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First Look At Microsoft Silverlight 3
snydeq writes "InfoWorld's Martin Heller finds Silverlight 3 gaining ground on Adobe Flash, Flex, and AIR in all the areas where Silverlight 2 had lagged. No longer do developers need to build desktop WPF apps based loosely on corresponding Silverlight RIAs, as Silverlight 3 adds the ability to install Silverlight apps on the desktop, update them in place, detect Net connectivity state changes, and store data locally and securely. Moreover, solid Expression Blend 3 and Visual Studio 2010 betas provide developers with much improved tools to create Silverlight RIAs. '"I do not expect many Adobe shops to give up their Flash, Flex, and AIR for Silverlight 3. I do expect many Microsoft shops to do more RIAs with Silverlight now that it's more capable and to create lightweight browser/desktop Silverlight 3 applications where they might have fashioned heavier-weight Windows Forms or WPF client applications," Heller says.'"
Well, not in the grand scheme of things it's not, I'd rather see the likes of Silverlight and Flash dissapear altogether. I think however in this context Silverlight might actually be a good thing. Flash has become so widespread because there was really no challenge to it, Java applets never really ever managed to perform as was originally hoped.
On one hand I'm glad to see some competition for Flash rather than it be allowed effectively a monopoly on RIAs but on the other the worry is of course that this'll just mean more RIAs!
I'd personally rather see the advances in Javascript allow us to move forward for RIAs because no plugin is required, and it's not some compiled proprietary lump of bits. Google's chrome demos mentioned here a couple of months ago looked very promising in this area so hopefully this will eventually the path we see taken for RIAs but in the meantime I think Silverlight is possibly a good thing, if not only because even in the worst case it forces Adobe to make Flash a better product.
Seriously. Silverlight is gaining on flash in all areas. What about portability ... open standards ... interoperability. Not that flash is really that much better, but at least Adobe is making a token effort.
http://yetanotherpoliticalrant.blogspot.com
Applications that can be run in the browser or installed on the desktop? Java's had both for many years (applets and webstart).
Ability to update desktop apps? Webstart again.
Access to a rich, general purpose library? Yup, Java provides that - and it's very similar to .NET for some reason.
So suddenly the old thing is the new thing.
For Silverlight, the only direction it had to go was "up". I mean, it had an almost zero percent installed base. Now if I were Adobe, I would seriously consider open sourcing Flash and all technologies around it. Otherwise Adobe will only continue to lose market share to Silverlight.
No? /me doesn't care
That's just exactly the problem. TBH I dont care either. I browse with no flash plugins (if absolutely needed then yes I have a separate installed browser with it), noscript, and all the other little useful privacy goodies.
I want information and I want it fast. In all reality text is still text information is information. I dont need popups, animations, ads, etc etc the list is long.
The problem arises when technologies like flash, silverlight, etc come out. Major websites and corporations start publishing there material and information with these technologies because everyone wants to be "up to date". Then your normal user who doesn't have and idea about technologies being used comes along. These users who think the internet is that blue "e" or the little "fox around the globe" on their desktops. These types of people want content too, and if they cant view it then they start to feel they are "missing out". They just don't care and just want it to "work like designed".
Like another reader commented about "balkanizing the web" I feel that this hits the nail on the head. Think of the repercussions if major social networking sites, or other major web presences starting implementing code "X" which doesnt run on every system. (And I am not saying it hasnt already happened) They are alienating people. Which then in turn makes movements like FOSS, OSS, or other kind of free and open standards look bad because your "normal user" thinks while it sounds nice and the idea is good nothing "works as designed" and is in the end limiting their user experience.
imo I think its time that the experienced user base starts taking back the web. Implementing more "open" standards. Showing some of these major asshat corporations that it can be done differently. The internet was not intended just to make a $
I hate to feed a troll, but obviously no one is suggesting Adobe should open source their dev tools.
Just the flash interpreter. They give it away for free anyway (those commie bastards), why not let other people deal with fixing it? Then they can proceed to rake in tons of profits from people who want to build apps that they now can rest assured will run on the coming generations of Flash-enabled smartphones.
Moonlight supports Silverlight 1. Support for Silverlight 2 is in "preview".
Thus far the Moonlight project is "compatible" enough to tell you your version of Silverlight is out of date, and please upgrade.
Silverlight 1 and 2 are much more different than 2 and 3. The Mono development team has explain that implementing the full CLR for Moonlight 2 is one of the largest stages of the development process. For instance, Moonlight 2 Preview already has many Silverlight 3 features implemented. So, once Moonlight 2 is out, it will not be long before Moonlight 3.
Furthermore, I consider this the best pro-developer free software rant explaining the pros of mono in general:
http://www2.apebox.org/wordpress/rants/124/
Flash and Silverlight 1, yes, you're right. Flex and Silverlight, not so much: they're just not browser APIs, but actual app frameworks, so they go a lot further than just providing end user features: they help the programmer, too (like Silverlight can consume an ADO.NET data service with LINQ, which is a lot better than using the built stuff, even in HTML 5. Flex has BlazeDS, and so on. Just an example)
And I'm sure it'll remain consistently at least one version behind the Windows one, and still missing features, just as Microsoft would prefer. Moonlight has not even reached parity with Silverlight 2.0 as a final release, let alone 3.0.
Functionally, Moonlight is probably somewhere between Silverlight 2 and 3. It already includes quite a few Silverlight 3 features in its current preview.
And bear in mind that Silverlight 3 isn't out yet.
Silverlight already had Mac/Win parity, and most of the code sits on top of a platform abstraction layer. So it's already proven to have full functionality outside of Windows.
My video compression blog
Just in case anyone decides to post the parent as informative, I'll point out Moonlight which is an implementation of Silverlight that runs on Linux. There is also Mac support in Firefox and Safari.
And I'll point out that it doesn't bloody work on video sites. So pretty much pointless. Offer Moonlight as a token effort, and then try to take over Adobe's niche. SOP pretty much.. Why yes Mr customer.. Silverlight is cross platform.. (It works with Vista and XP..) So your customers will be able to view the rich multimedia experience no matter what platform they use..
Air on the other hand, works great with the BBC iPlayer on Linux AND Windows. No idea if it is available for Apple.
It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his job depends on not understanding it.
I call the bluff. To run moonlight you need mono. Microsoft holds ALL the pattens on the dotNET programming environment. When you can show me an app that runs on Mono that Microsoft gives one of those royalty free licenses to, then come talk to me.
I am an old Forth programmer so I don't mind building my own stuff. However, I would appreciate some actual "proof" that I won't get sued. A supporter of Mono saying that "Microsoft would not dare get into a patent war over dotNET with open source comapnies" just does not cut it for me as proof.
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