Silverlight difference faqs-1

1.Difference between ASP.NET and Silverlight

S.No	ASP.NET	Silverlight
1	ASP.NET is Microsoft's technology for developing dynamic web application using .NET languages like VB.NET or C#. The code is executed on the web server and the results are sent to the user’s browser. This is comparable to the way a web site would be done with the PHP language.	Silverlight is Microsoft technology for developing Rich Internet Applications. It is a browser plug-in that allows code from .NET languages to be run in the user’s browsers making it easier to develop graphically rich applications without having to constantly go back and forth between the browser and the server. This is comparable to Adobe's Flash technology.
2	ASP.NET uses AJAX to improve performance in the browser by making post backs and calls between the browser and server asynchronously. ASP.NET AJAX uses new built-in types and controls and JavaScript.	Unlike ASP.NET, the bulk of Silverlight processing occurs on the client machine thus decreasing server resource utilization and improving the Web experience on the client. There is no concept of “Post back” in Silverlight.
3	Asp.net is not platform independent.	Silverlight is delivered as a cross-platform and cross-browser plug-in that exposes a programming framework and features that are a subset of the .NET Framework and Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF).
4	ASP.NET is a server framework for building dynamic web applications. In Asp.net most processing happens from the server side.	Silverlight is a client-side framework geared at providing a rich user experience and/or other capabilities such as video streaming. In Silverlight most processing happens from the client side.
5	Both ASP.NET and ASP.NET AJAX are heavily dependent upon the ASP.NET page event life cycle, are tightly coupled to the server.	Silverlight is a free plug-in that encompasses a subset of functionality from the .NET Framework and WPF.Silverlight runs in the browser as a "sandbox" - a secure zone installed into the browser that accommodates Silverlight functionality while completely protecting the host platform from any possibly adverse actions performed by Silverlight
6	Asp.net can be hosted in IIS.	Silverlight can be hosted in IIS & Apache.
7	ASP.NET is Microsoft's competitor to JSP/JSF and the successor to classic ASP	Silverlight is Microsoft's competitor to Adobe Flash and Flex. Basically, a standalone runtime running inside a browser allowing animation, real-time 2D and vector rendering, etc

2.Difference between WPF and Silverlight

S.No	WPF	Silverlight
1	WPF is mainly used for creating desktop applications.	Silverlight is prominent for creating web based applications.
2	WPF extends support for advanced features of Windows OS. Few among those features are: 3D, complete documentation support and hardware acceleration.	The advanced features of Windows OS namely 3D, complete documentation support and hardware acceleration are not supported in Silverlight.
3	WPF includes extensive collection of data binding properties.	Silverlight does not support many data binding properties that are supported by WPF. Few properties that are not supported by Silverlight are ElementName, RelativeSource, UpdateSourceTrigger
4	In WPF, the custom markup extensions are supported through the markup extension support x:type.	The x:type is not available in Silverlight.
5	In WPF, the items that are added to the control named TabControl will be wrapped automatically within the TabItem.	In Silverlight, the items that are added to the control named TabControl will not be wrapped automatically within the TabItem.
6	WPF provides routed commands and all its controls are linked to commands using the property called Command.	Silverlight does not provide routed commands or Command property. Silverlight provides only an interface called ICommand. The developers have to create classes that implement this interface and the custom behavior has to be defined within the class.
7	WPF offers input binding support.	Silverlight does not offer input binding support.

3.Difference between HTML 5 and Silverlight

S.No	HTML 5	Silverlight
1	HTML5 needs to integrate CSS3 and JavaScript to add its effects to web pages.	On the other hand, Silverlight can be programmed without getting error prone due to usage of a statically typed .Net language. It is easier to program in Silver light.
2	While HTML5 is more resource friendly. This is the primary reason which Apple has given for not including support for technologies other than HTML5.	Silverlight has a disadvantage in that it consumes a lot of hardware resources of our device
3	When HTML5 will be fully standardized it is likely to get better support from all the newer versions of different browsers.	On the other hand, newer browsers would have to be compatible with older versions of Silverlight in order to get the proper functioning.
4	HTML5 uses multiple codecs to run videos on the browsers that are not considered in the Apple’s bloc.	Silver light always needs a plug-in for any case and would not even run on iPhone and iPad.
5	HTML5 video quality is not that crisp as other competitors and its lack of ability to provide video content of various quality levels on various bandwidths to the user is also a hindrance in getting the message across to low data rate users.	Silverlight offers good video quality and also provide video content of various quality levels on various bandwidths to the user.
6	HTML5 pages, when designed, should be compatible with all the browsers.	Silver light works just like a plug-in. We can simply add the functionality to for any browser.
7	While HTML5 being more tilted towards open source is a relatively easy target of stealing code. The divisions of JavaScript and HTML are clearly marked so it is easy to view and understand the code.	Silverlight application is not easy to decode
8	At present HTML5 doesn’t provide direct support for these devices. However there are some difficult ways to get around this in HTML5.	Silverlight supports microphone and web cam and thus renders a number of rich interactive applications.
9	HTML5, like its predecessors facilitates search engines to crawl through its content and get maximum exposure for the website.Therefore,HTML5 is suitable for online business websites or those sites which require traffic through search engines.	Silverlight is not popular in the SEO community. At present the content of Silverlight is not indexed by search engines.Therefore,Silverlight is not suitable for online business websites or those sites which require traffic through search engines.

