Joe Marini - Why I love XAML

The Discussion

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  The Channel 9 Team wrote:

  What do you think? Are you looking forward to using XAML?
  
  

  
  
  Well, I certainly would be if it were showing any sign of turning up before I'm too old to care.

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  It is interesting, notepad will out-last almost all of even the most well written development environments. I can easily see it out-lasting VB6.
  
  This technology is pretty cool. I hate XML style new technologies (I think they are too resource intensive to pass) but when it is used correctly (like this) I love it. I must admit, I would like to have a converter so I can take the XAML and compile it right into the app, to save the processing time.
  
  A converter for say C# wouldn't be too complicated because XAML is strictly defined. I wonder if it is passed each time you load the application or each time you use the graphic interface? I would assume it is passed and stored as a more efficient format so the 'events' within the XAML can pass to data handlers more quickly.
  

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  I think XAML rocks. Will VS.NET 2005 output forms in XAML?  Or will there be a new release of VS in 200x....?
  
  Any links to download samples, as I have longhorn installed.....(Via MSDN WinHec Build).
  
  

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  I like the look of XAML from what I've seen so far. I do think though that it's adoption will be severely limited by it being a longhorn only feature. Even after longhorn does eventually ship, if I write an app that only runs on longhorn I'm eliminating a huge percentage of my potential customers - no amount of protuctivity gains can make up for that. It's a shame as I haven't seen anything to indicate that XAML (and the Avalon graphics engine it relies on) couldn't be integrated into XP or even 2000.
  
  On the subject of dev tools for XAML, I don't think there are any yet (except for the general XML tools in the Whidbey beta and 3rd party stuff like XMLSPY). I assume there are plans for another VS release to coincide with Longhorn and that it will include gui editing tools for XAML. I always groan when I hear people talk about how great it is to be able to edit stuff  in Notepad (I hear this from "hard core" web developers all the time). Don't ignore the sucess of Visual Basic. There's a reason why that was so popular and it had little to do with the actual language - Visual forms editing is a big deal to the majority of developers.
  

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  XAML is impressive. Let's hear about security features! Let's hear about dropping XAML decalrations into ASP.NET and suddenly getting a web page (based on a subset of controls not Longhorn dependent).
  
  Let's hear about Adobe or Macromedia embracing XAML so these mature design tools can be used by these mythical designers that work with us developers.
  
  At least let's hear about Microsoft building, say, an XPDF to XAML converter.

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  rasx wrote:

  XAML is impressive. Let's hear about security features! Let's hear about dropping XAML decalrations into ASP.NET and suddenly getting a web page (based on a subset of controls not Longhorn dependent).
  
  Let's hear about Adobe or Macromedia embracing XAML so these mature design tools can be used by these mythical designers that work with us developers.
  
  At least let's hear about Microsoft building, say, an XPDF to XAML converter.

  
  What plans does Microsoft have with XAML? Are they going to make it a standard like they did with C#?

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  It would be hard to make a standard, since XAML is more of a way to map the Avalon API into XML, not a strongly defined markup.
  
  But since we're again at Avalon and XAML, I'm wondering, did the stance about MDI in Avalon change by now? The last thing I knew was that it wasn't planned for 1.0, so developers would have to write their own MDI handler (wouldn't probably be too hard fiddling with panels, but it's all about getting system window borders and what not).
  

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  I wonder how the execution will be though trying to get people on board with this--especially with LH on a slippery slope.

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  It's a very good technology but will MS be able to make beautiful look of Mac OSX happen in Windows. XP is much more simple but Mac OSX has more hot looks. Not only should they be showing us these technologies, they must really start some great coding to make a some what beautiful, easy to use OS. Then their will be no complaint. Other uses of XAML could also be, for people wanting to make birthday cards and brochures and that kind of stuff. So I don't really reckon this technology lies just with developers. It lies within everyone. I think XAML will be one the best technology out along with .NET and the other Longhorn Pillars. Plus it's gonna be available on XP and Windows Server 2003, so it should really be something that will be encorporated not only into Longhorn but some exisisting Windows Operating Systems too. Although that is only the latest ones. But by the time it's released, 2000 will be like 98 when Xp was released. And 98... LOL!!!   

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  For how i know MS-Build (the ng compiler/linker) will compile XAML files into a more performant format (somewhat like IL i suppose). That when you use XAML mixed with your code (like C# or VB.NET) and need to compile your app to execute it.
  
  If you write applications only using XAML that's not the case... but i think that'll be very rare .

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  Too bad Microsoft doesn't have a technology which uses info cards stored on your machine which they could use to handle sign in....oh wait they do have that (called card space), too bad they don't use it. Nah, they just going into reinventing the wheel again...*Sigh*

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  Alexm wrote:

  >It's a very good technology but will MS be able to make beautiful look of Mac OSX happen in Windows. 
  
  Well if you apply the appropriate visual theme you can already get the look and feel of Mac OSX on Windows XP (and some even more impressive look and feels). For my money the new Royale theme is pretty cool too.
  
  Looking at Lornhorn's new Aero UI, (the few glimpses we've seen from the PDC and other sources), it already looks top notch. Hopefully it'll be a significant step forward in elegant interfaces (though it'll be interesting to see how a older windows apps will look on the new platform).
  
  On the other subject of backwards compatibility, I understand way it's impossible to retrofit the vector based render engine of Avalon into Windows 2000/XP, but perhaps it would be possible to use the framework to render XAML apps with the GDI on older versions of Windows, in a cut down form (losing the high fidelity graphics, resizing etc...).
  
  Thus an application made using XAML could perform on a older platform much like a browser can render html pages even if it doesn't support CSS (although hopefully the drop in visual quality won't be as drastic). 

  
  I know I'm just say that Windows is a really good operating system except Mac OSX has the looks that attracts people. The only thing Windows needs is people the looks. I'm not saying that Window's lame or anything it's the best OS! And always will be.
  This isn't about Themes, skins, wallpaper, etc...

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  There was mention of designing XAML Documents and the availability of designers.  One third party designer is Mobiform's Aurora XAML Desinger for WinFX.  The product is still in Beta, therefore free to download at http://www.mobiform.com/Eng/aurora.html.  You can start easily building these revolutionary UI's today!
  
  Thanks

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  A bit late response but I'm a new-comer:)
  2 weeks later I'll have a presentation about XAML in my software company and this video was really helpfull in understanding what's XAML without reading something.
  I'm glad that I've become a member of this community and had shared channel9 with my collegues[H]