What else could I use Silverlight for Windows Phone 7 Apps?

Question

One of the reasons I don’t want to follow the iPhone’s development path is because Objective-C is n’t particularly relevant. You are either developing applications for the iPhone or Mac.

If I am on the path to developing Windows Phone 7 , can I apply Silverlight skills in areas other than mobile phone development? Is Silverlight useful in the financial industry? Or the IT industry?

If something is unclear, write below and I will update the corresponding question.

update:. After reading all the answers, switching to Silverlight looks like a way. Thanks to everyone.

Answer 1

You can develop for WP7 (Windows Phone 7) using either Silverlight 3 or XNA. I am currently using both for writing applications for applications / performance, and for the game.

Silverlight is a subset of Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF), and the knowledge and experience gained can easily be transferred to another. Other business-class applications (LOBs) are starting to use WPF / Silverlight every day.

I can see that Silverlight will be used in the coming years for several reasons: it is easier to deploy than ActiveX, it has excellent tool support (VS2010, Expression Blend), and you can use the existing code base. The current installation base for Silverlight is at 60% (sorry, there is no backup link, it was indicated in a telephone conference last week with Microsoft).

I receive calls / emails from recruitment agencies that often ask if I am interested in changing industries (from video games to commercial / government), as there is a huge demand for candidates who have WPF / Silverlight experience.

Answer 2

I think Silverlight (and WPF, which is closely related) are basically user interface libraries, but you can use them in several ways:

• Silverlight was originally aimed at developing rich client-side web applications (i.e., launching in a browser such as Flash). There are plugins for many web browsers, and this is not bad in this scenario.

• Recently, you can also use the out-of-browser output model, which allows you to develop regular Windows applications in Silverlight (although they work in an isolated software environment and are somewhat limited).

• In addition, Silverlight is somewhat compatible with WPF, which is a complex framework for developing desktop user interfaces. After learning Silverlight, you will also learn a lot about WPF and you can use it.

Answer 3

Starting with Silverlight 3, I think it has become useful for regular business web applications that look beautiful.

However, this is true if it is OK to force the user base to download and install Silverlight. In some markets, client companies have severe restrictions on what their employees can install on their machines.

Answer 4

Silverlight is a competitor to Flash and is intended for use in similar areas:

• Video Most videos on the Microsoft website use Silverlight.
• Games SilverlightGames.com contains a large collection.
• Image Editors There are many Flash image editors such as pixlr and sumo paint , and Silverlight has the ability to do this, but I can’t find it yet.

However, with the help of canvases and video tags, these areas become less exclusive for browser plug-ins.

Answer 5

In addition to W7 applications, Silverlight is not gaining momentum in the market at all. WPF is not much for LoB applications, but considering that Sivlerlight has 60% of cases penetrating the market at best, it is useless to write anything other than an intranet-type application (that is, one where you can allow users use him).

So, for mobile phones you are stuck: Silverlight or XNA for WM7; objective-C for iPhone; Java or C ++ for Android. Choose one ... or select C ++. WM7 can run C ++ code if you use a subset that can be compiled into Managed C ++; IPhone applications can run C / C ++ code even if you need to develop a GUI part in objective-C; and Android apps can run C / C ++ directly using the NDK. In all cases, you will write different graphical interfaces for each platform, but at least your internal code may be the same.

Answer 6

Silverlight is very useful for LOB applications, especially when combined with RIA Services .

It is also a much faster transition to developing WPF on the desktop (and Silverlight from a browser) and .NET development in general, since you use the same languages ​​and (basically) the same infrastructure.

Answer 7

I would say that there are many areas where Silverlight is useful, for example, some companies are starting to move their WinForms applications to WebForms, and Silverlight is one way.

Answer 8

Good, so you want to know, this is a side effect of winph7 application development that you can get. There he is:

C # and .Net: You will learn about .net things, and this experience will help you accelerate your understanding of any other .net libraries. This is a major advantage.

• The same tools (VS-2010 + blend) are used to develop applications on a PC: desktop applications, games / Xbox: games / Webapps.
• The ability to develop cross-platform applications with the same common code base is really interesting: for example, the ability to play on the phone, xbox and pc (in combination with the azure backend) for the same game. It is interesting.