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Product Description
Product Description
Silverlight in Action, Revised Edition is a fast-paced, comprehensive tutorial that guides the reader from creating "Hello World" to coding production-quality, data-driven rich internet applications with graphics, audio, and video content. Written for a developer who already knows how to code in C#, this fluff-free book covers the basics quickly and dives into the heart of Silverlight development using XAML (a language for creating user interface elements), Visual Studio 2008/2010, and the Expression design suite.
In addition to the fundamentals, the book covers the new features in Silverlight, as well as .NET RIA Services. It explains developing offline and "outside the browser" applications, managing video and audio, handling validation, navigation and deep-linking, and how each Silverlight feature fits into the overall Silverlight ecosystem.
About the Author
Pete Brown is a Senior Program Manager with Microsoft on the developer community team lead by Scott Hanselman, as well as a former Microsoft Silverlight MVP, INETA speaker, and RIA Architect for Applied Information Sciences, where he worked for over 13 years. Pete's focus at Microsoft is the community around client application development (WPF, Silverlight, Windows Phone, Surface, Windows Forms, C++, Native Windows API and more).
Inside This Book
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
4.8 out of 5 stars (33 customer reviews)
13 of 14 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great Book!!!!! A MUST HAVE Silverlight Resource, Sep 11 2010
By T. Anderson - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Silverlight 4 in Action (Paperback)
Finally someone has given Matthew MacDonald some competition when it comes to Silverlight books. This book is a great read.The book starts with an introduction to Silverlight and XAML and then digs into the application model and browser integration.
Below are the book's chapters-
Introducing Silverlight
Core XAML
The application model and the plug-in
Integrating with the browser
Integrating with the desktop
Rendering, layout, and transforming
Panels
Human input
Text
Controls and UserControls
Binding
Data controls: DataGrid and DataForm
Input validation
Networking and communications
Navigation and dialogs
Structuring and testing with the MVVM/ViewModel pattern
WCF RIA Services
Graphics and effects
Printing
Displaying and capturing media
Working with bitmap images
Animation and behaviors
Resources, styles, and control templates
Creating panels and controls
The install experience and preloaders
There are also an appendix on how to install the database used throughout the book's examples.
The book does a great job introducing MVVM, RIA Services, and inversion of control. The MVVM chapter is one of the best resources I have come across for someone to learn about the pattern.
The threading coverage using SynchronizationContext is great. It is the first book I have seen use it instead of the Dispatcher.
The author's style of writing is clear and the book is an enjoyable read. If the author detours to a sidebar story, it is done in such a way that it adds enjoyment to the reading and value to the topic at hand. I have read a ton of books lately where I find that not to be the case. The sidebar stories are distracting and tend to annoy me. An example in this book is the beginning of the MVVM chapter when the author tells about his experience teaching the pattern. It set the stage for the chapter's logical flow.
The accompanying code is very well organized and usable. The author really did a good job of breaking the code down per Listing allowing you to open the examples at different stages instead of just the end result.
The only thing I would have like to have seen more material on Managed Extensibility Framework (MEF).
A very cool thing is that you get with your purchase is a free ebook with your purchase. Not a 45 day trail to view it online, an actual downloadable ebook, which is great for finding all the places a given topic is covered, and fast.
All in all I highly recommend this book to anyone doing Silverlight development. It is a must have addition to any Silverlight developer's book shelf.
16 of 18 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Outstanding in content and even in style, Oct 6 2010
By Christopher Estep - Published on Amazon.com
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Silverlight 4 in Action (Paperback)
It's rare to find a technical book that succeeds in balancing depth with approachability. I've been using Silverlight since it was still called WPF/E so I'm no novice. But unlike many technical books, you have to make a choice between entertaining "beginner" books and dry "expert" books with the latter reading more like a textbook. I was very please to discover that Brown's book does cross that gap quite well. It certainly has content that a veteran like myself needs but it also takes a relative beginner (at least in the specific Silverlight technology) and helps them come up to a more useful speed.As I said previously, the style is lighter than one typically finds in a technical book of this depth and length. This is a good thing. Brown has discovered the little applied truth that technical books don't have to read like an IBM manual, circa 1975. The tone is conversational when it's appropropriate but doesn't sacrifice content quality or substance in favor of that style.
I recommend this book to anyone looking for a good end-to-end guide to Silverlight version 4. It's broad, but has good depth. I can't recommend it enough.
7 of 8 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great book with engaging author!, Sep 22 2010
By JoeSuchy - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Silverlight 4 in Action (Paperback)
Let me just say up front that Pete Brown has such an engaging style of writing, especially to an audience of nerds! The little references to Star Wars and so many other nerdy references makes the book feel more like a conversation instead of another dry book about technology. I have also not seen Silverlight covered as completely anywhere else. Pete covers many topics that are hard to explain and I think other authors just decide to stay away from. Even the way the book is laid out: Intro, application structure, "completing the experience". It just makes sense. I find myself reading a chapter, writing bits of code to reinforce what we covered, and then I'm ready to read some more! I follow Pete on Twitter and enjoy his comments and helpful tidbits there, but this book is the full explanation. Enjoy!
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