In this recipe, we'll look at what we need to install to start developing Silverlight applications. We'll learn about the basic tools that we need as a developer and also take a look at the designer tools that can come in handy for developers as well.
To start developing Silverlight applications, we'll need to install the necessary tools and SDKs. Carry out the following steps in order to get started:
1. We need to make sure we install Visual Web Developer Express 2010 (available for free at http://www.microsoft.com/express/downloads/) or Visual Studio 2010 (trial version available at http://www.microsoft.com/visualstudio/en-us/download).
2. Go to http://www.silverlight.net/getstarted/ to download and install the Silverlight 4 Tools for Visual Studio 2010. Open Visual Studio 2010 after installation. Visual Studio 2010 ships with Silverlight 3 templates installed out of the box, the tools add support for version 4.
3. Go to http://www.microsoft.com/expression/ to download and install Blend 4.
For Silverlight development, the minimum that we need are the developer tools. These will integrate with Visual Studio 2008 (if you're using Silverlight 3) or 2010. In Visual Studio 2010, a nice, visual designer is added for editing our XAML code. In the 2008 version, this designer doesn't exist. When installing the developer tools for Silverlight 4, the following components are automatically downloaded and installed:
Silverlight 4 developer runtime
Silverlight 4 software development kit and Visual Studio project support
WCF RIA services
We can write XAML code using Visual Studio. However, if you're serious about designing, you might want to consider using Microsoft Expression Blend. This tool, primarily aimed at designers, should be seen as an application that generates XAML for us by means of a rich number of options and an easy-to-use interface. It also integrates nicely with Visual Studio and source control software integration is available as well.
After having installed all the necessary tools, it might be worth taking a look at the Creating our first service-enabled and data-driven Silverlight 4 application using Visual Studio 2010 recipe as well as the Using the workflow between Visual Studio 2010 and Blend 4 recipe. In these recipes, we create an entire application in Visual Studio 2010 and Blend 4 respectively.