and that can evolve over time based on changing requirements. These kinds of applications require a loosely coupled modular architecture that allows individual parts of the application to be independently developed and tested, allowing the application to be modified or extended later on. Additionally, the architecture should promote testability, code re-use, and flexibility.

Prism helps you to design and build flexible and maintainable WPF and Silverlight applications by using Read More ...

Book Description

WPF and Silverlight are unlike any other user interface (UI) technologies. They have been built to a new paradigm that—if harnessed correctly—can yield unprecedented power and performance. This book shows you how to control that power to produce clean, testable, maintainable code.

It is now recognized that any non-trivial WPF or Silverlight application needs be designed around the Model-View-ViewModel (MVVM) design pattern in order to unlock the technology’s full data-binding potential.

However, the knowledge of how to do this is missing from a large part of the development community—even amongst those who work with WPF and Silverlight on a daily basis. Too often there is a reliance on programmatic interaction between controls and not enough trust in the technologies’ data-binding capabilities. This leads to a clouding of design values and an inevitable loss of performance, Read More ...

Book Description

Silverlight 4 is the latest iteration of Microsoft’s cross-browser technology for creating rich user experiences on the Web. Like its predecessor, Silverlight 3, it rides atop the .NET Framework for maximum ease of use and coding efficiency. The new technology carries forward much of the work that has been done before and augments it in many important respects, including support for H.264 video, major improvements to the graphics engine (including true 3D rendering), and much richer data-binding options for interfacing with other applications.

Pro Silverlight 4 in VB is an invaluable reference for professional developers wanting to discover the new features of Silverlight. Author Matthew MacDonald’s expert advice guides you through creating rich media applications using Silverlight in the environment you’re most productive in—no matter what the target platform. As you learn about the features that put Silverlight in direct competition with Adobe Flash, such as rich support for 2D and 3D Read More ...