Creating a Silverlight application with a Bing Map control is surprising easy. To do this, start by downloading the Bing Maps Silverlight Control SDK which can be found by clicking here.

Once installed, follow these steps to get Bing Maps loaded in your Silverlight application:

1. Open your Silverlight application.
2. In the Solution Explorer, right click on Reference for your Silverlight app and add a reference to: Microsoft.Maps.MapControl.dll as well as Microsoft.Maps.MapControl.Common.dll. Both of these DLL’s where in my C:\Program Files (x86)\Bing Maps Silverlight Control\V1\Libraries folder.
3. Open MainPage.xaml. Add a reference to these assemblies in your UserControl:

xmlns:m="clr-namespace:Microsoft.Maps.MapControl; assembly=Microsoft.Maps.MapControl" 

Next, declare the Map control like this:

<Grid x:Name="LayoutRoot" Background="White">     

   <m:Map CredentialsProvider="" Name="myMap" /> 

</Grid> 

At this point you will see the Map rendering in the designer as seen in the screenshot below:

CrendentialsProvider is the API key you get when you register with the Bing Maps Account center. This is a easy, straight forward process that can be done here: https://www.bingmapsportal.com/. Once on the site click on the Create a Bing Maps account in the left hand side of the page. Once you create the account the key will be automatically provided for you.

Demo:

[silverlight: Tip19_BingMaps.xap]

Thank you,

–Mike