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Is ASP.NET really as good as they claim? (No, this isn't a troll, please read)

Hello,

This is NOT a troll, it's a genuine question. Please read right
through to see why.

I have been using Vusual Basic and Classic ASP for some years, and
have now started looking at ASP.NET. At first glance, it looks
excellent, albeit nothing that couldn't have been done to Classic ASP.
I have been through a few tutorials and was impressed with how quickly
you can get database info onto a page.

What worries me is if it really is as good as it looks. Some years
ago, MS tried to persuade VB programmers to get into writing web sites
by introducing Web Classes to VB. These looked, at first glance, like
a really quick and easy way to code a web site. The universal opinion
on them was that they were awful when you tried to get anything real
done with them. You spent so much time fighting with the system that
you would have been quicker doing it by hand in the first place.

Same thing happened when MS introduced the Data Environment into VB.
Again, this was supposed to be a RAD tool for getting database-based
apps up quickly. The first impressions were very favourable, but you
quickly found yourself writing more code to fight the system than you
would have done by doing it all by hand in the first place.

There are other examples, but I think the point is clear. That which
appears to be a fantastic way to code initially may turn out to be a
coding nightmare when you try and take the second steps.

So, is ASP.NET the same, or have MS finally got it right? My first
impression is that is it great and could save a lot of time. Trouble
is, I can almost feel myself going back a few years to when I first
tried the Data Environment. That's what worries me, am I going to
start with it and then find it's more bother than it's worth?

Do people do professional sites in ASP.NET and still think it's good?
Maybe this is the wrong place to ask as anyone who hated it and gave
up probably wouldn't be reading here, but I would still like some
reassurance that my time is going to be invested well if I learn
ASP.NET. Given my extensive code library, built up over a number of
years, I can get db-driven web sites up in Classic ASP quite quickly.
I'm not going to drop that unless I know the alternative is a genuine
improvement.

As I said at the start, this is a genuine question, not a troll.
Please reply appropriately. TIA
Nov 19 '05 #1
59 4889
ASP.NET really introduces the concept of separating UI and code. So the UI
can still be done by a web designer and it can look any way you want. The
functionality is then provided by a developer who write the code behind.

"Alan Silver" <go****@alansilver.co.uk> wrote in message
news:90**************************@posting.google.c om...
Hello,

This is NOT a troll, it's a genuine question. Please read right
through to see why.

I have been using Vusual Basic and Classic ASP for some years, and
have now started looking at ASP.NET. At first glance, it looks
excellent, albeit nothing that couldn't have been done to Classic ASP.
I have been through a few tutorials and was impressed with how quickly
you can get database info onto a page.

What worries me is if it really is as good as it looks. Some years
ago, MS tried to persuade VB programmers to get into writing web sites
by introducing Web Classes to VB. These looked, at first glance, like
a really quick and easy way to code a web site. The universal opinion
on them was that they were awful when you tried to get anything real
done with them. You spent so much time fighting with the system that
you would have been quicker doing it by hand in the first place.

Same thing happened when MS introduced the Data Environment into VB.
Again, this was supposed to be a RAD tool for getting database-based
apps up quickly. The first impressions were very favourable, but you
quickly found yourself writing more code to fight the system than you
would have done by doing it all by hand in the first place.

There are other examples, but I think the point is clear. That which
appears to be a fantastic way to code initially may turn out to be a
coding nightmare when you try and take the second steps.

So, is ASP.NET the same, or have MS finally got it right? My first
impression is that is it great and could save a lot of time. Trouble
is, I can almost feel myself going back a few years to when I first
tried the Data Environment. That's what worries me, am I going to
start with it and then find it's more bother than it's worth?

Do people do professional sites in ASP.NET and still think it's good?
Maybe this is the wrong place to ask as anyone who hated it and gave
up probably wouldn't be reading here, but I would still like some
reassurance that my time is going to be invested well if I learn
ASP.NET. Given my extensive code library, built up over a number of
years, I can get db-driven web sites up in Classic ASP quite quickly.
I'm not going to drop that unless I know the alternative is a genuine
improvement.

