HLSL and Pixel Shaders for XAML Developers

Chapter 2. Getting Started

In this chapter, you get your first look at using shaders in an XAML application. Using the prebuilt shaders in .NET is a snap. It’s not much harder than using a drag and drop UI designer. You will also get a miniature tutorial on creating a simple custom shader.

Setting Up Your Development Computer

If you are a .NET developer, you know a lot about managed code and the .NET framework libraries. If Microsoft statistics are accurate, you write your code in either C# or Visual Basic. Moreover, if you are like me, you are a Visual Studio junkie, spending countless hours living inside the Visual Studio environment. Given these facts and the possibility that you are also an experienced XAML developer, it’s likely that you already have your computer ready to create HLSL shaders. But I’m going to be methodical and show you what you need to make sure your development computer is set up correctly.

Silverlight Development

One thing you can say about the Silverlight team: they produce high-quality releases on a tight schedule. Silverlight 5 is the newest version available at this time. It requires a Visual Studio 2010 installation in order to build a Silverlight 5 project. If you are cheap, all you need is a copy of the free Visual Web Developer 2010 Express edition (http://www.microsoft.com/express/web/) to be ready to create Silverlight applications. If you have access to your corporate credit card, buy Visual Studio 2010 pro, premium or ultimate. You get a lot more ...