Silverlight. Practical guide

Posted by: P. Brown
Translation: O. Sivchenko
Release date: 08/02/2012

Book review is based on an article by Ben Michelson.

Good day Habrayuzer. We would like to present to your attention a wonderful guide on the Silverlight 4 software platform. The choice of the prototype for the translation fell on the popular In Action series by Manning Publications.
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This book is intended for web developers who want to create non-trivial applications using Silverlight. Although Silverlight has a lot of possibilities for web designers, this publication is suitable primarily for those who are perfectly oriented in Visual Studio.


According to the content of “Silverlight. Practical Guide "is divided into three parts:

1. Introduction to Silverlight
2. Structuring the application
3. Finalization of the application

The first two parts describe all the information needed by a novice specialist to work with Silverlight. The third covers more specialized and deeper topics.

Part 1. Introduction to Silverlight

The first part of the book provides an introduction to Silverlight, describes how this platform is related to WPF, browser and desktop integration. Although this is the very beginning of the book, do not think that these topics are focused only on beginners. It provides a detailed explanation of how the display system works, what controls are at your disposal, and how the text can be applied when working.

Part 2. Structuring the application

The second part provides all the information needed to write a workable application. Describes the possibilities of binding, validating data and communicating with other applications. You can share information with other Silverlight plugins located on the same page or with other systems via web services. In the last two chapters of this part, the MVVM pattern is intelligibly explained, but the topic of the chapter is not limited to this. It also shows how to optimize maintainability of your code. Practical examples show the application of the principles of SOLID and DRY - it is hoped that more and more developers will follow them. The last chapter of the second part is devoted to WCF RIA services. For me personally, this was new information, and such a rich functionality, already available “on delivery” of the system, I was somewhat stunned, but I, nevertheless, still treat it a little skeptical. Perhaps I am confused by such a multitude of forms above the data, although in this structure it is easy to find the layers to which you can connect and complete the task.

Part 3. Finalization of the application.

In the last part, the reader will find chapters on working with graphics, creating animation, improving the mechanism for installing programs, working with styles and resources, and creating your own controls. You will have to use some of these opportunities often, others only a couple of times in your life. For example, it is not often necessary to create your own panel.

In general, this is a very good book that helps you learn how to work with the platform and create full-featured Silverlight applications. It is definitely focused on developers. However, there is relatively little attention paid to Expression Blend, although this tool is great for creating graphics and animation. It is much better to use it, rather than implement all these functions in code, as suggested by the author of the book.

Sincerely, Vinitsky Dmitry (head of the computer literature edition of the Minsk branch of the Piter Publishing House).

The content of the book is here .
Book on piter.com
Book on ozone.ru