Silverlight 2.0 Set to Arrive Soon (Can't wait for Mix 08)

by Don Burnett

Over at Scott Gutherie's Blog, he has released a series of first articles (and code samples) on Silverlight 2.0.. Since this information is released publicly I thought it would be nice to talk a little bit about it here and the important things for our community to know about it.

What is Silverlight 2.0?? 

Quoting Scott on his blog "Silverlight 2 includes a cross-platform, cross-browser version of the .NET Framework, and enables a rich .NET development platform that runs in the browser.  Developers can write Silverlight applications using any .NET language (including VB, C#, JavaScript, IronPython and IronRuby).  We will ship Visual Studio 2008 and Expression Studio tool support that enables great developer / designer workflow and integration when building Silverlight solutions."

What features have been added that improve on Silverlight 1.0's functionality?

Again quoting Scott's Blog:

"

• WPF UI Framework: Silverlight 2 includes a rich WPF-based UI framework that makes building rich Web applications much easier.  In includes a powerful graphics and animation engine, as well as rich support for higher-level UI capabilities like controls, layout management, data-binding, styles, and template skinning.  The WPF UI Framework in Silverlight is a compatible subset of the WPF UI Framework features in the full .NET Framework, and enables developers to re-use skills, controls, code and content to build both rich cross browser web applications, as well as rich desktop Windows applications.

• Rich Controls: Silverlight 2 includes a rich set of built-in controls that developers and designers can use to quickly build applications.  This upcoming Beta1 release includes core form controls (TextBox, CheckBox, RadioButton, etc), built-in layout management panels (StackPanel, Grid, Panel, etc), common functionality controls (Slider, ScrollViewer, Calendar, DatePicker, etc), and data manipulation controls (DataGrid, ListBox, etc).  The built-in controls support a rich control templating model, which enables developers and designers to collaborate together to build highly polished solutions.

• Rich Networking Support: Silverlight 2 includes rich networking support.  It includes out of the box support for calling REST, WS*/SOAP, POX, RSS, and standard HTTP services.  It supports cross domain network access (enabling Silverlight clients to directly access resources and data from resources on the web).  Beta1 also includes built-in sockets networking support.

• Rich Base Class Library: Silverlight 2 includes a rich .NET base class library of functionality (collections, IO, generics, threading, globalization, XML, local storage, etc).  It includes rich APIs that enable HTML DOM/JavaScript integration with .NET code.  It also includes LINQ and LINQ to XML library support (enabling easy transformation and querying of data), as well as local data caching and storage support.  The .NET APIs in Silverlight are a compatible subset of the full .NET Framework.

"

Wow he said it, databound controls, i.e.,  DataGrids, Listbox, etc.. This will change the face of Silverlight applications almost immediately. Networking support including all major web service protocols, cross-domain access and "socket" support.. This rocks. Especially considering this is all CROSS-Platform..  He also mentions things like threading, generics, collections, storage and LINQ support..

If you have never heard of LINQ it stands for Language INtegrated Query and lets you code things you'd normally have to use stored procedures for and gives you very secure ways to access data from XML and other sources..

He also goes further to do a great six part tutorial on how to create a sample "Digg" application in Silverlight, then in parallel with a platform-dependent version using WPF to show the parallels of creating an application..

I would say if you are familiar with Silverlight 1.0 the important reads are

Part2: Using Layout Management

Part 3: Using Networking to Retrieve Data and Populate a DataGrid

Part 6: Using User Controls to Implement Master/Detail Scenarios

Part 7: Using Control Templates to Customize a Controls Look and Feel

All of these are very NEW topics to Silverlight Designers and Developers and Scott walks through them very thoroughly and it's a very easy read. The functionality added with Silverlight 2.0 really underscores the commitment made to the Silverlight platform itself. With the new controls, databinding and cross-platform functionality. It's a new day for Silverlight where real Rich Interactive Applications are possible from inside a web browser with services that the built-in framework provides the plug-in that haven't been available to web applications developers before. Web applications will now have most of the power of desktop applications. Also, due to the cross-platform nature of Silverlight 2.0, your customers will not worry about what OS you are running..

Technorati tags: Silverlight 2.0, databinding, webservices, styling, user controls, control templating, layout management

Panning for Gold (or maybe Silver) on CodePlex

By Don Burnett

CodePlex is a great place to find great tools and open source if you are looking for components and nifty cool tools and programming projects to inspire you and move your own projects forward. I took sometime tonight to look at some of the latest projects that are in the works and found some gems that you might not actually realize was out there..

Trolling Codeplex

While panning for gold (or maybe just some Silverlight) I found a great project that brings EXtensible Messaging and Presence Protocol (XMPP) protocol to WPF Windows applications. It's a whole WPF client to support this called BinaryDialog  (aka BI Log IM). Besides being originally in French but easily translated using Babelfish. Keep a watch on this project as it should bring an open source messaging capability to your WPF applications.

Another gem was ZipStudio 2008. Yeah it's a utility/Visual Studio Add-in but it makes quick work of zipping up entire projects, especially if you have to make a copy of the project to a remote worker or customer for review directly in Visual Studio.

Sifting through the silt I also found the start of IronLogo, a currently very simple implementation of the LOGO language that uses IronRuby and runs from the DLR. This will be great for Silverlight in education as it's still a very popular first language for kids..

GemBlaster a very familiar looking game, which I still have a lot of fun with. It's done in Silverlight 1.1 by Keith J Rome and the source code is also present at codeplex so you can take a peek at how the game was created.

I know we all know how to play this game, but this version sure is a lot of fun and it's pretty quick.. Take a look, it's worth the browse..

 

 

 

PolyGraph3D is a basic 3D scene graph engine that provides the essential mechanics of displaying 3- dimensional objects in a 2-dimensional viewport using Silverlight 1.0 (3D objects are drawn into any existing Canvas element). This project is 100% cross-browser JavaScript.

 

PolyGraph3D has many basic features of a typical 3D engine, including polyhedral hierarchies, positioning/scaling/rotation, movable camera, and multiple brushes.

 

SVNConverter to the Rescue!

Starting with Team Foundation Server now, but have to migrate your source from Subversion? There is a handy dandy Subversion converter tool on CodePlex to make your life easy.. It transfers files, folders, version history, branches, and user information from a SVN database to Team Foundation source control.

Got LINQ? (Language Integrated Query)

And of course for builders there are now a ton of LINQ providers on CodePlex so you can connect to any and all sorts of data. These are very important to WPF developers and will see a lot of interest by developers when they start building with Silverlight 2.0. If you don't know what LINQ is; it's new to the .NET Framework 3.5 that allows more SQL-like querying of any kind of data. In the case of LINQ to JavaScript, it provides the ability to query against Arrays.

