Slashdot Mirror
Flash, Meet Sparkle
Robert writes "Microsoft finally released more information about their Sparkle product on a Channel 9 MSDN video. Sparkle is vector based XAML system for doing applications that may have traditionaly been done in flash. Ars Technica's Josh Meier has a few things to say about it, too."
Can you see I am serious!
Get out of my way, all of you!
This is no place for loafers.
Join me or die.
Can you do any less?
For lucky best wash, use Mr. Sparkle.
Now I'm gonna need SparkleBlock as well as FlashBlock. More browser plugin bloat.
Mr. Sparkle: A joint venture of Matsumura Fishworks and Tamaribuchi Heavy Manufacturing Concern
Product Demonstration here
Yet, here it is, with a name that sounds exactly like it's directly competing with Flash. Along those lines, why Sparkle? Flash sounds cool, but Sparkle sounds...girly.
Otherwise, the concept actually sounds really cool, like the visual component of Visual Studio on steroids. Replacing the windowing interface with purely vector graphics sounds promising, though it also sounds a little too abuseable. Still, this might herald the beginning of an actually innovative M$, seeing that they now have Google and FOSS knocking on its doors.
I wonder if it'll make use of the GPU to do the rendering.
"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be."
"programs like winamp"?
How about "programs like MS Office" which since God knows when has come with its own separate widgetset? You see, those UI guidelines, those are for *other* programmers to follow.
N4st0r, trixx0r h0bb1tz0rz! Th3y st0l3 0ur pr3c10uzz!
is still technically XML
Snowden and Manning are heroes.
"historical performance is a reasonable basis for prediction."
Ah, this is an interesting rule. Well, in that case, I'd like to point out that next year will not be the year for Linux on the desktop.
"Derp de derp."
I've spent the last 2 days on the road talking with people at 53 companies. Dragged along an engineer as part of his training. I'll be out there again tomorrow, and I'm sure that it'll be the same.
Not one person said they liked using Windows. Not one! They hate Windows. They hate Microsofts Client Access Licensing schemes. They hate the viruses, the downtime, the forced upgrades, the patch hell, the crappy products - everything. And they also hate it when they go home. They want OUT!
This is not a slashdot "talking-out-of-my-ass" opinion - this is the reality in the corporate world today. Pissed off doesn't begin to describe it. They feel they've been raped.
Like I said, I've expended the shoe leather, gotten the face time, and this is the reality. Microsoft makes crap. Everyone knows it. Nobody likes it.
There's no need for a "coming together." The world and Microsoft are heading for a divorce.
"Flash, Meet Sparkle" and then linking to an article explaining how it has nothing to do with Flash at all.
1) Sparkle is not a technology. Sparkle is the codename for an application. Get it right.
2) The technology is Windows Presentation Foundation (formally codenamed Avalon).
3) It is not a flash killer. It is true that you can host Avalon applications in a web browser, and they will interact with the back and forward buttons of a web browser. It is true that Microsoft is touting this as a high-end replacement for HTML (as far as I can tell).
4) Although details are sketchy, Microsoft has announced a royalty free OPEN technology called Windows Presentation Foundation / Everywhere. This means that you can run these applications in ANY web browser on ANY platform.