What is the difference between WPF and Silverlight?

Due to the name relationship, WPF and WPF/E are always considered similar. In fact, apart from rendering the UI, the two use the common language XAML, which is essentially quite different. Even XAML has different meanings for WPF and Silverlight, and it cannot be considered a "common language" between the two.

For WPF, XAML is a way to change the. NET program language to XML. In other words, XAML is used on WPF, such as another programming language. Similar to C #, VB, and IronPython. So what XAML can do is C # and VB. But in turn, what C # and VB can do is that XAML may not be able to do it, because XAML is a language specially designed to work with development tools and has its own limitations, therefore, we must work with formal programming languages to complete a truly useful program.

However, with the current capabilities of XAML, we should not rely on C #, but VB to do what simple Flash can do. it should be no problem. Therefore, Petzold, author of Application = Code + Markup, will write the structure of this book as C # To write the WPF program first, and the latter half will introduce the XAML. Avoid misunderstanding of WPF = XAML.

XAML can also be used on WF, so it is not limited to WPF. If XAML is used, it is a big mistake to think that this is all about WPF!

However, for Silverlight, XAML is essentially close to SVG. XAML is used to describe the structure tree of the image. Then, it uses Javascript to operate the tree representing the UI to achieve interaction. For Silverlight, XAML is like a group of tags used to expand HTML/CSS. Like in Firefox, Javascript can be used to operate the images described by SVG to achieve multimedia effects.