We were beginning to start on an enterprise application using silverlight.
However after reading this post we doubt whether it is the right choice going forward.
The post says that, according to
Microsoft's declaration in PDC 2010,
Microsoft has changed their strategy
regarding silverlight and they no
longer view it as their technology to
deliver cross platform applications.
Instead they are targeting silverlight
as their development platform for
Windows phone 7.
Is this correct? Should we still continue with silverlight or go back to ASP.NET WebForms\MVC?
The Scope of the application is basically intranet with Windows 2008 servers and Windows XP and Windows 7 clients. However a subset of functionality needs to be available to the external users over the internet. There we cannot have any restrictions on what OS users can use.
based on the info you gave, I can't conclude whether silverlight is the way to go. But what I do know is that a number of Microsofties wrote some blogposts about the things said about Silverlight on the pdc. For example John Papa, Bob Muglia and Scott Guthrie.
Update about the scope
I think you already gave the answer when you described the scope of the application. A part of the application will be available to external users and you cannot have any restriction about the OS they are running. With that requirement I think Silverlight is not the best way to go. Not because the rumours about its future but because of its platform indepency. What are the reasons not to go for a ASP.NET/web solution? Silverlight doesn't work on each OS whereas plain HTML will work everywhere. (ok you need a descent browser)
Although for a good advice I'd need more information about the application.
Basically the question you have to ask yourself is this: do you need your application to be used on every platform, i.e. Windows, Mac, Linux, misc. flavors of Unix, IPhone and other mobile platforms?
If that's the case, then a web based solution is the way to go.
If Windows, Mac and partially Linux is enough, then save yourself and your team a lot of pain and use Silverlight.
In my opinion support for mobile clients is the key factor in your decision.
For sure the right platform for Intranet, Enterprice applications Is Silverlight. It is
stable, performs extreamly well, the environment and the development time is huuge less than web application development, the end User Experience is much better and so on and so forth... Once you want to show part of the system out the the intranet - just create some specific target modules that will address the needed audince. You won't have the universal "Reachfull" solution, that will target everyhing, you'll always need mobile versions or other devices and so on. But once you've built your project the right way with Services (same services that the Silverlight app will consume), it'll be easy job to consume them with new UI.
Hope you will choose Silverlihgt.
Silverlight is a great technology, but the Microsoft does not develop it anymore. So as a technology is a great decision. But if you want to make a Silverlight app usable on a NOT supported platform (e.g. Android or iPhone) you have to use 3rd party services. For example http://sl2html.com
Related
My org is currently in Winforms and we are renegineering our complete system which has following parts
- It is a heavy businesslogic desktop application
- Should support part on web/multiple devices (handheld)
- Part of it to be exposed as enterprise solution.
To define the target system, platform and language for such a system (timeline are to create by mid of 2016)
1. Can I replace heavy Desktop application with MS Application?
2. Should I create such DS Application with .net 4.0 WPF? (I am currently on Winforms so to me moving from Winforms to WPF or HTML5 is same)
3. I would prefer to move to HTML5 for the reason that my web, devices and desktop applocations are taken care - but do not have a path for DSA + HTML5 with WinRT
Please advice. Any other solution/suggestion also is welcome.
It really depends on what direction your company wants to go.
If you want to go down the desktop only route, then yes, WPF should suit your requirements. I would suggest using the MVVM Design Pattern, with the Repository/Unit Of Work Pattern.
If you want to go towards the Desktop/Tablet/Mobile route, then you have the option of developing an Windows App, or a Website Application.
For a Windows App, you're looking at developing Microsoft Store Apps (I'd suggest a Universal App). If you want to do this, you might as well wait for Windows 10 to be released, as universal apps have grown up since 8.1.
That leaves Web Applications. There are a myriad of options to choose from here, most common of those would probably be ASP.NET, and things like AngularJS. Please note that I'm not saying that these technologies are the best, but they are just a couple of options. It's really up to you to research the frameworks and libraries that suit your requirements.
But like I said, it really depends on what your company wants their application to do, and what devices will be compatible.
When I create new Windows Phone project I have an option to create a "Windows Phone" or "Windows Phone Silverlight" app. I know that they have different runtimes and different APIs.
I was under the impression that Microsoft wants to unify Windows and Windows Phone platforms so why is there even a Silverlight version? What benefits does it bring?
