How does silverlight work in web browser?

How does 开发者_高级运维Silverlight application work in browser?

E.g When I access a page having Silverlight control, how does Silverlight runtime extract data/ dlls from 'XAP' package? does it load all dlls in one go or support lazy loading of dlls?

If you're interested in some of the inner working of how the silverlight plugin and how it reads the XAP visit http://stuff.seans.com/2009/03/23/hello-silverlight-world-part-3-the-lifecycle-of-a-silverlight-control/#comment-826

He sums it up very well.

The Silverlight Runtime will extract and load all the DLLs from the Xap file before executing the entry point. Other files within the Xap will be extracted in an on demand fashion.

If you have significant "data" files in your Silverlight project and they need to be in the Xap add them as "Content" rather than as "Resource".

For larger Silverlight apps there are technologies such as MEF which allow you to divide up your app into multiple XAPs and support the dynamic loading of dlls.

Silverlight xap file is just a zip file that contains all required dll s, and files for executing. browser downloads, than extracts files and start executing using Silverlight player, which is light version of .NET engine. Of course there are technologies for lazy loading dll's too, I guess, if you need it.