virtualboy

I've been meaning to blog about this for ages and today is the day.  I've tried to embrace as many cool Vista applications and gadgets as I possibly can, but I don't have time to use and write about them all, and what with WPF and now Silverlight gaining momentum, there is going to be more and more coming out on to the web for all of us to use.

One that I have started using however, is the Daily Mail eReader.

You know the thing I love about using this style of newspaper rather than a paper one (apart from saving trees), is the search functionality.

Just like in Vista, it quickly brings back any stories that are relevant to what I want to know - it means I can cut out all of the stuff that I'm not really interested in at this time.

You'll see from the piccy on the left that I'm on the sport page - should I want to view more info, I can maximise the window and all the content will scale accordingly.

When I drill into a story that I'm interested (Man Utd are my team, so any news of a new goal machine up-front is important), I can quickly see other commands become available for my use such as re-sizeable text, printing, and perhaps the coolest one, "Speak this Article".

Looks cool, right?  The voice that reads the text out loud is a bit quick at the moment, but it does get pretty much everything spot on, and is easily understandable.  You can also use these drop down menu's at the top of the eReader to drill into specific sections even quicker.  It even allows you to view the previous couple of days papers! Genius!

The Daily Mail eReader is still in Beta, but you can register for access here, and subsequently download the application.  It weighs in at about 4mb.

These are just the first kind of applications coming out, and trust me, there are going to be some crackers soon enough.  Check out what's possible by heading over to the Silverlight homepage, the Mix 07 University and the Mix 07 Community Page.