Data Access in Silverlight Applications

As discussed in Chapter 1, Rich Internet Applications (RIAs) bridge the gap between Windows-based smart clients and web-based applications. When moving to this type of environment, data access and networking can be confusing.

In a Windows-based smart client, the application has access to the database at all times. It can create a connection to the database, maintain state with the database, and remain connected.

On the other hand, a web application is what is known as a pseudo-conversational environment, which is, for the most part, a completely stateless and disconnected environment. When a client makes a request to the web server, the web server processes the request and returns a response to the client. After that response has been sent, the connection between the client and the server is disconnected, and the server moves on to the next client request. No connection or state is maintained between the two.