Here's a sampling of LINQ providers on CODEPLEX

LINQ to JavaScript

LINQ to JavaScript (JSLINQ for short) is an implementation of LINQ to Objects implemented in JavaScript. It is built using a set of extension methods built on top of the JavaScript Array object. If you are using an Array, you can use JSLINQ.

 

LINQ To SimpleDB

A LINQ provider for Amazon SimpleDB

LINQ Alias Generator

LINQ Alias Generator will automatically create "friendly" alias names for database column names commonly used in Linq2SQL.

PHPLINQ - LINQ for PHP - Language Integrated Query

A set of PHP classes mimicing C#3.0's LINQ (Language Integrated Query) extension methods.

Continuous LINQ

Continous LINQ is a .NET Framework 3.5 extension that builds on the LINQ query syntax to create continuous, self-updating result sets.

LINQ to Google

Linq to Google allows developers to easily query Google's Data Sources using a strongly typed syntax. Linq to Google shows an example of implementing IQueryable and IQueryProvider.

LINQExtender

LinqExtender is a query provider library that can be used to create custom LINQ providers without knowing anything of how expression is parsed or processed.

LINQ to Active Directory

LINQ to Active Directory implements a custom LINQ query provider that allows querying objects in Active Directory.

LINQ.Flickr

Easy to use LINQ priovder for Flickr, the api gives the power of query language right to the doorsteps of Flickr.

LINQ to Lucene

Providing a custom LINQ solution for the Lucene Information Retrieval System, commonly referred to as a search-engine.

InterLINQ

InterLINQ is an IQueryable Provider implementation. LINQ stands for Language Integrated Query and is one of the most important and powerful features of the new .NET 3.5 Technology

NLINQ

NLinq is a framework focusing on reimplementing the Linq functionnalities in Visual Studio .Net 2003 and Visual Studio 2005 (C# & VB .Net) by providing a Linq grammar parser and a "Linq To Objects"...

LINQ to metaweb(freebase)

Implement linq for metaweb api.

System Search to LinQ

The main goal of this project is create a LinQ extension to interact with the new functionality of desktop search using de advantages of the elegant and efficient programming model introduced by C#.

LINQ over C# project

This project is an extension to LINQ to provide query functions over C# language elements. The query parses the project files and works over the C# source code.

LinqToGeo - Language Integrated Query for Geospatial Data

LinqToGeo provides language-integrated query to geospatial data.

SLINQ - Streaming LINQ

An implementation of LINQ focused on streaming data.

MetaLinq - LINQ to Expressions

Class library that allows developers to use LINQ to search through and edit expressions in place, without having to manually recreate the expressions.

Cs2GenLinqToXml - Linq To Xml code generator

the utility allows: - To open a Xml file: the XLinq code is then generated in the richtextbox (and the structure of the Xml document posted in a treeview) - You can also copy in the clipboard of...

LINQ Expression Builder

A SQL to LINQ translator that will help the development community to adopt the new expression language using a user friendly integrated tool for Visual Studio 2008.

LINQ to SharePoint

LINQ to SharePoint is a custom LINQ query provider implementation for SharePoint that translates LINQ queries to CAML in order to query SharePoint lists.

i4o - Indexed LINQ

i4o (index for objects) is the first class library that extends LINQ to allow you to put indexes on your objects.

RLINQ

A port of Rainbow open source portal on .NET 2.0 using LINQ technology.

A custom implementation of the .NET Standard Query Operators from LINQ

This project provides a custom implementation of the .NET Standard Query Operators from LINQ, including unit tests for all operators.

Technorati tags: CodePlex, WPF, Silverlight, LINQ, SVN Conversion, Team Foundation Server

Cool Silverlight Site Spins Up in France...

By Don Burnett

 

Over at Microsoft France to promote their TechDays event, they had Brainsonic a great Rich Media production specialty company to come up with a great Silverlight site to promote their TechDays event. This is a really neat site because it uses not just Silverlight video, but some of the functionality we have seen in video demos for Microsoft Surface.. 

 

You should check out the site as it's a very innovative user interface and is a pretty incredible site and very informative with a lot of organic UI appeal. Scalable pictures and documents.

Here is the great searchable schedule page...

 

 

Technorati tags: TechDays, Microsoft France, Surface, Silverlight

Michigan Interactive Designers Meeting gets BIGGER for January 24, 2008 Meeting

by Don Burnett

Our January 24^th, 2008 meeting will be extended until 10:30pm so we can feature another very exciting technology that has just been released. You probably have seen the New York Times or Forbes WPF Readers. Well now the technology behind that, aka The Syndicated Client Experiences Starter Kit has been released. It’s a very cool RIA application that pulls in customized branded content via extended RSS feeds that you set up. It uses WPF client technology to display, search, print and more.  This is such an important application and there is so much interest we had to include it this month..

This is one of the first really killer applications for WPF, and now you can create your own desktop publication with syndicated and updated content, including advertising.. Our plan is to walk through customizing your own application for that company newsletter, technical publication and stepping through the server and client delivery process.

The Syndicated Client Experiences Starter Kit

.Net 3.0 and WPF made it possible to build rich, smart client applications that utilized some of the best features of the web app model (URL deployment for example) while fully exploiting the power and resources of the Windows desktop. SQL Server Compact Edition enabled those desktop applications to be built and deployed with an in-process database to cache data locally and work on or offline seamlessly. Now the Syndicated Client Experiences Starter Kit (built with Microsoft’s new Sync Framework) further simplify the development of these applications and facilitate the creation of new types of rich, optimal content experiences for the desktop – applications where content and design are afforded premium treatment and usability is a key consideration.

These Syndicated Client Experiences applications exploit the push capabilities of RSS in a model where each application retains full control over the presentation of the content. The Sync Framework and sync service take care of syncing, caching, subscription management and the safe caching of authentication credentials. These services are designed to help publishers focus on what matters to them most: providing differentiated content experiences with very rich content, branding, skinning and custom user interface elements for an optimal end-to-end user experience. With the Sync Framework doing the heavy lifting for sync and caching, each SC app can be relatively small in size – around 1-2mb typically.

