So you're a developer and you want to get started with Windows Presentation Foundation (a.k.a.) Avalon?
Well here are the steps I took to play around with this new and hip technology:

1. Create a fresh VirtualPC image with WindowsXP SP2. I read that you can also use Windows Server 2003 if you wish.
2. Install Visual Studio 2005. I use Professional edition, but the beta's also work with the Visual Studio Express editions.
3. Download the WinFX software developer kit at: http://msdn.microsoft.com/windowsvista/getthebeta/default.aspx 
   I've downloaded the WinFX RTC plus the VS2005 extensions.
   Note that if you want to install the VS2005 extensions you also need to download the Windows SDK beta.
   If you don't install the SDK the VS2005 extensions will show a message saying that you need to install the Windows SDK and then also make sure that you install the beta SDK, the regular SDK will not suffice!
   Feels like my WindowsXP machine is being turned into a Vista machine already
4. Install the WinFx RTC download. The installer will want to download another 16MB of data, so make sure your VirtualPC environment has Internet access.
5. Install the Windows SDK beta.
6. Install the VS2005 Extensions package.
7. Install the VS2005 Extensions for Windows Workflow Foundation. These are obviously optional for playing around with the WPF beta, but since we're setting up a play area we might as well get it complete.

Done? Okay, time to test to see if all is well.

Make a little test XAML application, it ofcourse has to be:

a) Use notepad to create a file called 'test.xaml'
b) Copy code below into file.

<Page xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/avalon/2005" 
      xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/xaml/2005">
   <TextBlock>Hello World!</TextBlock>
</Page>

c) Save
d) Double click the file.
e) Yeah! A real life XAML application.

I also tried placing this test file on my webserver ( http://www.develop-one.net/presentations/code/wfm/test.xaml ) but opening this URL results in a security exception. I'll look into that some more later. Probably still need to add this URL my Trusted sites.