Eclipse4SL : M2 released + REST and SOAP Guidance
The Eclipse Tools for Silverlight enter year 2009 after achieving its 2008 commitments !
First of all, SOYATEC did a great job at correcting more than 30 bugs (and 200 unit tests to ensure first quality) but also at enhancing the plug-in to provide a better support for Silverlight (improvement of the XAML editor, support for Styles and Embedded Custom Components in XAML preview…).
To get the full list of features, see this detailed blog entry: Release 1.0.0 M2 is ready. Moreover, when you install the plug-in, you are now given the options to also install the source code and/or documentation.
Second, guidance is now provided to connect Silverlight applications to Java business logic. Because REST and SOAP make sense, we chose to provide guidance for both. We also chose to use opensource frameworks and tools, such as the Tomcat server runtime :
- REST guidance : the Restlet framework from Noelios Technologies was chosen to illustrate the Silverlight to Java calls in REST style,
- SOAP guidance : JAX-WS implementation from Apache (CXF) was chosen to illustrate the Silverlight to Java calls in SOAP style.
Start building Silverlight RIA in eclipse today !
With Eclipse4SL M2 plus the guidance to connect Java business logic, you can now build Silverlight applications in what we call the Pure Eclipse configuration or you may complement your design by using Expression Blend, and collaborate with .Net teams using Visual Studio.
If the XAML experience is now completed, it is fair to say that the C# development experience is still rudimentary (no code assist and no debug). Therefore, in real world, you’ll still need Visual Studio for the Silverlight C# code development and debug tasks (Hopefully, Visual Studio Web Express is free).
Improving the C# experience as well as supporting other dev platforms is still on the Eclipse4SL roadmap… stay tuned…
If you want to support this project, feel free to vote on EPIC, but also contact the Eclipse4Sl Team if you want to appear among the SLDT proposal interested parties.