The Syndicated Client Experiences Reader

SCE applications are sophisticated .Net applications that are web deployed, occasionally connected, and fully exploitive of the desktop providing the optimal user experience for your content. The SC Reader application (the first application sample to be included with the Beta) is a feature rich application that utilizes WPF’s advanced text and layout capabilities to present the best possible reading experience on any screen:

• Readability and Rich document presentation – Content is rendered with sophisticated text and layout capabilities including hardware-accelerated, sub-pixel clear type, typography and Open Type support for best possible legibility; dynamic hyphenation, adaptable columns and pages, reflow and zoom to adapt to the screen and window size of virtually any screen; figures and floaters, footers, support for ads and hosting of controls within the document.
• Personalization and Accessibility - Sophisticated content display capabilities with text zoom and accessibility built in.
• Intuitive and Effortless Navigation - The SC reader is designed for effortless and intuitive “Twitch Navigation” with many keyboard shortcuts and mouse gestures, DPad and touch support (for handheld devices and Tablet PCs, and a remote for 10-foot scenarios). Customizable contextual transitions minimize visual discontinuities during navigation.
• Commenting and Sharing - Built-in commenting and book-marking functionality enable users to reference and share pages, articles as well as attach and share ink, text comments.
• Mobility and Robustness – the Sync Framework-based sync service caches content from the content provider feed for performance and offline use. Content is synchronized and downloaded in the background and ready whenever a user wants to access it - offline or online.
• Premier Desktop Positioning – A quick-access Subscription Center utility enables users to peruse subscriptions and content, available offline by way of a powerful SQL Server Compact Edition store.
• High Fidelity Printing- A rich, adaptive model for printing content that fits intelligently on any paper selected.
• Support for numerous languages including Indic and East Asian languages.

 

Meeting Agenda Revised..

Video.SHOW: Creating your own "Tube" style website. A look at how to create a website that features streaming video content, using Windows Live Streaming for Silverlight, Tags, and Expression Media Encoder on a server.

Using the Open Source Slide.Show Silverlight control in your own photography website.

7:00pm- Welcome
7:15pm- Group News and Q & A
7:30pm- Video.SHOW demo and how-to presentation
8:00pm- Slide.SHOW demo and programming example
9:00pm- Syndicated Client Experiences Demo and Walkthru
10:30pm- Adjourned

 

Bring your laptop, and get copies of the source and review it with us.

You will be taken step-by-step through creating this application in Blend and Visual Studio..

You must have the following items installed and ready-to-go to participate

Microsoft SharedView
Microsoft Expression Blend (Free Trial Available for download)
Microsoft Visual Studio Express or Visual Studio 2008

 

Our meeting will be held at University of Michigan School of Architecture….

Meeting Location:

The University of Michigan
Taubman College of Architecture
Thursday January 24th, 2007
Meeting Time: 7pm – 10:30pm
2000 Bonisteel Blvd.  Room 2216
Ann Arbor, MI 48103

 

Technorati tags: WPF, Silverlight, Code-Walkthrus, Video.SHOW, YouTube, Slide.Show, photography slideshow, web, NYTimes Reader, Syndcated Client Experiences Starter Kit, RSS, Syndicated Magazine, Forbes, Seattle Post-Intelligencer, RIA, Newsletter Maker, self-updating newspaper client

Why Silverlight Video in VC-1 versus H.264 ? What the heck is WMV HD?

By Don Burnett

A lot of people really like Silverlight for video, but a lot of people ask me the question of why Microsoft supports VC-1 in Silverlight itself? The other question people ask is whatever happened to WMV HD.. So I thought I might look at some of the reasons behind this. Now this is obviously not the complete answer (you'd have to ask Microsoft yourself) but these are some of the things that come to mind..

Why Microsoft went with VC-1 support instead of H.264 in Silverlight in the wake of other companies adoptions of H.264 (Notably: Apple, Adobe, and MainConcept now owned by DIVX)..

The answer I have heard at a presentation when this question was asked:

"VC-1 wins on performance when H.264 targets quality; VC-1 wins on quality when H.264 targets performance"

In other words (my words) for web based video when decoding video in certain situations VC-1 gives better performance when you are using a profile where quality is targeted... Giving Silverlight some sort of advantage in decoding, which becomes extremely important with web playback where bandwidth dictates everything..

A lot of folks are looking at their strategies for video again this week due to Warner Bros defecting away from HD-DVD to Blu-Ray. Remember both players support VC-1 as well.

However if you are examining that issue again, just rememberthat choosing one codec standard over another doesn't automatically improve video quality of your output. The codec maybe accounts 10% of the quality difference at most, being that it's an end-to-end equipment issue more than the CODEC itself.

Will Silverlight ever add H.264 support? Time will tell, Microsoft isn't saying anything at the moment..

The other question asked..

If you have never heard of WMV HD, it was an initiative back in the way early days of Windows XP, before the dual core CPUs hit and gave 720p and 1080p video thru WMV format. Some DVD makers included the files with their dvd releases (some of the files distributed even lacked any DRM) and some DVD players would actually play back these files on DVD, giving people high definition access very early. Though at the time HDTV's were just coming into existence and most people only had 480p dvd players so they could only play these back on their computer through windows media player. The standard also worked for the web that far back as well. So if anyone tells you web HD video is "new" from this or that vendor, tell them they need to get their facts right and look back a few years to Microsoft's original efforts which pre-date even Apple's Quicktime HD..

Minimum Requirement during the XP Era to Playback HD Video

Minimum Configuration
(to play 720p video)

Windows XP

Windows Media Player 9 Series

2.4 GHz processor or equivalent (At the time $$$$$)

384 MB of RAM

64 MB video card

1024 x 768 screen resolution

16-bit sound card

Speakers

Optimum Configuration
(to play 1080p video with 5.1 surround sound)

Windows XP

Windows Media Player 10

DirectX 9.0

3.0 GHz processor or equivalent (At the time $$$$$$$$$)

512 MB of RAM

128 MB video card

1920 x 1440 screen resolution

24-bit 96 kHz multichannel sound card

5.1 surround sound speaker system

Technorati tags: VC-1, H.264, WMV, Silverlight

Seasons Greetings

by Don Burnett

 

This is probably my last post of the year here, to which I would like to wish everyone a great holiday season and thank you for your readership over the last year. I am planning a great 2008. May your 2008 be the best year ever.. Some things coming up in January, the launch of our pod cast and video cast. We are taking time to make the production values as professional as possible, not just folks sitting around in a room. I have been taking extra time with this due to my video production background, as I want this to shine. We are working with the folks at Screencast.com (and Techsmith) to make this a success. Techsmith is a great Michigan based company focused completely on user experience oriented products and they make the best tools on the market for screen capture and usability testing. If you aren't familiar with Morae, UserVue, SnagIt, or Camtasia Studio then you should investigate their site right now..

Speaking of great blogs and WPF/Silverlight Stefan Wick has a great site for folks developing WPF and Silverlight applications for TabletPC and Ink.. He has a super article on how to render ink and image to a bitmap using WPF. He also made a great Silverlight Holiday Greeting that is so cool that I wanted to give it as my holiday card to you.. He also shows you how you can add it to your own site.

 

 

 

Technorati tags: Screencast.com, TechSmith, WPF, Silverlight, Stefan Wick, TabletPC, Ink, Seasons Greetings

"Did you ever dance with the Devil in the Pale Moonlight?"

by Don Burnett

Okay so the quote doesn't really fit with what I am actually writing here, "but I just like the sound of it.."...

