Comments on: Microsoft looking for a Silverlight bullet

From the Olympics to AOL to the Hard Rock Cafe, Microsoft tries to show that Silverlight is both popular with customers and compatible with rivals.

[ppgreat]

Forget the obvious pun made in Las Vegas

"...bet on us..."

I know a lot of people make their living off their MS certifications in
programming and IT functions. And I know MS depends on them to
keep purchasing their products, so the pleas to 'bet on us'.

But does anyone really TRUST Microsoft???

[Sumatra-Bosch]

Sure, Like Everyone Trusts the Mansons

. . . or the Borg

[lenrooney]

iPhone

Can I view Silverlight sites on an iPhone? If not, their in the same
holding pattern as Flash but without near ubiquitous support.

[bj1126]

That could be a winning point for Microsoft

If they were the first ones to push this tech to iPhone and Blackberry they'd have a solid jumping off point.

[ynotbecreative]

Silverspoon forcefeeding

Flash is not perfect, but I refuse to put something with the depth of
Flash that is MS-based on any machine. They can spoon feed it to
their MS cronies if they want, but no takers here. I won't develop in
it, nor will I risk it messing up my system as a plug-in. MS needs to
prove itself first. They cannot even get their operating system
stable and fast, and they want to add more bloat to it?

[dhavleak]

Not bloated.. try it..

The download is literally just a couple of MBs, and you won't even notice the progress bar during the install. You're calling for MS to prove itself, but you condemn Silverlight without trying it. How hippocritical is that?

[jhaks]

Sigh...

Silverlight goes way beyond Flash. Flash isn't a programming or application platform at all. It is great for a lot of things but application programming is not one of them. When you can write flash apps as performant and robust as Silverlight and choose between writing in Ruby, Python, Javascript or C# tell me.

[keeganwatkins]

@jhaks - "Flash isn't a programming or application platform at all" ??? have you ever heard of Flex? or perhaps the AIR runtime? i agree with ynotbecreative that "Flash is not perfect", and it definitely can't do everything. but your statement is just wrong. as for using the language of choice, with a little knowledge of ActionScript you can connect to any server-side app (written in PHP, Ruby, Java, whatever), and by doing so keep the data and presentation layers separate. Flash is not without problems, but it has enormous potential, especially in the application realm. not to mention the adoption rate. if using a platform with under 10% market-share who's parent platform is already riddled with problems is easier for you than learning ActionScript and the Flash Platform, you should just say that instead.

[t8]

Reminds me of Microsoft channels.

Reminds me of Microsoft channels.

Remember that?

It was a way for big companies to get one over everyone else.
While everyone else used HTML, big companies could have a Microsoft channel.
All this stuff could move around the page, blink, ans wink.
Of course it failed miserably because the bulk of web sites use standard stuff.

So will Microsoft Channels 2.0 take off?

I hope not. The last thing the Web wants is to rely on Microsoft for tech.
The Web is the best platform out there because it has encouraged developers to design all manner of sites and services using open and free standards.
Microsoft are not an open and standards company, so I for one will not develop using Silverlight, simply because Microsoft is not good the for Web and there is already great tech solutions available that are now a standard part of the Web.

[dhavleak]

Not really..

There's nothing common between Silverlight and Channels.

I don't think anybody will be unhappy if you refuse to use Silverlight. If you think there are already 'great tech solutions available that are now a standard part of the Web' that compete with Silverlight, you're clearly not a Web Developer in the first place.

[rwfresh]

Conspiracy theories

It seems many of the most vocal opponents to Silverlight have spent a little too much time worrying about what is 733t and not what is actually a well put together piece of technology.

As much as you might complain about MS, remember MS is at it's core a (whole) bunch of hard core programmers who love putting things together. Period. MS exists because they are providing something a lot of people want. That said Silverlight is a step in the right direction for the web in general. HTML is **** and flash is a hacked together first stab at a good idea. Silverlight plugin is 4megs. They've even gone out of their way to develop a linux version.. for all you ms haters. The MS you hate didn't build silverlight, a bunch of AWESOME, commited, accomplished, cool developers did. And it is killer.

[dm66]

True...ish

but then Marketing, Accountants, and Lawyers get their hands on it...Coding aside, Microsoft is a brutal company that will use illegal business practices to push this and kill the competition.

That's what people don't like, its not actually Silverlight, its the dark shadow standing behind it...

[Sumatra-Bosch]

I hope MSFT paid you well for that comment

At its core, MSFT is a law firm that finds ways to corner markets and occasionally produces some tragically flawed software.

Want proof?

Look at its alleged core product - Windows.

The only version of Windows that didn't ship as a horror that took years and dozens of service packs to stabilize was Win2000 - which was designed by a completely non-MSFT team led by an old DEC guy. The kernel of that OS is still working today in XP.

Vista is a complete and utter disaster, panned by every independent reviewer as a criminally inept piece of work. Users are reporting everywhere that it's a horror.

Silverlight is another attempt to superset the Web and impose MSFT taxes on the world.

The EU should just indict MSFT for crimes against humanity.

[kreshwolf]

It's not a conspiracy theory if it's real!

Yeah we get it. It's just that you don't. Microsoft will do
everything they can to show how they are playing fair, and tout
just how many platforms Silverlight works on.

So let's think this through. Silverlight becomes a smashing
success and thus the defacto standard that every web developer
settles on.

It won't be long before Microsoft starts updating the Windows
version first followed by the OS X and Linux versions a few
months later.

After the OS X and Linux users find slower updates, we start
hearing how certain functions only work on Internet Explorer
now and Firefox has to wait for an update.

Later on Microsoft freezes development of Silverlight for OS X
and Linux and really starts throwing obstacles in the path of
Firefox and other non-Internet Explorer browsers.

All of a sudden you discover that to really enjoy and use the web
you have to be running Windows and Internet Explorer.

It's Microsoft's history and methodology. They place nice until
they set the standard, then all of a sudden nothing works with
the standard but Microsoft products.

No thank you Microsoft, not this time!

[rwfresh]

I agree.

Show me a computer in 2 years that doesn't have silverlight installed and i will show you a computer that isn't networked.

[Imalittleteapot]

Well

Well guess what. in 2 years I'll do a clean install and then you can come over and look at my networked computer without Silver Light.

Wait....Does that count?

[Seaspray0]

they've finally figured out what .net is?

I've yet to see a web application that uses it, but I have talked with a developer who is building one now. His description in a nutshell is "silverlight is awesome" and he loves it. It's supposed to give the ability to present asynchronous java and xml (ajax) simultaneously on the webpage, not through a java pop up. While all this goes under the name of silverlight, I'm pretty sure it's all a take on .net 3.0. Does this mean microsoft has finally figured out what .net is supposed to do? Perhaps they have. I have seen some web apps done under .net 2.0 and that was pretty nice.

[The_Decider]

javascript, not java

Two totally different animals.

[gperrego]

Needs more clarity but it has legs...

Ithink this technology is going to have legs in the future but... there are not enough particulars spelled out. Especially for the mac guys who love to hate MS.

This is a good product that I plan on deveoping in.

[The_Decider]

regardless of how good it is

It has to be MS supported multi-browser AND multi-platform.

Otherwise, no matter how technically better it is than Flash it is going nowhere.