Hi, Microsoft has posted online the first chapters of the upcoming book "Introducing 'Longhorn' for Developers" handed out at last week's Longhorn Dev Pow Wow in Los Angeles.
In Chapter 1 titled "The 'Longhorn' Application Model Brent Rector states why XUL beats out hard-wiring your UI in C# and writes: Using a markup language to define a UI has a number of advantages over using a procedural programming language. These advantages include the following: * More apparent control hierarchies * More apparent property inheritance * Easier processing and interpretation of markup language by tools * Potential separation of UI and procedural code I like XAML [Microsoft XUL], and I prefer to use it to define my UIs rather than using procedural-type coding. After a slow start Brent wipes himself into a frenzy: When you're writing a document that displays static content, you can create it in pure XAML. You can even write a document that uses data binding to display and update content from a data source by using nothing but XAML. You can define animations and mouse-over effects by using nothing but XAML. You can do a heck of a lot using nothing but XAML. (In fact, I try to do as much as possible in XAML and as little as possible in code. My applications seem to be less buggy and work more quickly the less code I write!) I hear you. Brent also offers tons of insight how XUL unites classic desktop apps and classic web apps and thus offers you the best of both worlds. Brent writes: You typically must install a Windows application. This makes the application and any updates hard to deploy. Windows applications don't run in the browser. Therefore, familiar Web UI paradigms such as page-oriented applications, navigation directly from one page to another, page history, and more aren't available to your application unless you create them from scratch. Windows applications also don't support text very well, especially when you try to mix text and graphics on the same page. Creating a Windows application that automatically flows text around graphics and that responds to user-initiated changes in the window size and user preferences for fonts and readability is a huge amount of work. Web applications have their own distinct strengths as well. When you browse to a Web page, the browser downloads only that page and the components the page requires. When you navigate to a new page, the browser then downloads the new page's requirements. In other words, the browser progressively downloads the application as needed. Deployment of a Web application is trivial. What deployment? You place the necessary application components on a server, and the browser downloads them as needed. There's no deployment per se. Creating the UI for a Web application is also quite easy. You declare your intentions using markup. For example, suppose I want a table in a specific position. I want an image to follow the table. I want some text to flow around the image. Mixing text, graphics, and media (sound and video) in a Web application is straightforward. I guess you can see where Brent is headed. Full story @ http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/en-us/dnintlong/html/longhornch01.asp and http://msdn.microsoft.com/Longhorn/understanding/books/rector/default.aspx - Gerald ------------------------------------------------------- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. Does SourceForge.net help you be more productive? Does it help you create better code? SHARE THE LOVE, and help us help YOU! Click Here: http://sourceforge.net/donate/ _______________________________________________ xul-announce mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xul-announce