Sorry folks I could hardly resist that one after seeing the new Trailer for the Dark Knight. It looks way cool with a Joker done in a way that Nicholson or even Caesar Romero could have never brought out.. It was playing during the really great Will Smith movie "I am Legend".. Which is set in not so future New York.. It was neat seeing the fake billboards in the movie for the Superman/Batman Movie that had a release date of sometime in 2010... Anyone catch that stuff?? The logo looked cool. It had the batman/superman logo from the comic but with the new Superman logo..

"Why so Serious??"

Anyway the recurring theme of tonight's tidbits come from the Moonlight FAQ over at Novell..

 

Important answers that I am sure everyone want's to know about the Silverlight version for Linux.. This should fill in everyone about how video codecs, etc. will be available for Moonlight when it's released in 2008...

 

Quoted from their FAQ: "

 

..How will Moonlight be delivered?

Moonlight will be available as a single download from Novell which will include the browser plugin plus the Silverlight graphics engine and the Mono runtime. The codecs necessary to host Silverlight content on Linux will be available from Microsoft. The Moonlight installer will make obtaining the MSFT codecs a seamless step in the process.

I thought the codecs were Microsoft proprietary technology. How do I get those for Moonlight?

Microsoft will make these codecs freely available for Linux.

How much will Moonlight cost?

Similar to Silverlight on Windows, Moonlight will be freely available for all supported platforms.

When will Moonlight be available?

Moonlight version 1.0 will be available at the beginning of 2008.

Will Moonlight be feature compatible with Silverlight on Windows?

Yes.

Can I use Microsoft's Silverlight development tools to build Moonlight applications?

Yes

Will Moonlight be open source?

The Moonlight browser plug-in, the graphics engine and Mono runtime which will be available from Novell are open source components. The necessary audio and video codecs are proprietary components.

How are Microsoft and Novell collaborating to provide Moonlight?

This collaboration between Microsoft and Novell is a formal engineering development program. Novell is bringing the .NET-based Silverlight framework to Mono, an open source framework for running .NET applications on multiple platforms including Linux. Microsoft is providing a version of the necessary codecs for Linux.

Will Moonlight be available for Linux distributions other than Novell's SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop?

Yes, Moonlight will be designed to run on most Linux distributions, on any platform that Mono supports.

Why is Moonlight necessary when Flash already runs on Linux?

Moonlight provides users and developers of rich media another platform for delivering content. Moonlight provides users additional choice when creating content or viewing web-based rich media content.

Does this mean that Microsoft is officially endorsing Mono as an acceptable framework for running .NET applications on Linux?

We are focused on enabling developers and customers to run Silverlight applications on Windows, Macintosh, and Linux operating systems. Beyond this collaboration with Novell on the Moonlight project, Microsoft currently does not have plans to endorse Mono broadly...

"

Technorati tags: Silverlight, Moonlight Plug-in, Linux, Novell

2007: The Year In Review, 2008: The Year to Come

by Don Burnett

I read many blogs, one of my favorites is by Aral Balkan. He keeps me up with what's going on in the Adobe community and also is working on a data exchange format called SWX for Flash and other technologies including PHP and others that allows you to pass complex data objects between server and client. At the end of year we all blog about predictions for the year ahead. His blog states "In my predictions for 2008, I talked about how we will be seeing more RIAs in 2008 -- both from Adobe and third parties -- how Silverlight is not going to have a widespread impact".

I have a very hard time not looking back at 2007 for myself and seeing the impact first hand. Silverlight is only in it's infancy. It isn't to version 9.0 like Adobe Flash is. I like Flash, I have used it on website designs ever since the days it was something called FutureSplash Animator. During that time FutureSplash was working with Microsoft to make it one of the first ActiveX controls for Internet Explorer 4.0. I was also there for ActionScript 1.0... and so forth..  Don't get me wrong I love Flash, but it's not the end-all multimedia plug-in. It fits the needs of many people but it's not a one-size fits all proposition.

I only need to look back some to look ahead...

Silverlight has been around for about nine months, before that it was called WPF/E..  What has nine months brought us... Well lets take a look at some Silverlight 1.0 applications..

A new world of video for the web and unparalleled functionality...

SilverlightTV Demo (Count em 9 Picture-in Picture Video sources)

Video Puzzles in 720p HD

Video Overlay for Advertising

Dynamic Languages running cross platform (with Silverlight 2.0, still in development) with Intellisense...

Virtual Earth Viewer

Video Editing from inside a Web Browser (Metaliq's Top Banana)

I look at these examples and I find myself in saying wow! I don't think we would have ever seen things like this a year ago, especially inside a web browser.. It has become a platform unto itself, running independently of any operating system, but running in many (including Safari and the Apple Macintosh).

But it's not just these examples, we see many being used in real life. Microsoft is busy documenting these world-wide and you can see them at Silverlight.net.. Before Silverlight the web had no HD video (even from those other guys out there). Let's face it the prevailing multimedia plug-in (when Silverlight came along) had no reason to improve or get better and only saw gradual UI/Animation/Video improvements. The web browser has become the center of life now for many users and their applications. Even with Silverlight being so new, the technology reflects that now mostly centrist view that many people have.

Building on that, how about a full "You Tube" style video site sample so you can build your own, with full media encoding? Thank you Vertigo..

The fact is Silverlight has had a very huge impact on the web already. If you want to see more go to Silverlight.net. In the showcase right now there are more than 94 different applications from over 30 countries profiled. If that's not impact, You've got me..

 

As far as it goes for My predictions for 2008, a new improved 2.0 with much of the functionality already available to Windows applications (WPF), and a great integration story with browsers and platforms..

One of the things people are predicting for 2008 is advances in 3D. Silverlight at the moment doesn't include it's own in-built3D engine, much like Adobe Flash. Mostly this is due to the need for hardware accelerated 3D but no way to know this is available because it runs in the browser and just what capabilities it might have (like shader technology and hardware acceleration).

That doesn't mean you can't run a Windows Application with Accelerated 3D right now from an IE browser window. The only caveat, is this isn't cross-platform like Silverlight and you must be on a Windows OS to view. But exciting as well, is the fact that, even with those limitations people are doing some great no-install applications. Including this one from a Japanese Zoo, which is an incredible 3D multimedia learning experience.

http://asahiyamazoo.xbap

 

So if you think Silverlight isn't making a serious impact, you only have to look at what's really going on to see that 2007 has been a great year for the technology and 2008 is going to be an even greater year, especially with .NET 3.5's release and Silverlight 2.0's impending release which adds the power of .Net applications to the "mix".. It's been an exciting year for innovation and there will be even more this next year..

Technorati tags: Year in Review, Silverlight, WPF, Impact

 

 

.

Video.Show updated for Visual Studio 2008

By Don Burnett

 

Vertigo has been doing some excellent reference quality samples for both the Silverlight and WPF communities lately proving that you can create very professional applications and websites with not a lot of work.  One of the most exciting reference web applications I have seen in a very long time is their Video.Show application. It supports end-to-end functionality and the code is very well written and is a great example of how you can create a "videos" type site, in the spirit of YouTube.com. Now having said that this sample doesn't support the sheer volume of videos that YouTube.com does every day, but it will get you on your way to your own video site.

