Everyone’s working on Web applications today—those applications that make the browser experience just as good as anything you could write for the desktop. Silverlight 3 is the Rich Internet application (RIA) technology of choice for many developers. This article doesn’t assume you’re one of those developers. Rather, it assumes that you’re new to Silverlight and need a helping hand to get started. Look for more advanced articles in the future.

One of the more interesting Silverlight 3 features is support for running applications out of the browser. You also obtain dramatic video performance and quality improvements, and features that radically improve developer productivity. This article doesn’t provide a full list of Silverlight 3 features, but you can see them at http://silverlight.net/getstarted/silverlight3/default.aspx#whatsnew. Don’t let this impressive list overwhelm you; getting started with Silverlight 3 isn’t as hard as this list would make you think.

Getting Your Copy of the Silverlight 3 SDK

Silverlight 3 is getting close to release, but isn’t quite released as I write this. By the time you read this article, Silverlight 3 might be available in a released version. No matter what state Silverlight 3 is in, you can download it from http://silverlight.net/getstarted/silverlight3/default.aspx. Make sure you spend a little time looking at the Web page. You can download the SDK version of Silverlight 3 or runtime versions for either the Macintosh or PC. Getting the right version is essential. This article assumes you have the Silverlight 3 SDK installed; simply click the Silverlight 3 Beta Tools for Visual Studio link (find it at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=143571).

In addition to the Silverlight 3 SDK, you also want to download the Expression Blend Preview; also the Silverlight 3 Toolkit; as well as the .NET RIA Services, and finally the help file. Make sure you download the right version of the Silverlight Toolkit—there are separate versions for Silverlight 2 and Silverlight 3. Although you can view the help file online at http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb871518.aspx, I find it easier to have the help information available locally. All of these additional downloads are optional, but they’ll make it easier to work with Silverlight 3. For the sake of simplicity, this article uses only the Silverlight 3 Beta Tools download.

Before you attempt to install Silverlight 3, make sure you read about the Visual Studio requirements for using it. At the time of this writing, you must have Visual Studio 2008 SP1 installed (download it here). If you don’t know whether you have Visual Studio 2008 SP1, choose Help | About and you’ll see the version number in the About dialog box—it should show that you have SP1 installed.

I’m using Visual Studio 2008 Team System, so you may see some differences in the dialog boxes and menu commands in this article if you’re using a different version. However, the code I provide will work with all versions of Visual Studio 2008, so don’t worry about any small differences you notice.