More Resources MSDN: Microsoft Visual Studio 2008     Downloads Free Trial: Microsoft Expression Blend 2

Obtaining the Tools
To develop Silverlight applications, you'll need to obtain the following runtimes/tools:

Runtimes
To view Silverlight applications on your browser, download one or all of the following:

• Microsoft Silverlight 1.0
  • Mac
  • Windows

• Microsoft Silverlight 2.0
  • Mac
  • Windows
• Microsoft ASP.NET Futures (July 2007)

The ASP.NET Futures download contains new controls for ASP.NET that support Silverlight applications.

Developer Tools
The easiest way to get started with Silverlight development is to use Visual Studio 2008, currently available for download as Beta 2. You can download Visual Studio 2008 here.

Once you have downloaded and installed Visual Studio 2008, you also need to download the Microsoft Silverlight Tools for Visual Studio, which is an add-on to Visual Studio 2008 for creating Silverlight applications. Installing it will add the following items to Visual Studio 2008:

• Visual Basic and C# Project templates
• IntelliSense and code generators for XAML
• Debugging of Silverlight applications
• Web reference support
• Integration with Expression Blend

In addition, you can download one or more of the following professional tools to help design your Silverlight applications:

• Expression Blend 2 March Preview: A professional design tool to create user interaction for Silverlight.
• Expression Media Encoder Preview Update: A feature that will be part of Microsoft Expression Media that allows you to create and enhance video.
• Expression Design: A professional illustration and graphic design tool to create Silverlight assets.

Finally, you can download the following SDKs containing documentation and sample code:

• Microsoft Silverlight 1.0 Software Development Kit
• Microsoft Silverlight 2.0 Software Development Kit