You can download and install the source on CodePlex and then start delving into all the great functionality this site offers. One of the most exciting features about this site is that the site will let you encode videos using Expression Encoder for the site (if it's installed on your webserver).

It supports uploading videos to the Live Silverlight streaming site..

If you are trying to build such a site for yourself it gives you some great how-to code samples, including:

• Video is hosting at Silverlight Streaming, which gives you 4GB storage and 700 Kbps bandwidth via Microsoft's worldwide Content Delivery Network
• How to add user comments to the site that are time-based and are synchronized with video playback
• Demonstrates how to a data layer built using Linq To Sql
• Broad media format support (avi,mp4,asf,mpeg,dvr-ms,mpg,m2v,ts,m4v,vob,mov, and wmv) via Expression Encoder. That means you can upload quicktime movies, MPeg, DVD assets, and many more.
• It will show you how to leverage the AJAX Control Toolkit to add animations and interactivity.
• Encoding properties are configurable via standard Expression Encoder job files. This means you have total control of videos size and quality.
• How to create a Cross broswer (IE 6 and 7, Firefox 2, and Safari 3)  application.
• It's Open Source!!! And it will show you how to create a webservice based architecture.

 

Technorati tags: Silverlight 1.0, Silverlight Streaming Service for video hosting, Silverlight Streaming integration via REST API, Expression Encoder, AJAX Control Toolkit, Visual Studio 2008, Packaging API (for Zip file creation), ASP.NET / .NET 3.5, Linq To Sql

Vertigo Rocks with Slide.Show for Silverlight

by Don Burnett

Vertigo is a great development firm they keep coming out with great application reference samples and code for the WPF and Silverlight Community.. In the past they have done such very work as Family.show for WPF (a genealogy program) and Video.show (a "mini" YouTube  style site for Silverlight that takes advantage of Expression Media Encoder on the server-side).. The Slide.Show control would be great for professional photographers looking to show of their high quality pictures on a Silverlight based website.

 

They have recently release version 1.1 of their Slide.Show Silverlight "control" for doing great commercial quality slide shows with Silverlight. They have also made this release open source and available for download on Codeplex.

 

Technorati tags: Family.Show, Vertigo, Silverlight, Silverlight Controls, Video.show, Slide.show

Silverlight on the Apple Mac- The Story Continues

by Don Burnett

Since the 1.0 version of Silverlight has shipped on the Apple Mac platform, it has become a very popular plug-in, not just with users but with third party developers. It's hard not to see the potential for the plug-in's great cross platform video solution Silverlight presents. Sure it's new, and there are a few things they are still working out on it, but for most people it's a trooper.  The Mac community has been clamoring for a way to natively on OS X encode Silverlight Video and output it directly on the Mac, especially in broadcast arenas. The Apple platform is famous for it's digital video solutions in QuickTime and  Final Cut Pro is one of the most used professional editing tools out there.. Having said that, to create Silverlight video, until now you could only go part of the way, producing a WMV output file. To create Silverlight video then you'd have to import video into Expression Media Encoder (either .MOV (QuickTime) or .WMVs). That still left no native way of producing Silverlight video natively in OS X until now..

 

Enter Flip4Mac's Silverlight Support..

 

 

 

 Flip4Mac makes a set of well known Components for Quicktime that allow it to play and manipulate Windows Media Video and Audio formats.  The latest beta supports encoding to Silverlight directly and will add the well known media player and media skins that are available with Expression Media Encoder. This is exciting news for those looking to create Silverlight Video and not having access to a Windows box to do it.

Check out the new support today at Flip4Mac.com right now..

 

Technorati tags: Flip4Mac, Native Silverlight Encoding, WMV components for the Mac, OSX, Silverlight Video

Sunday Night News

By Don Burnett

Hob Noble Gobbles!

Happy Thanksgiving to you all. I wish you and your family all of the best. The holiday week is coming up, however there are some really cool and important events coming up that you should know about just after the holidays and I am not talking about "Black Friday" sales. It's going to be a December to remember in the design community, but more about that a little bit later. First onto XAML adoption..

Moonlight Madness (Surveying Open Source Blogs featuring XAML and the Moonlight Plug-in)

Bringing Silverlight to the Linux community is starting to bear some really cool results.. Over at Jackson's Activity Log it's noted back in September that they got the plug-in working to allow layers of html elements on top of a Moonlight control. That meant sites like tafiti.com now works within the Moonlight plugin.. Apparently this wasn't supportable until Firefox version 3.0 and that meant also that other plug-ins like Flash couldn't support it. Score one for IE flexibility..

Also at Jackson's Blog he has written a nice beginners guide to writing XAML by hand.. It's actually very useful for even Microsoft Silverlight developers and will talk about how to right XAML, well formedness, properties and collections. It's a good introduction if you have never looked at XAML before. He even explains how to define custom tags.

A December to Remember...

If you haven't heard about it, all next month the Phizzpop Design Challenge continues regionally, in Austin, Boston and New York, as well as Los Angeles and Chicago. What's so important about this event ? It will bring together the best of the best designers in a competition to see who can come up with the best design solution in the shortest amount of time. You will see some really skilled people attacking problem solving situations in real life. The winners will compete at the South by Southwest Interactive Conference in Austin, TX. The regional competitions will be open to the public (you do have to register to attend) and space is limited and filling up fast, so please register soon. On top of this all Microsoft is also giving out some free beverages (woo hoo!). This sounds like a totally great time, seeing design professionals in action in a swanky "hotspots and free beverages, what more can anyone ask!

Regional Locations

New York
Hiro Ballroom
http://www.themaritimehotel.com/hiroBallroom.html
363 West 16th Street
New York, NY 10011
212-242-4300
Doors Open: 6pm
End Time: 11pm then club opens to public welcome to stay
Directions
Chicago
The Underground
http://www.theundergroundchicago.com/
56 West Illinois St.
Chicago, IL 60610
312-644-7600
Doors Open: 6pm
End Time: 10pm
Directions
Los Angeles
Elevate Lounge
http://www.takamisushi.com/
811 Wilshire Boulevard, Suite 2100
Los Angeles, CA 90017
213-236-9600
Doors Open: 6pm
End Time: 12am
Directions
Boston
Saint
http://www.saintnitery.com/
90 Exeter Street
Boston, MA 02116
617-236-1134
Doors Open: 6pm
End Time: 10pm then club opens to public welcome to stay
Directions
Austin
J Black's Feel Good Lounge
Black's
710 W 6th St Ste B
Austin, TX 78701
512-433-6954
Doors Open: 6pm
End Time: 10pm
Directions

Technorati tags: Silverlight, Moonlight Plug-in, PhizzPop Design Challenge

Ken Arbogast-Wilson: Silverlight at the University of Michigan College of Architecture and Urban Planning

by Don Burnett

A Unique Cross-Platform Silverlight Solution at University of Michigan- Ken Arbogast-Wilson The Interview

By Don Burnett

Ken Arbogast-Wilson was nice enough to sit down with me and let me interview him about the College of Architecture and Urban Planning new use of Microsoft Design Tools and software, as well as, Silverlight to solve a huge cross-platform content delivery dilemma. We plan a more in-depth look at this solution and how it was implemented in an upcoming video netcast..Thanks Mr. Arbogast-Wilson for allowing yourself to be interviewed... So here we go..