As I said at the start, this is a genuine question, not a troll.
Please reply appropriately. TIA

Nov 19 '05 #2
i can't agree here...my opinion of ASP.Net is that it enables you to write
true N-Tier and OO code...but that you need to be disciplined and vigilant
about it. I'm not sure what you mean by this, but I'm guessing you are
refering to things like codebehind. As far as I'm concerned, codebehind
doesn't promote N-Tier, instead it hinders it. People think that if they
use codebehind they are developing an N-Tier system, because the
presentation layer is seemingly separated from the business layer. Only
problem is the separation is merely physical, not logical...using tools like
VS.Net the codebehind/ASPX files are strongly-coupled, meaning no true
separation exists. Added to this, codebehind should be the location of the
presentation logic layer NOT the business layer...most people think
codebehind IS the business layer, but of course it can't be since it's tied
to a specific page.

Luckily they got it right in ASP.Net 2.0 with the introduction of skins,
themes and partial classes. But getting back to the point, using ASP.Net
1.X it's possible to achieve this, just not as simple as it might be or
should seem (for a good example, check out the communityserverforums which
don't use codebehind nor code-inline, but instead rely on a skinning
mechanism to help promote that side of N-Tier).

I can also point to datasets, which I think are horrible from both an OO
standpoint and an N-Tier standpoint (though they certainly have their
place/advantage). But yet again, the .Net framework provides very capable
alternatives (there are a bunch in this case).

Yes, ASP.Net is serious and has been around for long enough now (~5years) to
say so with authority. There won't be another version of classic ASP so
you're going to have to move to either JSP or ASP.Net at some point. The
learning curve however is viscious and if you want to build serious systems,
you'll need people who know what they are doing and won't just take the easy
way out (which there are a lot of).

Karl

--
MY ASP.Net tutorials
http://www.openmymind.net/
"Marina" <so*****@nospam.com> wrote in message
news:%2***************@TK2MSFTNGP09.phx.gbl...
ASP.NET really introduces the concept of separating UI and code. So the UI can still be done by a web designer and it can look any way you want. The
functionality is then provided by a developer who write the code behind.

"Alan Silver" <go****@alansilver.co.uk> wrote in message
news:90**************************@posting.google.c om...
Hello,

This is NOT a troll, it's a genuine question. Please read right
through to see why.

I have been using Vusual Basic and Classic ASP for some years, and
have now started looking at ASP.NET. At first glance, it looks
excellent, albeit nothing that couldn't have been done to Classic ASP.
I have been through a few tutorials and was impressed with how quickly
you can get database info onto a page.

What worries me is if it really is as good as it looks. Some years
ago, MS tried to persuade VB programmers to get into writing web sites
by introducing Web Classes to VB. These looked, at first glance, like
a really quick and easy way to code a web site. The universal opinion
on them was that they were awful when you tried to get anything real
done with them. You spent so much time fighting with the system that
you would have been quicker doing it by hand in the first place.

Same thing happened when MS introduced the Data Environment into VB.
Again, this was supposed to be a RAD tool for getting database-based
apps up quickly. The first impressions were very favourable, but you
quickly found yourself writing more code to fight the system than you
would have done by doing it all by hand in the first place.

There are other examples, but I think the point is clear. That which
appears to be a fantastic way to code initially may turn out to be a
coding nightmare when you try and take the second steps.

So, is ASP.NET the same, or have MS finally got it right? My first
impression is that is it great and could save a lot of time. Trouble
is, I can almost feel myself going back a few years to when I first
tried the Data Environment. That's what worries me, am I going to
start with it and then find it's more bother than it's worth?

Do people do professional sites in ASP.NET and still think it's good?
Maybe this is the wrong place to ask as anyone who hated it and gave
up probably wouldn't be reading here, but I would still like some
reassurance that my time is going to be invested well if I learn
ASP.NET. Given my extensive code library, built up over a number of
years, I can get db-driven web sites up in Classic ASP quite quickly.
I'm not going to drop that unless I know the alternative is a genuine
improvement.

