Silverlight Recipes (eBook)

Rob Cameron is an industry architect with the Developer Platform Evangelism team at Microsoft, working on mobility and entertainment solutions. Rob has more than 13 years of solutions architecture and software engineering experience, with the last few years focused on the Internet, mobility, and entertainment space. You can read more about Rob s current work at http://blogs.msdn.com/robcamer.

Contents at a Glance 5
Contents 6
Foreword 25
About the Author 27
About the Technical Reviewer 28
Acknowledgments 29
Introduction 30
Who This Book Is For 31
How This Book Is Structured 32
Prerequisites 32
Downloading the Code 32
Contacting the Authors 32
A Quick Tour of Silverlight 3 Development 33
Getting Up to Speed with Silverlight 3 33
1-1. Setting Up the Silverlight 3 Environment 38
1-2. Installing Additional Silverlight-Related Services and Controls 39
1- 3. Understanding the Structure of a Silverlight Solution 40
1-4. Understanding the Developer/ Designer Workflow 49
1-5. Understanding the Basics of Expression Blend 3 52
1-6. Accessing Source Control 59
1-7. Running Silverlight 3 on a Mac 60
1-8. Running Silverlight on Linux 61
Application Design and Programming Model 62
The Mechanics of Silverlight Applications 62
2-1. Adding a Custom Class 63
2-2. Adding a Custom Control 70
2-3. Locating a Control 73
2-4. Dynamically Loading XAML from JavaScript 78
2-5. Dynamically Loading XAML from Managed Code 83
2-6. Persisting Data on the Client 85
2- 7. Opening a Local File from a Silverlight Application 92
2-8. Accessing XML Data with an XmlReader 97
2-9. Accessing XML Data with LINQ 100
2-10. Managing Unhandled Exceptions 105
2-11. Executing Work on a Background Thread with Updates 106
2-12. Updating the UI from a Background Thread 116
2-13. Managing XAML Resources 121
2-14. Managing Embedded Resources 127
2-15. Creating Silverlight Using Ruby, Python, or JScript 132
2-16. Creating Application Services 136
2-17. 142
2-18. Save a File Anywhere on the User’s System 145
Developing User Experiences 148
3-1. Importing Art from Expression Design 149
3-2. Working with Color and Gradients in Blend 152
3-3. Positioning UI Elements with a Canvas 163
3-4. Positioning UI Elements with a StackPanel 167
3-5. Positioning UI Elements with a Grid 171
3-6. Using Shapes to Draw 177
3-7. Using Paths to Draw 183
3-8. Using Geometries to Draw 190
3-9. Providing Scrollable Content 196
3-10. Applying a Border to Elements 198
3-11. Using Simple Animations with Objects 204
3-12. Animating UI Elements with Keyframes 212
3-13. Transforming an Object 222
3-14. Creating a Simple Cartoon Scene 228
3-15. Handling Keyboard Input 240
3-16. Working with Ink 247
3-17. Adding 3-D Effects to UI Elements 254
3-18. Dynamically Creating Bitmaps 266
3-19. Improving Graphic Animation and Video Performance 274
3-20. Improve Animation with Custom Easing Functions 278
3-21. Adding Pixel Shader Visual Effects 285
3-22. Create and Work with Design-Time Data in Expression Blend 290
3-23. Reuse Application Interactivity with Behaviors 301
3-24. Prototype Application Design 303
Data Binding 306
4-1. Binding Application Data to the UI 306
4-2. Binding Using a DataTemplate 314
4-3. Receiving Change Notifications for Bound Data 322
4-4. Converting Values During Data Binding 340
4-5. Binding Across Elements 354
4-6. Validating Input for Bound Data 362
4-7. Controlling Updates 378
Controls 389
A Word About the Samples 390
5-1. Customizing a Control’s Basic Appearance 390
5-2. Replacing the Default UI of a Control 394
5-3. Customizing the Default ListBoxItem UI 411
5-4. Displaying Information in a Pop-up 420
5-5. Displaying Row Details in a DataGrid 432
5-6. Applying Custom Templates to a DataGrid Cell 442
5-7. Creating Custom Column Types for a DataGrid 448
5-8. Creating a Composite User Control 455
5-9. Creating a Custom Layout Container 469
5-10. Creating a Custom Control 483
5-11. Defining a Custom Visual State 500
5-12. Controlling ScrollViewer Scroll Behavior 512
5-13. Customizing the Binding Validation User Interface 522
5-14. Control Behavior in Expression Blend 537
Browser Integration 545
6-1. Hosting Silverlight in HTML on Any Platform 545
6-2. Hosting Silverlight in ASP.NET 550
6-3. Setting Focus for Keyboard Input 551
6-4. Implementing a Full-Screen UI 558
6-5. Calling a JavaScript Method from Managed Code 567
6-6. Calling a Managed Code Method from JavaScript 576
6-7. Exchanging Data Among Multiple Plug-ins 590
6-8. Embedding Silverlight Within a Windows Gadget 597
6-9. Embed Silverlight in an Internet Explorer 8 Web Slice 613
6-10. Take Advantage of the Navigation Framework 618
Networking and Web Service Integration 628
A Quick Word about the Samples 629
7-1. Consuming a WCF Service 630
7-2. Exchanging XML Messages over HTTP 652
7-3. Using JSON Serialization over HTTP 664
7-4. Accessing Resources over HTTP 670
7-5. Using Sockets to Communicate over TCP 696
7-6. Enabling Cross-Domain Access 729
7-7. 733
7-8. Exchanging Data Between Silverlight Applications 761
Integrating Rich Media 781
8-1. Adding Video to a Page 781
8-2. Creating a Complete Video Player 786
8-3. Adding Streaming Media Support 818
8-4. Using Playlists to Package Media 859
8-5. Using Markers to Display Timed Content 865
8-6. Displaying and Seeking Using SMPTE Timecodes 882
8-7. Building a Managed Decoder for Silverlight 896
Building LOB Applications 921
9-1. Creating a LOB Application Framework 922
9-2. Adding Data to a LOB Application 934
9-3. Adding Advanced LOB Data Access with Data- Form Support 943
9-4. Adding Support for Data Validation 952
9-5. Adding .NET RIA Services to an Existing Application 958
9-6. Using the .NET RIA Services Class Library to Isolate Services 961