Microsoft Silverlight to come to S60

slitchfield · #1 04-03-2008, 07:38 AM

Nokia has announced at CeBIT that it will make Microsoft's Silverlight (think Flash clone) available for S60, as well as for Series 40 devices and
Nokia Internet tablets. Silverlight
is a cross-browser, cross-platform plug-in for delivering
'next-generation' media experiences and rich interactive applications. Microsoft
will demonstrate Silverlight on S60 during the opening keyote at their MIX08 conference on March 5 and availability to developers is intended to be later this year.

Read on in the full article.

Orophin Anwarunya · #2 04-03-2008, 08:38 AM

Another feather in the hat of S60 and Nokia in its push for full internet technologies and experience in the mobile handset space.

Silverlight is powerful stuff and worthy of its place amongst the other web tech, so people should try to see past their prejudice against MS and appreciate what it can do.

Awesome stuff.

DevilsRejection · #3 04-03-2008, 10:08 AM

Flash clone is a harsh way of labeling Silverlight, but at the end of the day ... I think both Flash and Silverlight are stealing the best bits from each other and evolving into something that will enable rich experiences regardless of platform.

Silverlight after all was the first to add 1080p video playback, albeit with their own codec solution, Adobe fought back with 1080p h.264, better suited for reducing licensing fees.

I'm not picking favorites this early in the game, don't forget Qt+WebKit = one powerful combination.

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post...th-webkit.html

ajck · #4 04-03-2008, 11:30 AM

I think only technologies that are lightweight, efficient, as bug free as possible, don't invite viruses and hackers in, genuinely cross platform and open (that does not have to mean open source) will, or should, succeed in the long run on mobile. If Microsoft can produce good technology that fits those requirements, then great stuff, bring it on.

However, it is recorded history that they have almost universally produced software that does not fit those requirements, and is often (usually?) an attempt to subvert the natural evolution of the market for their own devious purposes. We'll see if a leopard can change it's spots...

#5 04-03-2008, 11:38 AM

mmm its hard to welcome stuff from MS.

They have done so much good but have also done so much bad.

We'll see I guess!

Rafe · #6 04-03-2008, 11:39 AM

Quote:

... will, or should, succeed in the long run on mobile. ..

Unfortunately should does not always mean will... There are going to be plenty of other factors in play. Microsoft's established developer base could do a lot for them... in the same way that Flash Lite seems to have been given a lot of impetus by the large Flash develop base / web usage of Flash. Technology rarely seems to use the most elegant solution.

Changing tack, I think its interesting to see Silverlight come to S60 relatively early. I would have thought Silverlight would get showcased on Windows Mobile first (I assume its on the way)... Still I guess it the same as Exchange, Messenger, WMDRM etc etc.

xerxes · #7 04-03-2008, 01:48 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rafe

Unfortunately should does not always mean will... There are going to be plenty of other factors in play. Microsoft's established developer base could do a lot for them... in the same way that Flash Lite seems to have been given a lot of impetus by the large Flash develop base / web usage of Flash. Technology rarely seems to use the most elegant solution.

Changing tack, I think its interesting to see Silverlight come to S60 relatively early. I would have thought Silverlight would get showcased on Windows Mobile first (I assume its on the way)... Still I guess it the same as Exchange, Messenger, WMDRM etc etc.

You've got to remember that big companies (at least in the IT space) are almost always in reality just collections of business units that don't give a toss about each other. They have their own targets and p/l accounts that drive their behaviour.

The business unit that produces Silverlight is presumably targeted on licence revenue (most MS business units are in one or another). As the press release says, being on S60 gives them a potentially huge end-user market which gives possible Silverlight authors much more incentive to pony up for the authoring licence than the WinMob user base would.

Then add on top the licence fee from the device manufacturer. 10c per unit for 100M phones per yearr all adds up!

bartmanekul · #8 04-03-2008, 02:42 PM

Youve got to wonder if it would end up being charged for, like MSN messenger.

I know its a different thing, but given messenger on symbian had so many alternatives and still they charged for it...Im wondering.

Orophin Anwarunya · #9 04-03-2008, 05:39 PM

ajck, by your logic, we are due another major war from Germany and we cant trust any of them since they have a well known history starting wars.

Give the folks a chance, they have been trying to sort things out for years and they are making roads towards improvements. kinda unfair when people default to that "history of this and that..." comment even when what they see is actually quite interesting.

This announcement can benefit the proliferation of the platforms and technologies its being used on and with.

buster · #10 04-03-2008, 09:08 PM

It seems to me that Microsoft have been abusing their position for so long, that any announcement of this nature is always going to be viewed with suspicion.

Let's face it, they didn't get a €1,4 billion fine for "doing the right thing"...

MS have a history of trying to split markets up, such as their spat with Sun about Java. While an alternative to Flash might be a good thing, it also fragements the market, and forces browsers to deal with ever-increasing numbers of media-types.