As I said at the start, this is a genuine question, not a troll.
Please reply appropriately. TIA


Nov 19 '05 #3
If someone puts all their code directly into the codebehind, well, then they
are somewhat better off then before, but that doesn't truly promote modular
reusable code. Is it better then spaghetti code where all the dynamic HTML
is done with a series of Response.Write's and is impossible to understand?
Yes, by far, no comparison.

And it does mean that you can have a UI designer work on the client facing
part of the page, and the developer write the code later. And my point
here, was that the quality of appearence of the pages is going to be
completely dependent on who is doing your UI, and that asp.net introduces no
limitations on this.

Now, I didn't claim that just because the code and the UI are separated you
get true N-tier code, etc. Anyone can write all their code in a completely
non-modular way, 1 tier way, be it web forms or windows forms. This all
depends on the skill and forsight of the developer. To me, this is a
completely separate topic, and not what the person asked.

"Karl Seguin" <karl REMOVE @ REMOVE openmymind REMOVEMETOO . ANDME net>
wrote in message news:OB**************@TK2MSFTNGP14.phx.gbl...
i can't agree here...my opinion of ASP.Net is that it enables you to write
true N-Tier and OO code...but that you need to be disciplined and vigilant
about it. I'm not sure what you mean by this, but I'm guessing you are
refering to things like codebehind. As far as I'm concerned, codebehind
doesn't promote N-Tier, instead it hinders it. People think that if they
use codebehind they are developing an N-Tier system, because the
presentation layer is seemingly separated from the business layer. Only
problem is the separation is merely physical, not logical...using tools like VS.Net the codebehind/ASPX files are strongly-coupled, meaning no true
separation exists. Added to this, codebehind should be the location of the presentation logic layer NOT the business layer...most people think
codebehind IS the business layer, but of course it can't be since it's tied to a specific page.

Luckily they got it right in ASP.Net 2.0 with the introduction of skins,
themes and partial classes. But getting back to the point, using ASP.Net
1.X it's possible to achieve this, just not as simple as it might be or
should seem (for a good example, check out the communityserverforums which
don't use codebehind nor code-inline, but instead rely on a skinning
mechanism to help promote that side of N-Tier).

I can also point to datasets, which I think are horrible from both an OO
standpoint and an N-Tier standpoint (though they certainly have their
place/advantage). But yet again, the .Net framework provides very capable
alternatives (there are a bunch in this case).

Yes, ASP.Net is serious and has been around for long enough now (~5years) to say so with authority. There won't be another version of classic ASP so
you're going to have to move to either JSP or ASP.Net at some point. The
learning curve however is viscious and if you want to build serious systems, you'll need people who know what they are doing and won't just take the easy way out (which there are a lot of).

Karl

--
MY ASP.Net tutorials
http://www.openmymind.net/
"Marina" <so*****@nospam.com> wrote in message
news:%2***************@TK2MSFTNGP09.phx.gbl...
ASP.NET really introduces the concept of separating UI and code. So the

UI
can still be done by a web designer and it can look any way you want. The functionality is then provided by a developer who write the code behind.

"Alan Silver" <go****@alansilver.co.uk> wrote in message
news:90**************************@posting.google.c om...
Hello,

This is NOT a troll, it's a genuine question. Please read right
through to see why.

I have been using Vusual Basic and Classic ASP for some years, and
have now started looking at ASP.NET. At first glance, it looks
excellent, albeit nothing that couldn't have been done to Classic ASP.
I have been through a few tutorials and was impressed with how quickly
you can get database info onto a page.

What worries me is if it really is as good as it looks. Some years
ago, MS tried to persuade VB programmers to get into writing web sites
by introducing Web Classes to VB. These looked, at first glance, like
a really quick and easy way to code a web site. The universal opinion
on them was that they were awful when you tried to get anything real
done with them. You spent so much time fighting with the system that
you would have been quicker doing it by hand in the first place.

