I have seen the PDC sessions and some great stuff is coming down the pipe from Microsoft with regards to their Cloud / Mobile / Web / etc... strategy. Going through the different sessions from keynote to specific topics, there was great information shown with regards to HTML 5 and the headway IE9 has made in this space (from performance to possibilities). That being said, there was also a lack of discussion around Silverlight in general as to how this technology is strategic to Microsoft's execution of their strategy and where this technology fills the gap. Of course, there were sound bites and sprinkles across the spectrum, but I think the biggest mistake (to some folks) was not utilizing the Keynote to drive home its importance.
I have read some of the post discussions around what Microsoft is now doing with Silverlight. Honestly, I watched the keynote and most of the sessions and kind of found some of these post comments pretty humorous. They ranged from level headed discussions all the way to over the top (Silverlight is dead) and cited different pieces/ sound bites from the keynote. I am the co-founder of the .NET User Group in Lafayette, LA and had one of our passionate members describe the end of Silverlight. Won't go into detail about the discussion but the gist is there is no need to interpret the intent from Microsoft and I firmly believe that this technology will be around for a while. What the future holds remains to be seen. Reminds me of the recent Microsoft commercial - Thinking to myself (Really).
Anyway, I was pleased to see some announcements from Microsoft clarifying their position on the subject (Thank You!).
Looking forward to the new features that will be coming out in Silverlight 5 and to new features being developed to standardize and push HTML 5 from its current infancy status to prime time in 2 or 4 or 6 years :) All joking aside, I am excited about HTML 5 and what it has to offer to compliment other web technologies.
Regards,
Carlos