Also, if I want to create an app just for Windows Phone and never have plans to bring it to Windows, what should I choose, Silverlight or Windows Phone?
I'd suggest you go with "Windows Phone" (non-Silverlight). It's the new API, which works for both Windows and Windows Phone. At some point you may want to port the app or create a new one for Windows and you'll already know the API (and porting will be way easier). Also, the new API will most likely get more updates and features added, and at some point you may even be forced to update to it (either because the old one is no longer supported, or because it does not have some features that you need).
As it was said in the other answers - the Silverlight option is there only for backward compatibility and is likely to be phased out in time. That is - it's good if you already know the API and have many libraries (yours or others) for WP Silverlight, but if you're just starting - you'd better go for the new technology.
Edit
There is one other thing to consider before choosing between the two types of apps. Some features are only available in a Silverlight app, and others (smaller amount) - only in a Xaml app. Here's an article with some info on the differences: Migrating your Windows Phone 8 app to a Windows Runtime XAML app
Windows RT Xaml is quite new and People have to generate some knowledge first.
Silverlight for phone has been around for years and there's a load of tools available: Phone Toolkit, diverse Controls, etc.
Just killing it off would have hurt many developers who built up intellectual property over a long time forcing them to start over.
When starting a project with Silverlight you will have more things around that help you get stuff done.
When starting with WinRT Xaml, you will have better performance, but will have to figure a lot out by yourself.
So the Silverlight option is there to not throw of Silverlight developers.
I recently started a new project on WinRT Xaml and my experience was that I had to recreate a lot of common tools like Caches, etc. But also a lot of things that were in Toolkits previously are now part of the platform itself. Also, when moving over to Windows 8, you get to share a lot of code which is nice.
Unifying the environment(s) would be ideal. In my opinion, it hasn't been very successful. At one point in time, you could only develop under Silverlight, so what you are seeing is just a newer version of the same thing to keep backwards compatibility as well as to keep Silverlight's developers happy. In the future, it will probably be phased out. Plus if you want to support older Phones, Silverlight is basically your only choice (you'll be surprise, how many WP users haven't updated their 8.0 to 8.1)
There really isn't any other real benefit of Silverlight other than maybe the Windows Phone Toolkit which has been tremendously useful (you can see how many SO's answers rely on this simple addon). Once the universal runtime gets fleshed out to the point where the documentation reflects what's actually available -- then I think it would be the default project for developing in Windows going forward.
If you're just starting, I would use Silverlight the knowledge based is much greater. After you get use to the WP environment then switch to runtime.
I'm planning web application and considering silverlight as development platform. Will it help to solve browser compatibility issues? The app intended to be used on desktops only (no mobile).
Yes, it will solve browser compatibility issues, and could work on both Mac OS and Windows with the very same code.
The only drawback is that, the first time your user connect to your application, he will need to download the Silverlight plugin.
Awesome you would say? Well, unfortunately some people that probably never try to do something like image processing or advanced line of business application in a browser decide that plugins are not so cool and that you would be able to do the same thing with the magic power of HTML5.
We are still waiting to have the same possibility in HTML5 that we have in Silverlight or Flash, but plugins are already dead. At least as long as no big compay want to push them again.
So, my advice would be: don't start a project in Silverlight. You will have problems, even if you do not target mobile. For example it becomes harder and harder to find compatible good tools (like ReSharper, NCrunch, or even just a decent unit testing library). And in further release of Windows and Mac OS, it will probably not be supported at all (IE for Windows RT already does not support Silverlight).
Sorry man, Silverlight is dead, you arrive after the battle.
If your developing your application for an Intranet, I would say Silverlight is an excellent choice.
If you are developing for the Internet, use an HTML based language
Looking for opinions. I'm working on a mid-sized 3-tier ASP.NET project (.NET 2.0 and Visual Studio 2005) with an Oracle on Unix back-end, some beefy MS web servers, and IE browser clients. Performance is pretty bad, and users feel the UI looks outdated as well. We may have an opportunity soon to redesign and rewrite the entire application from the ground up, and I'm wondering what the current or recommended MS platform is.
I was involved with WPF and Silverlight on a different contract when MS downgraded support for Silverlight in favor of "HTML5" for Windows 8 and Windows Phone a few years back. I'm not trying to start a flame war between how long Silverlight or even WPF will be around, but I'm looking for some modern alternatives as of today, April 2013. The one requirement we can't get around is that we can't install something on each and every user PC throughout the client organization.
