Mobile Silverlight Update

Windows Embedded CE 6.0 R3 shipped with an edition of the Silverlight application platform, and Microsoft and Intel announced plans to port Silverlight to Intel’s Moblin OS for netbooks and other mobile devices. Silverlight is Microsoft’s platform for interactive graphical applications delivered over the Web. On mobile device platforms, Silverlight could help developers build applications that reach large numbers of devices, without sacrificing graphics quality or responsiveness. However, Silverlight is still not available on Microsoft’s most widely deployed mobile device platform, Windows Mobile.

RIA Platform

Silverlight is Microsoft’s platform for rich Internet applications (RIAs). Silverlight RIAs can be quickly deployed over the Web and run in a browser plug-in, although later versions of Silverlight can also run applications outside the browser. The dominant use of RIAs today is Web streaming video players (popularized by Adobe’s competing Flash platform), but some companies have created business-oriented RIAs for tasks such as e-commerce or charting data. RIAs are attractive because they can have broad reach, comparable to that of other Web content; for example, a Silverlight application written for the current version, Silverlight 3, can run on Windows XP and later, as well as Intel-based Macs running OS X 10.5 and later. However, because they run on client devices, RIAs can offer high-quality graphics and quick response times similar to locally installed applications.