Wednesday, March 5, 2008

IE8 and Silverlight 2, is this Microsoft making it right?

Today Microsoft announced the first betas of Internet Explorer 8 and Silverlight 2! Let me tell you, I've barely downloaded both, but my experience so far is great! If you're looking for a platform to develop Rich Internet Applications (RIAs) you're looking for Silverlight 2! If you know WPF, Silverlight brings the most good things from WPF to the web on any platform (yes! this time it's almost everywhere, from PC, Mac, Linux to Windows Mobile and Symbian!!)Silverlight - Windows Internet Explorer I've started to develop some basic controls I had for WPF and the experience was no different from what I already knew about WPF. I haven't tried developing any Panel yet, but I intend to do so in the next few days. Templating and styles... everything you could wish for is there, I can't wait to unleash the power of this beast, now that I have a Mac I can't wait to run my WPF applications on the dark side!

Check out silverlight at www.silverlight.net.

About IE8, I have to say it is a great step ahead for the Internet and not just Microsoft. Certainly it will break most websites (even Microsoft's own webpage is affected), but the advantages here are clear! I don't have to waste anymore time tweaking the standards compliant website to display nicely on IE. This is great news! Can't wait for the final version. By the way, the Webslices and Activities are a great deal!

Grab your copy of IE8 while it is hot at www.microsoft.com/ie/ie8