My own background is in WinForms and C# more so than any of the above, but everywhere I turn it seems developing any new LOB apps in WinForms isn't done much anymore.
Whatever happened to the Application Server platform and apps run thru Remote Desktop? Does it still make sense to develop desktop apps and deploy to app servers and just put a shortcut on each user's desktop, or even map a drive letter like we used to do back in the day?
Your $0.02 would be appreciated!
I would definitely consider doing it as an internal web site.
The UI would be HTML5 using the "single page application" (SPA) for each function you need. Each function would be on a page that is loaded when the user needs it. The javascript/ajax code in the browser would interact with the web server which feeds back the raw data needed to be displayed.
Using Active Directory, you can have full security and customization per person.
If you need lots of interactivity, then you'd also want to consider including SignalR in the mix. (That is one of the "new" MS tools!)
If you can't install anything in the end users' PCs then go ASP.Net. Anything else will require installation.
You can make a web application more appealing to the users by having a good designer and a LOT of javascript. Not remotely comparable to the power and beauty of WPF, but that's your best bet.
WPF is part of the .Net framework and will not run without it installed.
Silverlight could also be an option, but it still requires an installation (although minimal, 4 MB, less-than-2 minute install), but an install anyways.
WinRT only works in Windows 8. It's not supported in lower versions (Vista, XP, 7). So I don't think it's an option as of now (unless all your users have Windows 8, of course).
And no, winforms is not an option. It's also part of the .Net framework, and even if you could get it installed, it doesn't make any sense having to deal with the limitations of it, having many much much better technologies at your disposal.
Are ActiveX applets as a technology supported by Microsoft dead?
What are the alternatives to ActiveX to create extremely rich internet applications using Microsoft Technologies? (Silverlight does not cut it for me, as it doesnt give me access to serial ports - or does it?)
You can of course still make ActiveX applications, but know that they will only work with Internet Explorer, unless users of other browsers install hosting plugins, that aren't all that good anyway.
In either case, a web application that requires access to a serial port? Are you sure you're not better off with a desktop application instead? A simple refresh and you've cut off that serial port.
Not all applications belong in the browser.
If you want to launch an application via a web browser that can access the serial ports, one option would be to use Java Web Start with JavaFX as the rich interface API, and Java Communications for the serial port access. You could end up with a cross-platform application at the end as well.
Or just write a native application using your favoured Windows toolkit if you absolutely are restricted to using Microsoft tools.
ActiveX as technology is very much alive, and will remain for many years to come. But its usage for Internet is dead. ActiveX is to be only used from within windows stand-alone applications.
ActiveX as of 2015 is a dead technology that even the maker is no longer interested in continuing to use it. Here is something to read.
No, Silverlight is designed from the ground up to be completely sandboxed, no way to bypasss that (thank god).
If you need that kind of access, but are looking for an easy deployment, I would suggest building a Clickonce application.
There are restrictions, because I think by default they are not full trust, but that's the best you will get.
It's also going to be the only easy route if you need printing (unless you are willing to round-trip to a server to generate a PDF file).
If you need direct access to some hardware (like for a POS software with cash drawer, receipt printer etc), you need to go "desktop". Clickonce can give you some deployment options, XBAPs can give you the "browser experience", but you are going to have to make compromises based on what your "hardware access needs" are.
EDIT:
I didn't notice the Silverlight exclusion in the original question. My comment it not really applicable. Sorry!
I don't know that I would call ActiveX dead just yet, but I would be cautious if you are planning to build an application based upon this technology. My recommendation would be to use Silverlight. This provides much of the functionality that is commonly desired in ActiveX controls, but uses the newer .NET technologies.
There is alot of talk about using Silverlight for media playback, but it has many powerful feature that can also be used to create Line-of-Business applications as well. In fact there is a great podcast episode on DotNetRocks that discusses this exact subject.
Here are a few more links that might point you in the right direction:
Microsoft Silverlight Getting Started
Silverlight 2 and a Glimpse of Silverlight 3 by Scott Guthrie
To the best of my knowledge, Silverlight 4 still doesn't give you direct access to serial ports, but it does give you access to any local web cam and microphones now. You could presumably also run Silverlight 4 out-of-browser, which gives you access to COM objects, and you could write a quick-and-dirty COM object which wrapped serial port access. That said, I also agree with what folks said above about not all applications belonging in the browser.