Are WPF and Silverlight Dead?

By CentralDogma
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Grand Master

Andre S. Veteran

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They left windows forms to gather dust :( I never even saw any of vista's features getting into winforms without having to use the slightly buggy windows api code pack. They'll probably never give that a decent update again.

They're not in WPF either, it's all Windows Api Code Pack. Insane, but true. :(
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MFH

Posted
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How can you think that MS would abandon WPF or Silverlight? They have invested quite a lot into these technologies, I don't see them going away any time soon.

From what they actually communicate - not much I might add - WPF is legacy starting with Win8 => no more updates, slowly dying?

BTW: MFC is not gone either, so be my guest and use it in any new program?

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sbauer

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From what they actually communicate - not much I might add - WPF is legacy starting with Win8 => no more updates, slowly dying?

BTW: MFC is not gone either, so be my guest and use it in any new program?

I think that part is huge. Why aren't they communicating?

1) They know that their official announcement won't be well received (limited/no WPF updates) or

2) They haven't decided what they're going to do yet.

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MFH

Posted
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I think that part is huge. Why aren't they communicating?

1) They know that their official announcement won't be well received (limited/no WPF updates) or

2) They haven't decided what they're going to do yet.

1) Equals: They loose quite a big share of supporters. Let's face it no .NET leads to Java leads to Independence of Windows leads to market share decline leads to Microsoft screwd up

2) Equals: Microsoft screwd up

=> Either way they screwd up!

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MFH

Posted
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Third solution: Sinofsky screwed up. He wanted to say "you can also build those apps using HTML5" but what he said was more like "apps are built using HTML5".

If that's true, than?

a) he should have corrected this mistake.

b) he's not that brilliant I thought he is. I had been considering him one of the best, maybe even the best division president and a possible future CEO?

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sbauer

Posted
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Third solution: Sinofsky screwed up. He wanted to say "you can also build those apps using HTML5" but what he said was more like "apps are built using HTML5".

If that's the case, I don't see why they're not saying that now. Seems like a pretty simple thing to come out a say. "Oh, yeah, HTML 5 is one option, but you can still use WPF."

Grand Master

Andre S. Veteran

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The thing is that they don't have anything better. I fail to see how a spaghetti of web technologies some of which not even quite ready (HTML5) is on the same level as (nevermind better than) .NET/WPF. It'd be a major step back for developers. 3DS Max 2013 won't be made in Javascript. Are we supposed to go back to C++ for heavy desktop apps? :blink:

Grand Master

neufuse Veteran

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lets break it down like this...... normal windows apps use WinForms (Win32/MFC/normal .NET apps) those apps are tools, business apps, etc.....

WPF apps are few but they are more flashy stuff like kiosks and well any app that depends a lot on animation and scalable windows (almost like flash)... this is why silverlight was made on it....

HTML will never make it into the standard windows app universe as a application base...... it will probably only be used to enhance parts of stuff, not replace it...

WinForms, WPF, and HTML are not going anywhere

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sbauer

Posted
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lets break it down like this...... normal windows apps use WinForms (Win32/MFC/normal .NET apps) those apps are tools, business apps, etc.....

WPF apps are few but they are more flashy stuff like kiosks and well any app that depends a lot on animation and scalable windows (almost like flash)... this is why silverlight was made on it....

HTML will never make it into the standard windows app universe as a application base...... it will probably only be used to enhance parts of stuff, not replace it...

WinForms, WPF, and HTML are not going anywhere

You can break it down like that, but it's completely incorrect.

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rfirth

Posted
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It could work. If it's true, we'll just have to wait and see what tools they provide. If they have come up with something good enough to replace WPF & Silverlight, it must be something pretty special. I'm going to wait until BUILD in September before I get worried.

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somethingelse

Posted
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They're not in WPF either, it's all Windows Api Code Pack. Insane, but true. :(

Mostly true, but at least they added the windows 7 taskbar apis, and in all fariness with taskdialogs where its omission is annoying it's not as huge a task to create something similar in wpf as in winforms, I would have liked to have seen aero wizards though, not that they matter for the new Windows 8 apps.

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sbauer

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tell me how its incorrect? I was just stating a generalization on how people have developed apps using these technologies to date

First of all, what, exactly, is a "normal application"?

Second, I know many businesses that use WPF for their non-flashy applications. They use WPF for the features as well as the application design architecture. The programmers prefer programming using the MVVM model that WPF does well, instead of molding WinForms into MVP.

