In response to one of my earlier blog posts I was asked this question:
"As I get started with Silverlight, should I wait until 1.1 comes out? Would I have to scrap all my 1.0 efforts when 1.1 releases?"
The truth is I've been asked this in various ways by many people, and it concerns me a great deal because it means we are doing a poor job getting the message across that the answer is an unequivocal "No, Why Wait? Nearly everything you learn in 1.0 will move cleanly to 1.1"
Silverlight 1.0 is ready to go, and all the skills you learn with Silverlight 1.0 (other than (perhaps) getting good at Java-script) will apply to 1.1 and beyond. There is a great deal you can do in 1.0 today and getting started now has tremendous advantages. Take a look at the Major League Baseball showcase application for an idea of the kind of application that can be build with 1.0 (okay, yes, they added some of their own extensions to go as far as they did).
I know, from previous posts, that some folks are waiting eagerly (as am I) for 1.1 and the inclusion of the CLR, for managed code, etc. etc. I'm not suggesting that Silverlight won't improve, of course it will, nor that 1.1 won't be better than 1.0, (or for that matter that 2.0 won't be better than 1.0, and so forth). What I am suggesting is that you may not want to write off 1.0 — because it turns out to be a heck of a powerful tool, and you can get started today learning how to build Silverlight applications with a fully baked version.
Uh oh; that sounded dangerously like marketing. Okay, strike that. My enthusiasm does tend to get out of control. Let me try again… As a developer, what I see is a powerful tool that is being overshadowed by the promise of its own future; and I'd like to help provide the tools that other developers need to make use of the Silverlight we have today, so that we're all in a position to hit the ground at full speed as Silverlight evolves.
Listen, the marketing department is great; I have all the respect in the world for what they do, but I'm not in marketing I'm in development, so anytime I sound like I'm in marketing, please hit me hard with a dope slap.
Thanks.
-jesse
