Silverlight 2 Release Candidate 0 and Expression Blend 2.0 Service Pack 1 Preview

Microsoft has just released Silverlight 2.0 Release Candidate and set of tools and technologies to ease development with Silverlight 2.0. Expression Blend 2.5 seems to be obsolete since Blend 2 now supports development for Silverlight 2. Here is list of resources to help you out.

So, as usual, first things first…

Silverlight 2 Release Candidate 0 (SL2 RC0 – geek speak)

After Silverlight 2 Beta 2 we are greeted with Silverlight 2 Release Candidate 0. According to Scott Guthrie we are very near to full RTW (release to web) version of Silverlight. Just a handful of bugs, and we are there… I am really impressed with all great work that was (and is still) being done around Silverlight 2.0 so this is something that really gets me excited.

Silverlight Release Candidate 0 is primarily targeted at developers so they can update their existing Silverlight 2 Beta 2 solutions and prepare them for final Silverlight 2.0 release.

There are some breaking changes so you can take a look at this document to see what to do with them.

You can go and get Silverlight 2 RC0 Developer Runtime here.

Expression Blend 2 Service Pack 1 Preview

OK, this one is very important. Up to now, we’ve developed Silverlight 2.0 solutions with Expression Blend 2.5 June (or some other) Preview edition. As of now – Expression Blend 2.5 is out and you can use Expression Blend 2 with Service Pack 1 Preview to develop solutions targeted for Silverlight 2 RC0 platform.

What you will get with this Service Pack is basically all of the functionality you had with earlier Expression Blend 2.5 June 2008 Preview edition.

Please note that you CAN install Blend 2 Service Pack 1 on top of existing Expression Blend 2 installation. According to official sources at Microsoft this service pack is considered as an evolution of Expression Blend 2.5 so there will be no future Expression Blend 2.5 releases. I guess the next release will be something called Expression Blend 3 and that it will debut together with Expression Studio 3 sometime in future.

Furthermore, according to official Microsoft FAQ:

Please note that content created with Expression Blend Service Pack 1 Preview is NOT compatible with Silverlight 2 Beta 2. Silverlight 2 Beta 2 is going to remain the default Silverlight install until the official Silverlight 2 release later this year.

If you have a project that requires you to target the Silverlight 2 Beta 2 runtime, or if you need you content to be live on the web before Silverlight 2 reaches release status then you will need to author your content using Expression Blend 2.5 June 2008 Preview which is available here. Please check your Silverlight 2 Beta 2 content as early as possible with the Silverlight 2 Release Candidate to test for any breaking changes.

So, unless you have some other plans, you might consider sticking to Expression Blend 2.5 June Preview for Silverlight 2 Beta 2 development and later this year upgrade to full Silverlight 2 release (I guess that then Blend 2 will get Service Pack 1 – without that „Preview“ word in its title).

You can go and download Microsoft Expression Blend 2 Service Pack 1 Preview here.

Microsoft Silverlight Tools for Visual Studio 2008 Service Pack 1 – Release Candidate 0

Last but not least – This package is an add-on for Visual Studio 2008 SP1 to provide tooling for Microsoft Silverlight 2. It can be installed on top of either Visual Studio 2008 SP1 or Visual Web Developer 2008 Express with SP1, and it provides a Silverlight project system for developing Silverlight applications using C# or Visual Basic.

Yeah this is exact description form Microsoft Download site. So, in case you are interested – go there and get it.

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