Same thing happened when MS introduced the Data Environment into VB.
Again, this was supposed to be a RAD tool for getting database-based
apps up quickly. The first impressions were very favourable, but you
quickly found yourself writing more code to fight the system than you
would have done by doing it all by hand in the first place.

There are other examples, but I think the point is clear. That which
appears to be a fantastic way to code initially may turn out to be a
coding nightmare when you try and take the second steps.

So, is ASP.NET the same, or have MS finally got it right? My first
impression is that is it great and could save a lot of time. Trouble
is, I can almost feel myself going back a few years to when I first
tried the Data Environment. That's what worries me, am I going to
start with it and then find it's more bother than it's worth?

Do people do professional sites in ASP.NET and still think it's good?
Maybe this is the wrong place to ask as anyone who hated it and gave
up probably wouldn't be reading here, but I would still like some
reassurance that my time is going to be invested well if I learn
ASP.NET. Given my extensive code library, built up over a number of
years, I can get db-driven web sites up in Classic ASP quite quickly.
I'm not going to drop that unless I know the alternative is a genuine
improvement.

As I said at the start, this is a genuine question, not a troll.
Please reply appropriately. TIA



Nov 19 '05 #4
I felt rantish..sorry..and you are right, I implied that you claimed far
more than you did.

But Alan did ask for an honest assessment of ASP.Net and i think that my
caution that it's only as good as the people using it (which i guess I could
have simply said) is still valid. I also think you gave a very good one.
My original thread should have been better worded and not marked as a reply
to yours, but instead to the original post.

My sincerest apologies,

Cheers ;)

Karl

--
MY ASP.Net tutorials
http://www.openmymind.net/
"Marina" <so*****@nospam.com> wrote in message
news:uT**************@TK2MSFTNGP10.phx.gbl...
If someone puts all their code directly into the codebehind, well, then they are somewhat better off then before, but that doesn't truly promote modular reusable code. Is it better then spaghetti code where all the dynamic HTML is done with a series of Response.Write's and is impossible to understand?
Yes, by far, no comparison.

And it does mean that you can have a UI designer work on the client facing
part of the page, and the developer write the code later. And my point
here, was that the quality of appearence of the pages is going to be
completely dependent on who is doing your UI, and that asp.net introduces no limitations on this.

Now, I didn't claim that just because the code and the UI are separated you get true N-tier code, etc. Anyone can write all their code in a completely non-modular way, 1 tier way, be it web forms or windows forms. This all
depends on the skill and forsight of the developer. To me, this is a
completely separate topic, and not what the person asked.

"Karl Seguin" <karl REMOVE @ REMOVE openmymind REMOVEMETOO . ANDME net>
wrote in message news:OB**************@TK2MSFTNGP14.phx.gbl...
i can't agree here...my opinion of ASP.Net is that it enables you to write
true N-Tier and OO code...but that you need to be disciplined and vigilant about it. I'm not sure what you mean by this, but I'm guessing you are
refering to things like codebehind. As far as I'm concerned, codebehind
doesn't promote N-Tier, instead it hinders it. People think that if they use codebehind they are developing an N-Tier system, because the
presentation layer is seemingly separated from the business layer. Only
problem is the separation is merely physical, not logical...using tools like
VS.Net the codebehind/ASPX files are strongly-coupled, meaning no true
separation exists. Added to this, codebehind should be the location of

the
presentation logic layer NOT the business layer...most people think
codebehind IS the business layer, but of course it can't be since it's

tied
to a specific page.

Luckily they got it right in ASP.Net 2.0 with the introduction of skins,
themes and partial classes. But getting back to the point, using ASP.Net 1.X it's possible to achieve this, just not as simple as it might be or
should seem (for a good example, check out the communityserverforums which don't use codebehind nor code-inline, but instead rely on a skinning
mechanism to help promote that side of N-Tier).

I can also point to datasets, which I think are horrible from both an OO
standpoint and an N-Tier standpoint (though they certainly have their
place/advantage). But yet again, the .Net framework provides very capable alternatives (there are a bunch in this case).

