September 26, 2008 at 17:10Silverlight 2 RC0 released
So, today Silverlight 2 RC0 (release candidate) has been released . Please note that only the developer version (Silverlight 2 Dev Runtime) has been released. There are currently no end-user versions. This is done to give developers the opportunity to transfer their applications to the final version of Silverlight 2 API. There are several incompatibilities between Beta2 and RC, and Microsoft wants to be sure that existing sites using Silverlight 2 will be updated, and will work correctly with the final release. In the meantime, you can use the RC version only for development, and it will be possible to distribute applications after the release of the final version, which will take place soon.
Here are the links where you can download Silverlight 2 RC0, Visual Studio 2008 Tools RC0, and Expression Blend 2 SP1 RC0. I would like to note that the Expression Blend 2 SP1 RC0 listed here is only a Service Pack, and to work with Silverlight 2 in Expression Blend 2 you need to install this package yourself first.
Visual Studio 2008 Tools RC0
Expression Blend 2 SP1 RC0
Expression Blend 2
Windows Silverlight 2 Dev Runtime RC0
Changes between Beta 2 and RC
The release candidate includes a huge number of bug fixes, and work has also been done to optimize performance. In addition, some differences in the class library between Silverlight and the full .NET Framework have been resolved. Most of these differences are not great, but there were a lot of them. You can read about the changes in the API by following this link or by downloading this document .
Styles (that is, the appearance of the default) of the standard controls have also been updated.
New Controls
In the RC version, you will find many improvements in controls, network connectivity, data caching, rendering, multimedia subsystem and other components.
Over the next few months, many new controls will be released. And at the moment, three new controls are available in the RC version. These are ComboBox, ProgressBar and PasswordBox, which are added directly to Silverlight runtime (runtime still weighs about 4.6 MB and installs in a few seconds).
Here is an example of using new controls:
Here's what they look like by default:
Based on ScottGu's Blog .
Here are the links where you can download Silverlight 2 RC0, Visual Studio 2008 Tools RC0, and Expression Blend 2 SP1 RC0. I would like to note that the Expression Blend 2 SP1 RC0 listed here is only a Service Pack, and to work with Silverlight 2 in Expression Blend 2 you need to install this package yourself first.
Visual Studio 2008 Tools RC0
Expression Blend 2 SP1 RC0
Expression Blend 2
Windows Silverlight 2 Dev Runtime RC0
Changes between Beta 2 and RC
The release candidate includes a huge number of bug fixes, and work has also been done to optimize performance. In addition, some differences in the class library between Silverlight and the full .NET Framework have been resolved. Most of these differences are not great, but there were a lot of them. You can read about the changes in the API by following this link or by downloading this document .
Styles (that is, the appearance of the default) of the standard controls have also been updated.
New Controls
In the RC version, you will find many improvements in controls, network connectivity, data caching, rendering, multimedia subsystem and other components.
Over the next few months, many new controls will be released. And at the moment, three new controls are available in the RC version. These are ComboBox, ProgressBar and PasswordBox, which are added directly to Silverlight runtime (runtime still weighs about 4.6 MB and installs in a few seconds).
Here is an example of using new controls:
Here's what they look like by default:
Based on ScottGu's Blog .