I was poking around today and found this great article on caching: http://www.cloudcomputingdevelopment.net/cache-management-with-windows-azure/
Caching is a great way to boost application performance and keep down overhead on a database or file system. Its also great when you have say 3 web roles as shown in this articles Figure 2 that can share the same cache. If one of the roles goes offline then the cache is still there and can be used.
You can change out your asp.net caching to use this pretty easy. Its pretty cool.
There’s a sample that’s mentioned in the article that shows how to use this. You can download the cache here.
One of the sites I go to frequently is www.silverlight.net/showcase. Theres always new stuff showing up here and it gives me tons of ideas.
The business section is also awesome because it has tons of samples of great applications that should really jog your brain for ideas.
One of the great things about SL and WPF is how we can break the mold of application design and come up with truly great new applications for our users. That’s one are where the showcase can help to get new ideas on things you can do.
Check out this new demo from MIX11.
http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/silverlight/3D-Housebuilder-demo-from-def4af04
SL 5 is the next big step for great apps in SL. This new release is adding more features to an already great technology. You can find out more about this release at http://www.microsoft.com/silverlight/future/ .
I particularly like the new features for business applications such as the next text improvements and making the combo box type ahead right out of the box. Plus there are more enhancements for databinding too. And the list goes on and on with features such as performance and “trusted application”.
Where is Sl 5 now? its in Release Candidate now so the final bits should not be far down the road.