Finally, your saying that HTML will never make it as an application base is premature at best. You have no idea what they're doing with HTML to make it work on Windows 8. Your premature statement reeks of an opinion made by someone that doesn't like change.

Rising Star

KingCrimson

Posted
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First of all, what, exactly, is a "normal application"?

Second, I know many businesses that use WPF for their non-flashy applications. They use WPF for the features as well as the application design architecture. The programmers prefer programming using the MVVM model that WPF does well, instead of molding WinForms into MVP.

Finally, your saying that HTML will never make it as an application base is premature at best. You have no idea what they're doing with HTML to make it work on Windows 8. Your premature statement reeks of an opinion made by someone that doesn't like change.

HTML5 will never work for serious business or public safety applications. Those customers want stand-alone apps with the full functionality and flashiness that only WPF can provide.

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sbauer

Posted
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HTML5 will never work for serious business or public safety applications. Those customers want stand-alone apps with the full functionality and flashiness that only WPF can provide.

How do you know what won't work? You're clearly thinking that an html file is going to be sitting on the drive and you'll be able to do a view source on it. We have no idea what they're doing. How do you these applications are not going to be standalone? What if the presentation markup was written in HTML, but was embedded into an exe or something? Again, we have no idea what's going on.

Rising Star

KingCrimson

Posted
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How do you know what won't work? You're clearly thinking that an html file is going to be sitting on the drive and you'll be able to do a view source on it. We have no idea what they're doing. How do you these applications are not going to be standalone? What if the presentation markup was written in HTML, but was embedded into an exe or something? Again, we have no idea what's going on.

Remains to be seen, but the fact is WPF/Silverlight is here NOW and HTML5 that can be equivalent feature-richness is vaporware.

Grand Master

+LogicalApex MVC

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Beyond my earlier comment I'm not even sure why they are bothering to move from Silverlight...

With Windows Phone 7 adopting it as its only UI model a lot more of us devs are finally jumping into that camp and utilizing the technology. If the goal is to have a unified experience capable of being coded via one app targeting the tablet, phone, and PC I still fail to see the justification for a swap in technologies. The .NET CLR can, and does, run on all of those platforms and Silverlight can, and should be, synced between the platforms to allow this to take pace with little to no developer retraining.

I can understand allowing web apps to become more powerful... This is the model Google is using and they might not want to be left cold if it gathers some interest, but there definitely is no need to throw the baby out with the bath water on this one.

Grand Master

neufuse Veteran

Posted
  • Veteran
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First of all, what, exactly, is a "normal application"?

Second, I know many businesses that use WPF for their non-flashy applications. They use WPF for the features as well as the application design architecture. The programmers prefer programming using the MVVM model that WPF does well, instead of molding WinForms into MVP.

Finally, your saying that HTML will never make it as an application base is premature at best. You have no idea what they're doing with HTML to make it work on Windows 8. Your premature statement reeks of an opinion made by someone that doesn't like change.

:rolleyes:

I can count the number of public WPF applications I've seen on my two hands... they are not common, so therfore right now a "normal application" is just one someone writes without going to WPF directly for its additional features.... most people that go to WPF go there for what it gives them, if there is no reason to write in XAML or have scalable forms, or many of the other things WPF gives you, most devs stick to winforms.... and for those of us who have to write apps fast, we depend on control sets, and there are WAY more sets out there for winforms then WPF right now that run natively in their own environment (forms, wpf, silverlight, etc)... WPF is still not an ultra mature system like forms has been for a very long time now....

The MVVM model is overrated... we've worked with a LOT of large design companies and pretty much all of them are staying away from WPF right now and sticking with winforms, only using XAML and such for windows phone development but those are few and far between right now also in the large devlopment scheme...

and why am I saying HTML wont make it? because its been tried in the past and has failed in the past... MS has been down this road before and ditched it before... starting with IE4 they pushed their channel widget thing..... then Millenium and 2000 used HTML forms and then they ditched them... they've been on this back and forth teeter for years now... it's never been made into a mature system, and to say I dont like change is absurd, I'd love to make windows I could easy change just by setting CSS paramters to move things around... but besides in web browsers, i dont see this happening soon on the massive levels of winform apps.... the main problem is who controls the rendering of it? is it browser based rendering? (a la mshtml.dll?) or is it a completely different system designed for applications? if its mshtml based I can see it being a fail from the start just because developers who hate microsoft will thumb their noses up at it...

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