Mar
5
Written by:
Matt Abar
3/5/2008 1:33 PM
If you've been reading the blog, you know that our plan is to build our user interface in Silverlight 2.0. I haven't talked much about it, because it represents a big risk. Numerous things have to fall into place before we can commit to doing a significant portion of our development in an unreleased Microsoft product.
Our requirements:
- We need a solid Silverlight 2.0 beta by May.
- It needs to deliver a truly next-gen UI experience.
- We need some good reference apps to use as a starting point for our UI design.
- We need third party component developers to be writing Silverlight plugins.
Today brought us some *great* news. Silverlight 2.0 Beta 1 has been released. It's extremely impressive. We have at least one good reference application to use as a UI starting point. And all signs point to extensive third party support by component developers. Sweeeeet.
In one day, we've gone from complete uncertainty that any of our Silverlight requirements would be met, to having every single one in the bag. I'm now about 95% certain that our front-end will use Silverlight 2.0. In fact, the only remaining uncertainty is whether there will be a solid third-party grid control for us to use by May. (I'llbedammed if I'm going to write a grid control from scratch.)
AOL Mail was rewritten in Silverlight and it kicks ass. It retains the clean feel of a Web 2.0 application, but feels like a desktop app when you're using it. Switching between screens is instantaneous, data loads multi-threaded in the background, and in general the user experience has that undefined quality that you find in all great software applications. AOL Mail is now better than Gmail.
You heard me. AOL's new Silverlight beta app is better than Google's flagship Ajax app. And I'll guarantee you they developed it in a fraction of the time it took Google to create Gmail. I can't wait to see what we can do with a portfolio management application.
AOL Email:
AOL Calendar:
Sign up for your AOL account here. Let me know what you think.
Tags:
Re: Silverlight 2.0 - Beta 1
Good post. Recently ComponentOne has made a Silverlight library available, and has made it available for downloading. There are a bunch of standard controls, but the two most important controls in my book (DataGrid and Chart) are also included. :)
I also emailed Infragistics, asking when they would have something ready. They said "it is our intention to ship NetAdvantage for Silverlight 60 days after Microsoft releases Silverlight 2.0 but of course, that could change". I'm not sure if that means 60 days after a particular Beta release, or the final release. Having used their "UltraGrid", and loved using it, I'm somewhat dissapointed at how long it may take for them to get their component library released. Of course, you can't rush quality either...
Have you seen any good reference apps? I have seen a few that are available from the www.Silverlight.net web page, and it is highly encouraging. There are far fewer images on the page (that need to be created/maintained by graphic artists), but it seems that the UI is much smoother and polished.
Have you seen any good references to learn Silverlight from? Books, tutorials, ect? Again, www.Silverlight.net has some walkthoughs, so that is what I'll be tackling soon to see what Silverlight offers.
Ryan
By nayrnayr on
4/21/2008 8:28 AM
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