IT Bytes

I recently started to consider a new User Interface for a web application. Oh yes I want to use Silverlight but it just has zero presence on mobile devices, can I justify the speed in development/maintenance vs the lack of delivery channels. Hmm, I can try. But why should I? Windows Phone 7 (Wp7) runs Silverlight, that should certainly help me shouldn’t? But no, browse to my App on a browser on Wp7 and nothing, “no plugins here”. But why? The official line is about technical details, but I doubt that. Ok it’s not the same Silverlight but come on, it’s close enough to allow a desktop target of “restrict to Wp7 set”. So if not that then what else? Let’s imagine a world where Microsoft may pay some attention to Apple’s model. What if Microsoft can make money by only allowing apps on wp7 via a market place. Sounds like biz sense. But wait a second, if I browse to a site that has the same Silverlight app on it then why buy from the market place? Solution, stop Silverlight rendering on the browser. As I started this post, this frustrates me and stops me writing Silverlight apps for the web. But there is a way around this, “Wp7 enabled Silverlight app”. Imagine this;
1. In your Out Of Browser options you specify ‘Has Windows Phone 7 version’, and you enter the market place ID of your Wp7 application
2. You compile and deploy your Silverlight app
3. User browsers to your site via a desktop browser. They get the full experience
4. User browsers to your site from Wp7, the patched version of IE spots that the Silverlight host application has the market place id of a wp7 app. So it asks the shell’s catalogue if it has this ID, no – then prompt the user to purchase it, yes – launch the app and the user gets a specific phone experience. So there you have my idea of how we could get a shared experience, sure you’re still writing 2 apps, but now;
a) the site can have a functioning presence in a mobile browser
b) the wp7 has another selling channel, everyone’s a winner