Vista takes advantage of graphics hardware acceleration and leverages application switching. Three-dimensional capabilities from WPF, for building rich client interfaces, are leveraged on the desktop.
An offshoot, Windows Presentation Foundation Everywhere, was presented as a technology to extend the browser to run WPF. It is now in a technology preview stage.
Zocher showed a WPF application for Vista, the New York Times Reader, which also runs under .Net Framework 3.0 and Windows XP. It provides a newspaper-reading experience featuring dynamic new layout technology and advanced typography. Windows can be resized to dynamically lay out the whole page; ad placement also can be dynamic.
New York Times Reader presents a great example of a smart client application, Zocher said. The application also can cache stories it finds on the Internet for viewing in a disconnected manner.
Users get a very newspaper-like experience. "It's something no one needs to learn because they know how to use a newspaper already," said Zocher.
Zocher also highlighted some capabilities of the Microsoft 2007 Office system, including its ribbon-based toolbar.
With previous versions of Office, users have had to interrupt tasks to find the command they were looking for, Zocher said. "To counter that, the ribbon is totally reorganized," with the first tab of the ribbon including the most common functionality, he said.
The ribbon in Office 2007 also features a two-dimensional layout, and contextual tabs also are highlighted.
"These change as you select various things," such as choosing a bar graph or table. Commands are presented that apply to that particular object, Zocher said.
Microsoft's Wayne Smith, senior product manager for Expression Web, acknowledged that the company had retired its FrontPage Web authoring extensions. "Most of the FrontPage server extension [technology] was good for its time," Smith said. But most of the ground covered by FrontPage is now offered in ASP.Net, he said.
Similar ExpressionSession07 events are planned for upcoming weeks in Chicago, New York, and London.
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