Silverlight Developers are worried

It kind of feels like another episode of a dramatic television soap.  If you’ve been in a coma for the previous 5 months let me refresh your memory:

In episode 1 of ‘bye bye silvy’ Microsoft announced that they’ll beusing HTML 5 as a core technology for Windows 8.

Then in episode 2 we then saw that HTML and Javascript will be technologies that you can use in Windows 8 but you can still write your everyday XAML and use the WinRT API’s for your metro apps.  You can even still use .NET for your 'legacy' applications.

In episode 3 Microsoft announced that they’ll be ditching browser plugins in the metro version of IE and will only make them available in legacy desktop mode.  Another sad episode indeed, the part that made allot of people cry was quote:

For what these sites do, the power of HTML5 makes more sense, especially in Windows 8 apps.

Now for the cliffhanger of this seasons ‘bye bye silvy’ rumors are going that Silverlight 5 will be the last Silverlight version released.  Will this turn out to be true?

Since the release of this rumor my blog visitors have spiked and one post in particular received allot of views.  Based on this and the ranting that’s going on several forums I think it’s safe to say that allot of Silverlight developers are worried for their future.

But should you be worried?  After all the technology isn’t likely to go away the next couple of years, Silverlight 5 still has to be released.  But what company is going to invest in a project that makes use of a technology that is already deprived of its future?  Wouldn’t it make more sense to switch to HTML 5 instead?

Then again Silverlight will still be used in Windows Phone 7 and Xbox…. not really useful if you’re a corporate developer (unless you work at a company that uses Xbox's for their business apps).  Okay granted that there will certainly be a future for Silverlight in Windows Phone 7, but how long will it take for Microsoft to merge their desktop OS with their Phone OS, seeing that we already have quad core mobile CPU’s.

I don’t think Silverlight developers should worry just yet, the transition will go smoothly and there are still a ton of Silverlight applications that need to be maintained (or rewritten).  Though it won’t hurt you to start refreshing that good old HTML and Javascript as it looks that you’ll be needing it in the near future…