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Jonathan tries to keep his blog (http://blogs.msdn.com/jonathanswift) up to date, but feels that writing a book is a very good excuse for not doing so. (Other popular excuses including playing the XBox and washing his hair.) When he’s not working, Jonathan spends all of his time with his wife and kids, and occasionally gets to exercise his pilot’s license at the flying club.

Chris Barker works as an Application Development Consultant for Microsoft in the United Kingdom (www.microsoft.com/uk/adc). He spends his days traveling around the country visiting customers and consulting on development practices on the Microsoft platform. More recently, his interest has been captured by RIA development, and as a result, he has delivered several customer workshops on Silverlight. Away from the office, Chris likes to get out and about in his home county of Derbyshire, riding a bike, kicking a football, and sinking a few pints of real ale.

Dan Wahlin (Microsoft Most Valuable Professional for Connected Systems) is a .NET development instructor and architecture consultant at Interface Technical Training (www.interfacett.com). Dan founded the XML for ASP.NET Developers web site (www.xmlforasp.net), which focuses on using ASP.NET, Silverlight, AJAX, and XML Web Services in Microsoft’s .NET platform. He’s also on the INETA Speaker’s Bureau and speaks at several conferences. Dan has authored/co-authored numerous books over the years on .NET technologies with his latest being Professional ASP.NET 3.5 AJAX and Professional Silverlight 2 for ASP.NET Developers. Dan also writes for several online technical newsletters, blogs at http://weblogs.asp.net/dwahlin, and updates what he’s up to from time to time at www.twitter.com/danwahlin. When he’s not working with technology, he enjoys sports and writing and recording music to relax a little — http://weblogs.asp.net/dwahlin/archive/tags/ Music/default.aspx.

Salvador Alvarez Patuel has been in the industry for more than 13 years. Currently a senior application development consultant (ADC) at Microsoft, helping customers to architect and build complex solutions using Microsoft technologies in the United Kingdom. Salvador has also been delivering multiple technical sessions around EMEA on Windows Mobile development and has been answering questions on many ask-the-experts events. Before joining Microsoft, he was the main technical architect for real-time engines on popular auctions, TV channels, and the gaming industry. He holds a software engineering degree from his native Argentina and a specialization in artificial intelligence. When Salva is not thinking about ones and zeroes, he enjoys climbing, windsurfing, and recently trying to learn how to play golf.

Part I: Silverlight Fundamentals for ASP.NET Developers.

Chapter 1: Silverlight in a Nutshell.

Uphill Struggle.

Rich Client or Web Reach?

Silverlight Steps In.

The Impact of Silverlight on Your Existing ASP.NET Real Estate.

What You Should Still Do in ASP.NET.

The Development Environment Overview.

Summary.

Chapter 2: Silverlight Architecture.

Client/Server Architecture Overview.

Platforms.

Architecture.

ASP.NET Integration.

Application Life Cycle.

Summary.

Chapter 3: XAML Condensed.

Why All ASP.NET Developers Should Know the Basics.

XAML Syntax and Terminology.

Piecing It All Together.

Summary.

Chapter 4: Programming Silverlight.

How a Silverlight Application Is Composed.

JavaScript — How Much You Need to Know.

JavaScript — The Basics.

The Silverlight Object Model.

Events, Threading, and Browser Interaction.

Part II: Developing ASP.NET Applications with Silverlight.

Chapter 5: Creating the User Interface.

Expression Suite — A Whirlwind Tour.

ASP.NET versus Silverlight Layout.

Summary.

Chapter 6: Silverlight Controls.

Introduction to Silverlight Controls.

Media Controls.

Silverlight Toolkit Controls.

Summary.

Chapter 7: Styles and Templates.

Styles.

Templating.

Integrating with ASP.NET.

ImplicitStyleManager.

Summary.

Chapter 8: User Interaction.

The Silverlight Interaction Context.

Navigation.

Summary.

Chapter 9: Communicating with the ServerSilverlight Networking and Communication Features.

Cross-Domain Support.

Creating Services for Silverlight.

Calling Services with Silverlight.

Calling REST APIsSummary.

Chapter 10: Working with Data.

Data Framework.

Data-Binding Essentials.

Retrieving and Storing Data.

Data Controls.

Manipulating Data.

LINQ.

LINQ to XML.

Validation

Summary..

Chapter 11: Creating Custom Controls.

User Controls.

Customizing Current Controls.

Custom Controls.

Summary.

Chapter 12: Securing Your Silverlight Application.

You’re under Attack!

The Security Model.

Working in a Sandbox.

Cross-Domain Security.

Integrating with ASP.NET Security.

Obfuscation.

Cryptography.

Summary.

Chapter 13: Audio and Video.

First Steps.

Finer Control.

Summary.

Chapter 14: Graphics and Animation.

Breathing Life into ASP.NET.

Graphics in Silverlight.

Image Handling.

Animating Your User Interface.

Summary.

Chapter 15: Troubleshooting.

Is There a Problem?

Common Types of Problems.

Your Toolkit.

Reducing the Likelihood of Problems.

Summary.

Chapter 16: Performance.

Performance Bottlenecks.

Instrumentation.

Improving Performance.

Summary.

Index.