Question One:

So Ken what’s your relationship to the university and school etc..

Ken Arbogast-Wilson: I am the manager of media development and production at the University of Michigan College of Architecture + Urban Planning. I am essentially responsible for the college's web presence, as well as assisting in technology development used by our six programs. With over 600 students, 65 faculty, and 30 staff, we are constantly looking for new ways to leverage technology to help improve the educational environment and make our instruction more accessible.

Question Two:

I hear they are going to start using Silverlight for their Lectures?

Ken Arbogast-Wilson: The college turned 100 in 2006, and we had a year or high-profile events that necessitated web video, both on-demand and live streaming for several lectures and a three-day conference. In spite of settling on using windows media multiple bit rate streaming for these events, we also created quicktime versions for audience members with Macs. Lets just say we spent a lot of time encoding last year. I started dabbling in Silverlight video just recently, and by using Expression Encoder, I was able to create a cross-platform video with its own player that would execute right in the web page.

Question Three:

What kind of content?

Ken Arbogast-Wilson: We have a variety of content, but essentially public lectures by noted architects and planners. We also have some projects created by students as part of their coursework, and recruiting videos. A lot of our architecture students create 3-D animations of their work in 3D Studio Max, I could see making those more accessible through Silverlight too.

Question Four:
Why Silverlight?

Ken Arbogast-Wilson: Simplicity and power in one package. I like that I can encode my footage one time, have the player already configured, add a leader and trailer, and get everything I need to go live. With the possibility of up to 720p quality output, I can create work that would not only be usable on the web, but in a studio course, or for student reviews. What's more, I can customize the whole project in Expression Blend, adding even more functionality, and improving the user experience for our audiences.

Question Five:

How is it being received so far?

Ken Arbogast-Wilson: Our IT manager was stunned when I showed him. I expect we will receive very favorable reactions from visitors to our site when we release a series of lectures on diversity later this month.

Question Six:
How easy was it to do a Video Project in Silverlight?

Ken Arbogast-Wilson: It was very easy. I am a designer first, and tech guy second, and I was pretty excited that I could see my intention show through with very few compromises to the design aesthetic. Between Expression Encoder, Blend, and Design, I have a suite of pretty tightly integrated tools to accomplish nearly anything I can dream up.

Wow that's impressive. Thanks Ken for your time..We will be visiting Ken again soon, with a more in-depth look on our new netcast.

Technorati tags: College of Architecture and Urban Planning, University of Michigan, Silverlight, Video Cross-Platform solution

Announcing the New Webcast

by Don Burnett

Coming Soon to this Blog...

Conversation, "How-to's", special guests and what you really need to know about what's going on in the ever expanding .Net Designer Community..

There will be a bi-weekly pod-cast, with every month an alternating video-cast.

Technorati tags: Designing for .NET, webcast, podcast, videocast, wpf, silverlight, Expression Studio, Expression Blend, Expression Design, Expression Media, Expression Media Encoder, bi-weekly, monthly.

More UX@UM Content

by Don Burnett

If you missed the UX@UM day presentations, or are one of the many people anxious to get at the content. We have been able to upload about half of the content (the other half is coming, there is just a lot of it, and most of what is left includes video tutorials, so it's just a matter of getting it all uploaded and online. If you'd like to look at the presentations and some of the other content, you can check it out on my Windows Live SkyDrive..

Click on the drive here to access the content..

Technorati tags: User Experience Design, http://technorati.com/tags/UX@UM, Silverlight, Expression Web, Expression Media, Expression Blend, WPF, University of Michigan, Content

UX@UM Michigan Expression Day 2007 Sold Out!

by Don Burnett

Introduction
User Experience based design and development is a hot topic today. It's on the words of business and advertising but it's also in a few unexpected places, including Academia.. I have been working with local and regional User Experience Evangelists from Microsoft and with University of Michigan folks to bring a special day of user experience exploration and training to University of Michigan. I am pleased to tell you that the event is SOLD OUT.. If this event interests you and you can't make it to this event or you are a U-M person who wants to attend never fear. We have a wait list and we are planning on working with the University to make another event like this available soon If you are a U-M person click here to get on the waitlist. If you are not a U-M person and want to attend a local event like this send me an email, and we'll get you on the waitlist for a similar (but non-academic) event. don@donburnett.com.

Event Information

Friday, September 28
9:00 am - 5:00 pm

UM Duderstadt Center
3336 AC/BD

Devote a day to take your user experience knowledge to the next level. We've brought together top user experience evangelists--whose applications are used by people around the world--to present a special UM-only program on best practices for creating standards-based sites and demonstrations on how you can leverage rich media and interactivity with Microsoft Expression Studio.

Speakers

Chris Bernard is a user experience evangelist for Microsoft. He works in software design, development and business domains to communicate Microsoft's position on the importance of user experience in software design. Prior to his work at Microsoft, he was creative director at a large technology-focused professional services company. Chris brings over 14 years of expertise in design, consulting, strategy, business frameworks, design research, analysis, synthesis, planning and implementation. His mission as a design professional is applying principles of contextual research, cultural, human, physical and social factors to the products, services and systems that he develops. Chris has an M.S. in Marketing Communications from the Stuart Graduate School of Business and a M.D.M (Master of Design Methods) from the Institute of Design. Both schools are affiliated with the Illinois Institute of Technology. http://chrisbernard.blogs.com/

Eric Burke is a software engineer who was on the team responsible for Yahoo! soon to be released Yahoo! Messenger for Windows Vista, done all with Microsoft WPF technologies. Eric has had much experience with developing applications that have enhanced user experiences. He will be discussing the design process with Chris Bernard.

Josh Holmes is an Architect Evangelist with Microsoft. Prior to joining Microsoft, Josh was a consultant working with a variety of clients ranging from large Fortune 500 firms to smaller sized companies. Josh is a frequent speaker and lead panelist at national and international software development conferences focusing on emerging technologies, software design and development with an emphasis on mobility and RIA (Rich Internet Applications). Community focused, Josh has founded and/or run many technology organizations from the Great Lakes Area .NET Users Group to the Ann Arbor Computer Society and was on the forming committee for CodeMash. http://www.joshholmes.com/.

