

Getting started:

Visual Studio Community

WPF is, as already described, a combination of XAML (markup) and C#/VB.NET/any other .NET language. All of it can be edited in any text editor, even Notepad included in Windows, and then compiled from the command line. However, most developers prefer to use an IDE (Integrated Development Environment), since it makes everything, from writing code to designing the interface and compiling it all so much easier.

The preferred choice for a .NET/WPF IDE is Visual Studio, which costs quite a bit of money though. Luckily, Microsoft has decided to make it easy and absolutely free for everyone to get started with .NET and WPF, so they have created a free version of Visual Studio, called Visual Studio Community. This version contains slightly less functionality than the real Visual Studio, but it has everything that you need to get started learning WPF and make real applications.

So go and download Visual Studio Community from Microsoft - it's free and easy to install and use:

Once downloaded and installed, click on to the next article to get started with the WPF learning process!