14 DAY TRIAL // A new Silverlight streaming publishing plug-in is available for download. Designed to be integrated seamlessly with Expression Encoder 2, the plug-in is set up to permit users to publish content directly to the Silverlight Streaming service. In this regard, they will be able to enjoy a streamlined publishing process in relation to Silverlight Live, when it comes down to videos or screencasts. Microsoft Evangelist Keith Combs underlined that the tool was still in pre-release stage, but indicated that functionality was not affected even though the plug-in was still under development.
“There are a few things to remember about publishing to Silverlight Streaming (affectionately known as SLS internally),” Combs stated.
“If you spent a lot of time creating a video with another tool, you are not required to re-encode it with Expression Encoder 2 assuming the video is Silverlight compatible already. The first time you upload an 'application' into SLS, it uploads the video and all of the supporting configuration files. If you decide to change the player template, you can upload again, but this time you only need to upload the changed config files. Much faster the second time.”
The plug-in is based on the public application programing interface allowing job outputs from Expression Encider 2 to be made available to Silverlight Streaming via Windows Live service. As of version 2.1.0, the plug-in comes to the table with support for Silverlight 2 content authored with Expression Encoder 2 Service Pack 1.
“After you push the video and config files to the silverlight.live.com servers, the SLS service creates a nice iFrame link you can use to embed in a webpage or blog post,” Combs added. “You can automatically publish after the encoding job is done. If you are using the Source video profile on the front-end and not making any changes in your job, the encoding process is quick and then you are left watching the upload. And last and most important, the new SLS plug-in is supporting the kewl Silverlight 2 templates that shipped with Expression Encoder 2 SP1. Install SP1 to get them.”
Silverlight Streaming Publishing Plug-In for Expression Encoder v2 is available for download here.