Yes, ASP.Net is serious and has been around for long enough now (~5years) to
say so with authority. There won't be another version of classic ASP so
you're going to have to move to either JSP or ASP.Net at some point.

The learning curve however is viscious and if you want to build serious

systems,
you'll need people who know what they are doing and won't just take the

easy
way out (which there are a lot of).

Karl

--
MY ASP.Net tutorials
http://www.openmymind.net/
"Marina" <so*****@nospam.com> wrote in message
news:%2***************@TK2MSFTNGP09.phx.gbl...
ASP.NET really introduces the concept of separating UI and code. So the
UI
can still be done by a web designer and it can look any way you want.

The functionality is then provided by a developer who write the code

behind.
"Alan Silver" <go****@alansilver.co.uk> wrote in message
news:90**************************@posting.google.c om...
> Hello,
>
> This is NOT a troll, it's a genuine question. Please read right
> through to see why.
>
> I have been using Vusual Basic and Classic ASP for some years, and
> have now started looking at ASP.NET. At first glance, it looks
> excellent, albeit nothing that couldn't have been done to Classic ASP. > I have been through a few tutorials and was impressed with how quickly > you can get database info onto a page.
>
> What worries me is if it really is as good as it looks. Some years
> ago, MS tried to persuade VB programmers to get into writing web sites > by introducing Web Classes to VB. These looked, at first glance, like > a really quick and easy way to code a web site. The universal opinion > on them was that they were awful when you tried to get anything real
> done with them. You spent so much time fighting with the system that
> you would have been quicker doing it by hand in the first place.
>
> Same thing happened when MS introduced the Data Environment into VB.
> Again, this was supposed to be a RAD tool for getting database-based
> apps up quickly. The first impressions were very favourable, but you
> quickly found yourself writing more code to fight the system than you > would have done by doing it all by hand in the first place.
>
> There are other examples, but I think the point is clear. That which
> appears to be a fantastic way to code initially may turn out to be a
> coding nightmare when you try and take the second steps.
>
> So, is ASP.NET the same, or have MS finally got it right? My first
> impression is that is it great and could save a lot of time. Trouble
> is, I can almost feel myself going back a few years to when I first
> tried the Data Environment. That's what worries me, am I going to
> start with it and then find it's more bother than it's worth?
>
> Do people do professional sites in ASP.NET and still think it's good? > Maybe this is the wrong place to ask as anyone who hated it and gave
> up probably wouldn't be reading here, but I would still like some
> reassurance that my time is going to be invested well if I learn
> ASP.NET. Given my extensive code library, built up over a number of
> years, I can get db-driven web sites up in Classic ASP quite quickly. > I'm not going to drop that unless I know the alternative is a genuine > improvement.
>
> As I said at the start, this is a genuine question, not a troll.
> Please reply appropriately. TIA



Nov 19 '05 #5
That's ok, just wanted to clear things up.

Agreed, your caution is well placed. Hopefully people will take advantage of
all .NET has to offer.

"Karl Seguin" <karl REMOVE @ REMOVE openmymind REMOVEMETOO . ANDME net>
wrote in message news:eF**************@TK2MSFTNGP14.phx.gbl...
I felt rantish..sorry..and you are right, I implied that you claimed far
more than you did.

But Alan did ask for an honest assessment of ASP.Net and i think that my
caution that it's only as good as the people using it (which i guess I could have simply said) is still valid. I also think you gave a very good one.
My original thread should have been better worded and not marked as a reply to yours, but instead to the original post.

My sincerest apologies,

Cheers ;)

Karl

--
MY ASP.Net tutorials
http://www.openmymind.net/
"Marina" <so*****@nospam.com> wrote in message
news:uT**************@TK2MSFTNGP10.phx.gbl...
If someone puts all their code directly into the codebehind, well, then they
are somewhat better off then before, but that doesn't truly promote

modular
reusable code. Is it better then spaghetti code where all the dynamic

HTML
is done with a series of Response.Write's and is impossible to understand?
Yes, by far, no comparison.