4.Difference between Flash and Silverlight

S.No	Flash	Silverlight
1	The animation model is frame based.	Animation - Silverlight supports the WPF animation model, which is not only time based instead of frame based, but lets you define the start and end conditions and it will figure out how to get there for you. No need to deal with matrixes like in flash. Also no need to calculate positions on various frames. It just works.
2	Flash stores its shapes using binary shape records.In order to write shape definitions, you will need to either license a 3rd party Flash file format SDK, or build your own. It is not too difficult, but it does require a bit of a learning curve.	Silverlight uses XAML. XAML is text based and can be output using a simple XML object.
3	The debugging with flash is harder than Silverlight.	The debugging with Silverlight is simpler than with flash.
4	Dealing with fonts is fairly complex with flash.	Silverlight lets you embed true type font information directly into your projects, and download that information with the downloader object.
5	Only Action Script can be used as programming tool in Flash.	Rich set of development languages are available for Silverlight. Developer can use JavaScript as well as managed code VB.Net, C# for Silverlight development
6	ActionScript is an imperative language, which brings itself the pitfalls of imperative languages when compared with declarative languages.	XAML is declarative while ActionScript is imperative. Using imperative languages to build UIs goes back to the early days of DOS and Windows, when developers had to manage all of the API nuances when interacting with graphical panes.
7	There is not any such service provided by Flash	Web Services support for Silverlight Streaming
8	Flash is not spread as across the vast majority of both desktops and mobiles platforms, as compared to Silverlight. Flash requires Flash Lite preinstalled on mobile devices.	Additional Support for mobile devices with desktop and desktop browsers:Silverlight is supported by Windows mobile device as part of a new service that the NBL have built. Silverlight applications and media streaming can be run on a mobile phone – so Silverlight even at this stage is about more than just the desktop browser and desktop market. Silverlight may be seen soon on the Symbian OS too.
9	Flash requires video codec to run .WMV videos.	Silverlight does not require video codec to run industry standard videos like .WMV
10	Flash does not support scalable video formats from HD to mobile	Silverlight supports scalable video formats from HD to mobile.
11	Flash does not support Hardware-assisted editing and encoding solutions.	Silverlight supports Hardware-assisted editing and encoding solutions.
12	Flash does not have XAML based presentation layer for SEO.	Silverlight has XAML based presentation layer for SEO.
13	Flash does not provide End-to-end server and application platform.	Silverlight provides End-to-end server and application platform.
14	Media server licensing is costlier than Silverlight.	Media server licensing is cheaper than flash.
15	Flash does not support Scalable full screen video.	Silverlight supports Scalable full screen video.
16	This limitation doesn’t exist with Flash.	Silverlight is missing Linux support, so people using Linux machine cannot run it on their machines and will have to stick to Windows and MAC OS
17	Flash Video turned Flash into a mechanism for delivering media with far more potential than any other solution that is .flv, no doubt Flash has also limitation to play other video file. For that Flash required codex for that player installed on Client machine.	Silverlight will add to the use of the WMV file format.Using the WMV video format essentially makes Silverlight useless for the vast majority of video websites such as YouTube. It cannot play .avi and .mov file.
18	Even flash is also lacking this area. Flash can read data source in terms of XML or text from some URL and can use it. Same thing silverlight also can read.	Silverlight has no support for binding to models,binding to data, or even connecting to network resources to obtain data.
19	Flash has rich set of control library.	Silverlight doesn't even have support for things that should be considered a stock part of any library such as buttons, checkboxes, list boxes, list views, grids,etc. Probably in future release may Microsoft support it.
20	Flash test tools are already in place.	Once the accessibility features are provided with Silverlight versions, any existing test tools that support driving UI through Accessibility will be fully enabled to automate Silverlight applications
21	With some media file sound processing can possible.	Cannot do sound processing.
22	Flash allows creating XML Socket object.	Socket programming is not possible.
23	Can do that.	Per pixel bitmap editing, bitmap filters (convolution, color matrix, etc),bitmap effects (drop shadow, blur,glow) cannot be done.
24	Flash supports it.	Webcam and Microphone support are not provided by Silverlight
25	Inbuilt Upload/download support is there.	Built in file upload/download support is not available.
26	Flash has a long history that spans more than ten years, and already got acceptance in market and being the most successful browser plug- in ,it is installed on over 90 percent of the world’s web browsers	Silverlight is new in market and required time to get acceptance in market.
27	Size of flash component is smaller.	Size of Silverlight component is larger.
28	Flash ships in single component that is .swf.Images/video/sounds also incorporated in single .swf package.	It has found in practical implementation of image animation, at some extent flickering occurs on image.