Ramanjit wrote:I kind of new to the concept of WPF/E. I seen some WPF examples that are more applicative but the only demos I see for WPF/E is on playing movies and doing animation stuff.
Does WPF/E have any applicative support such as listviews and tree views or should I stick to frameworks like visual webgui to do my web application ?
As for this moment WPF/E looks to me like a Microsofts version for flash. I do love the concept of able to work from JavaScript with the WPF/E elements but it is just a better way to do flash?
It's a fair set of questions, so let me see what I can do to answer them.
Is WPF/E Microsoft's 'version of Flash' -- I would have to say the answer is 'No'. While there is certainly an overlap between what can be done in Flash and what can be done in WPF/E, the latter is part of a larger ecosystem of development APIs and runtimes that work nicely together.
WPF/E, at it's heart is a scriptable, programmable renderer of XAML. It can work nicely in conjunction with AJAX, ASP.NET or any other Web development technologies.
On the question of application development components such as list views and tree views, then the answer to this is also 'no'. At least at present. The control model in WPF/E is limited. But it is also an early CTP. More controls _may_ be added in over time, but, before assuming what should and shouldn't be there, it's good to step back and think about it a little.
WPF/E is all about empowering the next generation of the Web Experience. With that in mind, it is build on XAML, allowing for great flexibility of design. Traditional client applications are designed with conformance in mind ('make it look like Office!'), but Web ones tend towards uniqueness. Therefore, a control model, bringing about conformity, might be a waste of time and download space. Instead, designers can implement their own UI in XAML and devs wire it up. Not as productive as having off-the-shelf-controls that are built into the system, but, perhaps it is better that way? And because XAML is just XML there's nothing to stop an ecosystem of controls to be designed and built on XAML by third parties.
There are a number of new demos in the pipeline, including one that I've developed that shows how ASP.NET, AJAX and WPF/E fit together nicely to deliver a rich front end for a weather application. It'll either show up on my blog (blogs.msdn.com/webnext) or in MSDN Magazine. Watch this space
Laurence
(WPF/E Evangelist, Microsoft)