And it does mean that you can have a UI designer work on the client facing part of the page, and the developer write the code later. And my point
here, was that the quality of appearence of the pages is going to be
completely dependent on who is doing your UI, and that asp.net introduces no
limitations on this.

Now, I didn't claim that just because the code and the UI are separated

you
get true N-tier code, etc. Anyone can write all their code in a

completely
non-modular way, 1 tier way, be it web forms or windows forms. This all
depends on the skill and forsight of the developer. To me, this is a
completely separate topic, and not what the person asked.

"Karl Seguin" <karl REMOVE @ REMOVE openmymind REMOVEMETOO . ANDME net>
wrote in message news:OB**************@TK2MSFTNGP14.phx.gbl...
i can't agree here...my opinion of ASP.Net is that it enables you to

write true N-Tier and OO code...but that you need to be disciplined and vigilant about it. I'm not sure what you mean by this, but I'm guessing you are refering to things like codebehind. As far as I'm concerned, codebehind doesn't promote N-Tier, instead it hinders it. People think that if they use codebehind they are developing an N-Tier system, because the
presentation layer is seemingly separated from the business layer. Only problem is the separation is merely physical, not logical...using tools like
VS.Net the codebehind/ASPX files are strongly-coupled, meaning no true
separation exists. Added to this, codebehind should be the location
of
the
presentation logic layer NOT the business layer...most people think
codebehind IS the business layer, but of course it can't be since it's

tied
to a specific page.

Luckily they got it right in ASP.Net 2.0 with the introduction of
skins, themes and partial classes. But getting back to the point, using

ASP.Net 1.X it's possible to achieve this, just not as simple as it might be or should seem (for a good example, check out the communityserverforums which don't use codebehind nor code-inline, but instead rely on a skinning
mechanism to help promote that side of N-Tier).

I can also point to datasets, which I think are horrible from both an OO standpoint and an N-Tier standpoint (though they certainly have their
place/advantage). But yet again, the .Net framework provides very capable alternatives (there are a bunch in this case).

Yes, ASP.Net is serious and has been around for long enough now (~5years)
to
say so with authority. There won't be another version of classic ASP so you're going to have to move to either JSP or ASP.Net at some point.

The learning curve however is viscious and if you want to build serious

systems,
you'll need people who know what they are doing and won't just take the easy
way out (which there are a lot of).

Karl

--
MY ASP.Net tutorials
http://www.openmymind.net/
"Marina" <so*****@nospam.com> wrote in message
news:%2***************@TK2MSFTNGP09.phx.gbl...
> ASP.NET really introduces the concept of separating UI and code. So the UI
> can still be done by a web designer and it can look any way you
want.
The
> functionality is then provided by a developer who write the code

behind. >
> "Alan Silver" <go****@alansilver.co.uk> wrote in message
> news:90**************************@posting.google.c om...
> > Hello,
> >
> > This is NOT a troll, it's a genuine question. Please read right
> > through to see why.
> >
> > I have been using Vusual Basic and Classic ASP for some years, and
> > have now started looking at ASP.NET. At first glance, it looks
> > excellent, albeit nothing that couldn't have been done to Classic ASP. > > I have been through a few tutorials and was impressed with how quickly > > you can get database info onto a page.
> >
> > What worries me is if it really is as good as it looks. Some years
> > ago, MS tried to persuade VB programmers to get into writing web sites > > by introducing Web Classes to VB. These looked, at first glance, like > > a really quick and easy way to code a web site. The universal opinion > > on them was that they were awful when you tried to get anything
real > > done with them. You spent so much time fighting with the system that > > you would have been quicker doing it by hand in the first place.
> >
> > Same thing happened when MS introduced the Data Environment into VB. > > Again, this was supposed to be a RAD tool for getting database-based > > apps up quickly. The first impressions were very favourable, but you > > quickly found yourself writing more code to fight the system than

