Introduction to Silverlight
This content is outdated and is no longer being maintained. It is provided as a courtesy for individuals who are still using these technologies. This page may contain URLs that were valid when originally published, but now link to sites or pages that no longer exist.
Microsoft Silverlight is a cross-browser, cross-platform client technology that helps you design, develop, and deliver media-enabled experiences and rich interactive applications to the Web. Silverlight unifies the capabilities of the server, the Web, and the desktop, of managed code and dynamic languages, of declarative and traditional programming, and the power of Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF).
The focus of this section in the Developer Guide is to demonstrate how to create a Silverlight application and how to display a Silverlight application in an Office Live Small Business application.
Requirements to run a Silverlight application
In order to try the steps in the how-to articles included in this section, you will need to download and install Microsoft Silverlight and the Microsoft Silverlight Software Development Kit. To find the most current downloads for these applications, see Silverlight Deployment and Resources.
For a Web site visitor to run a Silverlight-based application, they require a small plug-in in their browser. The plug-in is free. If they don't already have the plug-in, they are automatically prompted to install it. The download and installation take seconds and require no interaction except permission to install.