Before we can commence any Silverlight development, we need to understand two different kinds of tools:
Development tools: Development tools help developers implement a designed solution.
Design and content-creation tools: Designer tools are used by the graphic designers to design the look and feel of the end-user experience.
You can find these tools at http://www.microsoft.com/silverlight/resources/tools.aspx.
Development Tools
Microsoft
Silverlight Tools for Visual Studio 2008 is an add-on for the Visual
Studio 2008 development environment that enables the development of
Silverlight directly within Visual Studio. You can leverage several
features of the Visual Studio tools when creating applications in
Silverlight. The Silverlight tools designer support is a subset of the
features in the Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) Designer. You can
download this from http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=C22D6A7B-546F-4407-8EF6-D60C8EE221ED&displaylang=en.
Microsoft has a software
development kit (SDK) available for Silverlight. This SDK resembles the
form and content of most of their technologies and highlights the
recommended development methods. This Microsoft Silverlight SDK contains
documentation, tools, Silverlight ASP.NET controls, and the libraries
required to build Silverlight applications. You can download the SDK
from http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/silverlight/bb187452.aspx. (The SDK is included in the installation of Microsoft Silverlight Tools for Visual Studio 2008.)
Microsoft has also provided an array of learning mechanisms to help you master Silverlight, which you can access at http://silverlight.net/Learn/.
Design and Content-Creation Tools
Microsoft Expression
Studio enables web designers to create the Silverlight interface.
Expression tools enable designers to fully apply their creativity while
collaborating with developers who are using Microsoft Visual Studio.
Expression Studio comes in many versions and is available as an off-the-shelf product, just like Microsoft Office:
Expression Web for building websites
Expression Blend for illustration and graphic design
Expression Design for creating Silverlight and Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF)-based sites
Expression Media for assets management and media encoding
Expression Encoder for transcoding video content
Expression Studio, which includes all the previously listed functions
Deep Zoom Composer
The Deep Zoom Composer
prepares images for use with the Deep Zoom feature in Silverlight 2. The
new Deep Zoom technology in Silverlight enables users to see images on
the web like never before. The smooth in-place zooming and panning that
Deep Zoom allows is a true advancement and raises the bar on what image
viewing should be. High-resolution images need to be prepared for use
with Deep Zoom, and this tool enables the user
to create Deep Zoom composition files that control the zooming
experience and then export all the necessary files for deployment with
Silverlight 2. Figure 1 shows an example of the Deep Zoom interface with three images at different sizes and image control.
Kaxaml
Kaxaml is a lightweight XAML editor that provides a split-screen view of the XAML and the rendered content (as shown in Figure 2). This powerful tool enables rapid development of user controls and Silverlight applications. You can find this tool at http://www.kaxaml.com/.