Ken Arbogast-Wilson is founder and creative director of WTW Design Group, a southeast Michigan firm focused on design, marketing and advertising. Ken has a BBA from the University of Michigan and an MBA from Michigan State University. He has been creating singular designs for more than thirteen years. Ken has expertise in concepting, design, drawing, copywriting, editing, marketing planning, communication consulting, and anything involved with new technology. In addition to running WTW Design Group, Ken manages media development and production for the University of Michigan College of Architecture + Urban Planning. Prior to that, Ken worked for a variety of companies including M-CARE (UM's managed care provider), Cellular One, and Marshall Field & Company, Chicago. http://wtwdesign.com/

Don Burnett is a technology evangelist, project manager, interactive designer, and nationally recognized technology blogger specializing in rich media application development for web and desktop. Don's past work for creating, designing, and deploying multimedia applications and products include Disney Interactive, SegaSoft, Universal Interactive, and MediaOne. http://blog.donburnett.com/

Agenda

8:30 am-9:15 am
Check-in and refreshments
9:15 am-9:30 am
Welcome
Ken Arbogast-Wilson
Keynote Session
9:30-10:30 am
The Importance of User Experience Design

Chris Bernard

10:30-11:30 am

Introduction of Expression Studio, WPF and Web Demos

Chris Bernard, Josh Holmes, Don Burnett

11:30 am-1:00 pm

Lunch on your own

How-to Sessions

Option 1
1:00-2:00 pm
Designing Windows Experiences
Don Burnett
Option 2
1:00-2:00 pm
Designing Rich Web Experiences
Josh Holmes
Panel Discussion Sessions

Option 1
2:00-3:00 pm
The Value of User Experience Design in Education
Chris Bernard
Option 2
2:00-3:00 pm
Integrating Expression with Your Tools Arsenal

Don Burnett

3:00 pm-3:15 pm

Break

Capstone Session

3:15 pm-5:00 pm

Design Process for Yahoo Messenger with Expression Designer Tools

Chris Bernard and Eric Burke
Closing remarks
Chris Bernard and Josh Holmes

Technorati tags: Expression Studio, User Experience Design, University of Michigan, Expression Day 2007, Microsoft, Silverlight, WPF, Web 2.0, Design, Development

Swift 3d 5.0 Supports Silverlight

by Don Burnett

Animation solutions that support Silverlight compatible XAML output seem to be blossoming as acceptance of Silverlight is growing by leaps and bounds.. Interestingly enough they are only to version 4.5 on the Mac yet. That must say something about web artists using PCs, and this company is increasingly targeting Windows users.

Electric Rain's Swift 3d 5.0 animation powerhouse tool now supports Silverlight compliant XAML export (along with WPF)..

The exciting thing about their output is that it works just like their Flash add-in.. So, you can do all the cool things you see people doing in Adobe Flash with Swift3d now in Microsoft Silverlight. The XAML is also quite compliant with Expression Blend, so you'll be able to integrate this tool with Expression Studio... Some of you might ask why then would you want to use Swift3d and Zam3d both? The answer is simple. Zam3d is aimed at WPF based real time 3D interactivity.

While Swift 3D 5.0 can output three dimensional animations in Silverlight as 2D frames (like it does again for Adobe Flash), Silverlight is missing hardware accelerated 3D support. Swift3D is a very cool product and it is proving that you don't need a 3D engine present to still show wonderful rendered 3D results.

Some of the advantages Swift3D has as an animation package are full-featured support for many things you only find in professional animation packages. And very dynamic import and export in many formats.

The Converted scores with work on a new Silverlight compliant version..

The converted is a very cool tool that's in development right now (you can buy it here). The author of this tool has much in the way of animation expertise, and considers the work one that will see much updating as Silverlight itself matures into a more rich and efficient animation environment. For now though this tool is very slick.

Technorati tags: Electric Rain, XAML, Silverlight, the Converted, SWF to XAML, Swift3d version 5.0, XAML and Silverlight Export. Quality 3D now on Silverlight.

Windows Live Explodes

by Don Burnett

Wow it's been a wild week for new technology. Microsoft's Live initiatives is seeing some impressive results.. Let's get to these...

First look at this beautiful web browser, in of course the Apple iPhone... What's really cool about it is it's usability.. Content scrolls and zooms at your fingertips..

"42 Wallaby Way, Sidney.."

No it's not Finding Pixar/Disney's Nemo 2, but Microsoft Live Labs new Mobile web browser for Windows Mobile 5 and Above... DEEPFISH...

The nice thing about Windows Mobile based products is that you can just install new programs and upgrade your Windows Mobile's Installation. Unlike the Apple iPhone which Apple locks you out of installing new applications from third parties. Applications for the iPhone require web browser access at the moment for 3rd party content. Granted some Windows Mobile providers do the same thing, as a matter of security (which very few end users agree with) but the majority of Windows Mobile devices let you install new updates and 3rd party applications.

When the iPhone was released just about everyone agreed it has great web browser with scaling and zooming of web pages. Windows Mobile users felt left behind, until now.

Deepfish enhances existing mobile browsing technologies by displaying content in a view that is closer to the desktop experience. The zoom-able interface and cue map allow you to quickly access the information you care about over the web without ever losing track of where you are. Right now it's still in development, and they have been doing community technology previews, so keep an eye out for the next set of invites to betas if it interests you..

The scaling technology is pretty advanced and amazing. If you have looked at Microsoft's Photosynth you will see a familiar imaging engine, called SeaDragon. It also supports things like dynamic overlays, so you'll see some very exciting things in the future with content integration..

On10.net has some exclusive video if you are interested in seeing this cool new technology. Between this and Windows Mobile Live Search, my iPhone interest is beginning to wain. I will say I would think the design of the iPhone is cool, if they just supported more than AT&T as a carrier now and opened it truly up to 3rd party NON-WEB applications..

You say Taffy, I say Tafiti !

One of the coolest interfaces ever... Tafiti means "To Research.." Many other people have blogged about it here, but I am just going to say that this is the coolest interface to a search engine ever. It's done in Silverlight and gives you not only access to searching thru images, RSS feeds and the Web, as well as books and news. If you want to know what the web you work with will look like in the next few years, check out the richness of this application. I bet they have even Google salivating with such a great user experience.

Most search engines just display content and you have to capture the data yourself. With Tafiti everything is just like working with the physical content. You can pick up content (of any type) and drag and drop content on stacks while labeling it and storing it. The user experience value of this application is phenomenal and should revolutionize how we work with content when we research things on the web. The correlation between the User Interface and what you actually do when you research and organize that research is almost exactly one-to-one.. Another nice feature (but not sure how people will end up using it is a tree view). You can also store and return to individual searches as well as merging them.

This is a UI tour-de-force, and it's only a "demonstration"

Look up in the sky! It's Windows Live SkyDrive!

