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1. Introduction

In the first part of the article, I tried to describe what is RX Framework and what can be done with it. One thing I’ve missed to mention was how RX could be used for asynchronous service calls. Namely, this is the accent in the second part of the article. For those who missed the first part, you could read it here.

The demo source code could be downloaded from here.

1. Introduction

Beta versions of Silverlight 4 and .NET Framework 4 are already a fact. There are just a few weeks until the official releases. One of the coolest features which will be part of .NET Framework 4 and also will be available for Silverlight applications is the RX Framework. The arising interest around the RX Framework made me roll up my sleeves and start playing around this.
So the first step was to answer several important questions such as: “what is Linq to Events?”, “what is RX Framework?”, and “what is Reactive Programming?” And generally what lies behind these sound terms? Linq to events or RX Framework (also known as Reactive Extensions for .NET Framework) is one and the same designation for a library for composing asynchronous and event-based programs using observable collections.

Introduction

Only three months after the release of the latest official version of Silverlight 3, a new beta version – Silverlight 4 is already a fact. There are a lot of new things, which deserve to be mentioned, such as Rich Text, drop target, webcam, microphone, etc. Check out the official Silverlight site for more information. However, in this article I decided to show you one very interesting feature, which is taken from WPF, namely it is the implicit styles feature.
What was the situation till now? Whenever you’ve created a style  in Silverlight, you were obligated to specify the TargetType as well as an unique Key/Name for the style.

1. Introduction

Silverlight 3 is already a fact and along with it a new version of Expression Blend has been released. One of the changes in the Expression Blend that makes me a deep impression is that the new Blend has been made more approachable for designers. Beside the behaviors, Photoshop and Illustrator importers, the new Blend 3 makes a huge step in the direction of making better user experience. This step is the SketchFlow. The SketchFlow is a new set of tools for Expression Blend to create sketches and prototypes of interactive content and applications.

1. The problem

Download source code.

Have you ever wondered why the XAML parser recognizes the full palette of 141 colors (by name), but the Silverlight Colors class does not support the same full range of color names, for example, as WPF? I haven’t even noted that until the last week. In Silverlight in the XAML markup you can access all colors by name:

 Unfortunately, this not valid if you try the same operation in the code behind file:

If you check in MSDN you will see that the Colors class allows you to access only 16 colors.

1. Introduction

With the release of the new Silverlight 3, a lot of new cool features have been introduced. One of my favorite definitely is the support of behaviours and triggers. In WPF the triggers are extremely powerful. They allow you to declaratively associate an action with an event or property value. In the previous versions of Silverlight one of the things that were really missing were the triggers and the behaviors. It was not possible, for example, to add mouse-overs to objects declaratively (as in WPF).

1. Introduction

Sometimes creating user interface for Silverlight application can be tricky. The reason – the different users may have different screens, resolutions, some of them may have installed multiple toolbars in their browser (that will cause less space for our Silverlight application), or maybe some of them don’t like maximized windows. The purpose of that article is to show you how to create a Silverlight custom control, which will allow you to create applications with dynamic layout, that are easy for use on any screen and will use the screen area in the most optimal way. You can see the demo here.

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. 

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.