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1. Introduction

Silverlight 3 is now fact, and it introduces a lot of new functionalities. One of the things that we have been missing in Silverlight 2 was the element effects. If you want to make your elements more attractive then you need to write your own custom effects. Of course there are additional libraries (such as Silverlight.FX), which offer a great number of effects and animations. Fortunately, in Silverlight 3 such effects have been implemented.

In this article I will develop a simple Silverlight Slide Show using Pixel Shader effects. 

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1. Introduction

In the previous parts of the article I showed you the first two groups of patterns used in the Composite Application Library (CAL) – Composite User Interface patterns and Modularity patterns. In the final part I will show you the third group – Testability patterns.

2. Patterns and Practices in the CAL - quick overview

As a whole the patterns used in CAL can be separated in three main groups:

• Composite User Interface patterns (part 1)
  • Composite
  • Composite View
  • Command
  • Adapter
• Modularity patterns (part 2)
  • Separated interface and Plug In
  • Service Locator
  • Dependency Injection
  • Event Aggregator
  • Façade
  • Registry
• Testability patterns (part 3)
  • Inversion of control
  • Separated presentation

3.

1. Introduction

In the previous part of the article I showed the first part of most important patterns and practices used in the Composite Application Library (CAL). In the second part I will show you the second group – the Modularity patterns.

2. Patterns and Practices in the CAL - quick overview

As a whole the patterns used in CAL can be separated in three main groups:

• Composite User Interface patterns (part 1)
  • Composite
  • Composite View
  • Command
  • Adapter
• Modularity patterns (part 2)
  • Separated interface and Plug In
  • Service Locator
  • Dependency Injection
  • Event Aggregator
  • Façade
  • Registry
• Testability patterns (part 3)
  • Inversion of control
  • Separated presentation

3.

Introduction

In Part 7.1 of this series I looked at the importance of styling your Silverlight applications. In this article I will be taking a look at fashions in user interface design of late, and what basic elements can be identified as working towards beautiful and functional applications. Also I will address some of the “controversy” from my previous article and provide some opinions and responses to the comments I received.

Before we start, I have a disclaimer. I’m a developer, not a graphics designer – so I’m writing these styling articles from a developer’s perspective (and with the same limited graphical design skills many other developers share).

Introduction

Yes, I was searching for months if there is any possibility to simple justify block text! And I didn’t find anything – except lots of posts like: “Why didn’t they implement it?”!

So I waited for Silverlight 3 Beta 1 to appear, and I began to hope and pray, but: Once again – there was nothing like block text. I was very disappointed. How should I display long text on the screen without clear formatting borders on both sides - and I don’t want to mix Silverlight and HTML again, either. I need this for building a web application composed of 100% Silverlight, and I don’t feel like doing the text-rendering and position-calculation by myself.

1. Introduction

In previous articles I showed how the most famous composite design patterns (Model – View – Controller and Model – View – Presenter) can be used with great success in Silverlight despite of the different programming model in Silverlight. My latest article targets a completely new pattern which has been created especially for WPF, but it is also very suitable for Silverlight applications. Today I’ve decided to continue my series of articles with OOP approach and to present you the main design patterns and practices used in the Composite Application Library (CAL).

Introduction

In Part 6 of this series I looked at implementing a means for displaying reports that appear to be within the application and permitting them to be printed. In each of the articles so far I have discussed major components of line of business application development, but have spent little or no time in styling the application in anticipation of writing an article dedicated to doing so. However that article has turned into seven articles which will become a mini-series within this existing series.

1. Introduction

Whatever software application you want to create, the most important problem that must be solved is the tight coupling. Mixing one layer with another is a very common mistake and it is the main reason for your application to be tightly coupled. For example: as a practical example in this article I will create a simple data entry application, which purpose is to load, create, edit, delete and save data. The most straightforward way to create the application is to put everything in the user interface (handling the button’s click events and writing the code there). It is the easiest way but it is far from the best. This will produce a low quality code and high complexity. And when the things are tightly coupled, one change can lead you into chasing breaking changes in the whole code. So the most important thing is to keep the layers separate, one layer – one responsibility. Yes, it is true, that creating an application with separate tiers requires additional work, but this may save you a headache in the future.

The most famous solutions and approaches (patterns) for creating a multi layer application are the MVC and MVP patterns. Since Silverlight does not require reinventing the wheel, these patterns and practices can be applied with great success when you create a Silverlight application. In previous articles I showed you how the Model-View-Presenter (MVP) pattern and the Model-View-Controller (MVC) pattern can be used in Silverlight. Today I decided to continue and to present you another pattern – it is the Model-View-ViewModel (MVVM). MVVM is tailor-made for WPF and it is an adaptation of the MVC and MVP.

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