Microsoft's Silverlight 4.0
Microsoft released details about its upcoming Silverlight version 4.0 at the annual PDC conference. Many new features will be included with the new version of Silverlight. These include greater integration with web browser and local hardware resources. It will also have similiar features found in Adobe Air and be compatible with Google's Chrome web browser.
Silverlight is similiar to Ajax and Adobe Flash in that it can be used to create interactive websites with multimedia. It is compatible with .Net programming resources and allow direct printing which was not allowed in previously versions of Silverlight.
According to Mary Jo Foley and Gavin Clarke of the UK Register, Silverlight 4.0 may come with some unwanted features as well. Reportedly it will more directly linked into Windows com features as well as being optimized for Windows computers using Internet Explorer. If this is true than Silverlight may be developing more of a Windows only platform. Adobe Flash and Ajax are cross platform developer tools and Silverlight has been developed as an alternative tool that is more Windows frienldy. It will be interesting to see how exlclusive Silverlight really is for Windows.
Silverlight 4.0 is now released as beta code for developers. It can be download from Microsoft's website. It is expected to be fully released to the public in 2010.
For more articles on Silverlight:
Register UK Microsoft unleashes Silverlight 4 beta
Silverlight 4.0 Beta: Official Website
Comments
The com integration is only for trusted apps. Personally I'm not excited about this feature, and adding windows only features for it just makes me even less excited.. If the optimization for IE is true I would consider that to be a step backwards. That being said I'm excited about most of the other features that were announced for Silverlight 4.
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