The competition for online storage of your files is heating up. Microsoft has a new release of Windows SkyDrive for online storage. If you use Windows Live for storage you'll find the great for situations where you want to share files over multiple computers.

SkyDrive is also giving Windows Live Writer an assist! There is a new plug-in that you can download to allow you to link content to your blogs/writing consumers to also access content saved to your SkyDrive folders inside of Windows Live Writer. Yeah file based content embedding finally! It even lets you put it in an iframe, just in case your provider doesn't like you linking up due to server restrictions.

Technorati tags: Windows Live, Silverlight, Rich Internet Application, Search, Google, Tafiti, SkyDrive, Web 2.0, iPhone, DeepFISH

Flash Video and H.264

We consumers are seeing some really cool things from competition between Microsoft Silverlight and Adobe Flash. Today the Flash plug-in gets a major upgrade to join Silverlight in supporting HD video over the web. The exciting thing is the plug-in will also support playing other video formats including QuickTime. H.264 is supported by major video companies and is great for video and streaming over the web. Apple also is a big supporter of H.264. This really wasn't a surprise that Flash would add this kind of support; I expected this when Adobe Media Player was announced and it supported such multi-formats.

So where does this leave the competition with Silverlight you might ask? I would consider them dead even for web video, but really the 1.1 Silverlight release still shines ahead because of the .NET runtime that has been refactored into it. The one edge it has is the CLR (Common Language Runtime) which is almost a platform itself. The only way I'd consider that Flash has capabilities, beyond Silverlight, would be if Adobe and Sun were to get together and offer a plug-in that integrated Flash with a Java virtual machine.

Someone said to me today, "Now that Flash has high definition video, no one will even bother with Silverlight, because it has nothing people want, it's just a “want-to-be". My first thought was well," Wrong I don't see it that way. You are completely missing the point of having .NET in the runtime".

The CLR (.NET runtime) gives you things like extensibility and core features you expect from an operating system that arguably aren't present in Flash or Action Script at the moment. It's also language agnostic unlike Java. In a world where the operating system is quickly becoming the network and what framework you are running to provide your users with a set of services are make or break, you will start to see the difference in complexity of applications very soon.
It's possible with a combination of Silverlight and GOA WinForms to move entire windows applications (including enterprise applications) to the platform agnostic Silverlight (yes it runs on Mac and PC and soon Linux). Some of you might remind me that GOA also makes a Flash version, but it's not quite the same because of the CLR/.NET runtime. If you use another RIA platform you don't get that same rich set of APIs and functions that almost make it an operating system out of it.

In my opinion Silverlight's .NET runtime almost qualifies itself as a platform agnostic OS. Because of this, if you are in Flash or Flash with AIR your applications begin to look thin, or you have to resort to browser integrated applications to get the functionality. Both are designed not for the same purposes, so it's like comparing apples to oranges with their individual design sensibilities.

The CLR in Silverlight means things run faster (not like JavaScript based web browser applications), and they are ultimately easier to make SECURE. No one has talked about security in RIA's (Rich Internet Applications) yet that much. But believe me when they become common place, who will be better poised to be secure and offer more OS services type of support.
Don't get me wrong, I am glad Adobe brought Flash video into HD and the world of H.264, we all benefit from that, plus the ability to play other movie formats right from that one plug in. With a 98% of the browsers in the world having Flash installed, this will be a major upgrade in capability for most everyone. But why did they add this now? Why did it take Adobe so long, they have obviously been working on this for some time? Why try to cover playing so many video file formats (beyond H.264)? It's obvious that Silverlight is gaining momentum on Adobe Flash. But the reason isn't probably video, though Adobe needed to do this to stay in the game.
Does the new Flash version make everything that is in Silverlight's core functionality obsolete or negate people doing work in Silverlight? I don't believe so, not at all! I believe because of Silverlight 1.1's CLR we'll see a whole new class of capable Rich Internet Applications that compete successfully with Java and gives the web a framework that's really its own OS. That's something Flash on its own still isn't competing with.

I would tell developers and designers to just remember that Silverlight with the .NET CLR (common language runtime) is not just a platform for cool video and animated graphics, the core services it provides really bridges the gap from calling it just a plug-in, to making it full web platform, one that is language and web browser agnostic for development and platform as well, that we are just starting to see the benefits. Now a Windows platform developer can take his full windows application and implement most if not all functionality in Silverlight and have it run just about anywhere. It is a platform that doesn't care if you are on a Windows or Mac box or what browser you are running.
So, Adobe Flash got better, but is it good enough? I would question how rich an API and how functional you can make an Flash or AIR application, versus Silverlight with the .NET Runtime. I think our next battle the industry will see in the world of RIA's and which platform has the best most complete API's and set of functionality. Sure RIA's are new and not that functional yet, but would you rather go with a full featured framework to build your applications that people already build current platform applications daily? Or one that doesn't let you go as deep as you needed or something that is new and barely scratches the surface. I love the CLR and the extensibility and the fact that it's a real "web platform" not just a framework that just gets you as far as taking you out of the browser.

In this sense I think it will be a battle between Java and Silverlight, not Adobe Flash and Silverlight. If you just even look at the functionality, you should think about what can do with a Java application today versus a Flash application. You will see there is a decent amount of disparity of functionality for core services, just like the situation when comparing Adobe Flash and Microsoft Silverlight.

I was hoping today (instead of just adding HD video) that the Flash runtime was to be totally reworked from top to bottom, improving the runtime, making Action Script just one of the possible languages. I'd like to see the runtime reworked to support multiple languages, a better set of core framework functionality that goes way beyond Action Script. I hope the competition continues because we users are heavily benefiting.

Someone asked me today if I thought Flash with HD Video, would trump Silverlight or stop the defections to Silverlight? Until Adobe gets a framework refactored into with all the services of .Net, or partners with Sun/Java to make Flash and Java one big plug-in, the defections will continue.

Who will win the RIA battle? I can't really honestly guess at this stage.. I think the winner will be whoever gets RIA development to the stages where they are just as capable as an enterprise platform application with all the same available services. Whoever gets there first will no doubt win all the marbles. Right now, I believe personally, Silverlight has the win here because of the .NET runtime (CLR). The heart and soul of Windows development now works everywhere. The way I see it, Silverlight is more a competitor to Java than it is Flash, because it's almost an entirely self contained platform. Its original purpose (still in definition) isn't just cool graphics and video on a web browser. Silverlight is much deeper. I think it's Microsoft's recognition that the OS is no longer on the PC but inside the network and web browser. It's a framework that runs on many platforms and gives you services everywhere.

These of course are just opinions and how I see things. Tell me what you think. Have you worked with both? Am I off the mark? Or missing points?

Technorati tags: Adobe, core OS services, Dot NET, Flash, Flash plug-in, H.264, HD Video for Web, RIA, Rich Internet Application, Silverlight