you > > would have done by doing it all by hand in the first place.
> >
> > There are other examples, but I think the point is clear. That which > > appears to be a fantastic way to code initially may turn out to be a > > coding nightmare when you try and take the second steps.
> >
> > So, is ASP.NET the same, or have MS finally got it right? My first
> > impression is that is it great and could save a lot of time. Trouble > > is, I can almost feel myself going back a few years to when I first > > tried the Data Environment. That's what worries me, am I going to
> > start with it and then find it's more bother than it's worth?
> >
> > Do people do professional sites in ASP.NET and still think it's good? > > Maybe this is the wrong place to ask as anyone who hated it and gave > > up probably wouldn't be reading here, but I would still like some
> > reassurance that my time is going to be invested well if I learn
> > ASP.NET. Given my extensive code library, built up over a number of > > years, I can get db-driven web sites up in Classic ASP quite quickly. > > I'm not going to drop that unless I know the alternative is a genuine > > improvement.
> >
> > As I said at the start, this is a genuine question, not a troll.
> > Please reply appropriately. TIA
>
>



Nov 19 '05 #6
WJ
"Alan Silver" <go****@alansilver.co.uk> wrote in message
news:90**************************@posting.google.c om...
I have been using Vusual Basic and Classic ASP for some years, and
have now started looking at ASP.NET. At first glance, it looks
excellent, albeit nothing that couldn't have been done to Classic ASP.
I have been through a few tutorials and was impressed with how quickly
you can get database info onto a page.

What worries me is if it really is as good as it looks....


This due largely to a so called "old habit dies hard!". Many shops have been
used to with classic VB and ASP. And managers are afraid to make changes to
an already working product! That is common sense. A new product is a new
product. You have to make commitment to learn it. Asp.Net and its .Net
Framework is pure Object, a modernized system. Yes, it is better, much more
improved from an experienced programmer point of view. Indeed, these new
products are not for amateur (another reason why many classical VB
programmers donot want to move because they donot need to understand what OO
is all about, and or n-tier thing, all they want is simple stuffs to get
things done quickly!). For Security alone, the classic VB and ASP will not
be able to match! Period! I see a lots of Connection strings laying naked in
legacy VB/ASP pages, no protection at all, this was one of the things got MS
into troubles !!!

In short, .Net and its 6000+ classes is an excellent system. not even Java
would match! Unfortunately, it only works on MS/Windows platform!

John

Nov 19 '05 #7
> excellent, albeit nothing that couldn't have been done to Classic ASP.

Apparently, you know almost nothing about ASP.Net ASP uses VBScript, and is
extremely limited in what you can do with it without using COM objects.
ASP.Net can do literally anything, without having to go outside to COM
objects. The .Net platform can do anything you want, no outside help needed.
For example, I'm currently writing some classes that parse binary meta-data
from GeoTiff files. Try doing that with the Scripting.FileSystemObject of
Classic ASP.

That siad, ASP.Net is much more complex and difficult to use than ASP. So,
if you don't like learning and studying, you might want to stick with
Classic ASP. But once you DO learn ASP, you will be MUCH more productive.
It's a short-term vs. Long-term issue. In the short term your work will be
slowed way down as you learn the object model and syntax, etc. You will have
to learn about some low-level concepts that VB 6 and earlier didn't handle,
such as strict data typing and Obect-oriented programming concepts. In the
long term, the CLR has some awesome classes that enhance productivity
extensively.

If you're looking for Drag 'n Drop developer tools, there are plenty to be
had in Visual Studio.Net, and to a lesser extent, other Microsoft .Net tool
sets. However, you will never progress very far by simply using these types
of pre-built capabilities.

So, if all you want to do is some puddle-jumping, a Cessna (ASP) is a good
enough airplane. But if you want to get 150 people from coast to coast in
under 6 hours, the Boeing 747 of ASP.Net is the plane to fly. Sure, you
can't learn to fly it in 6 easy lessons, but once you've mastered it, the
"sky" is the limit!

--
HTH,

Kevin Spencer
Microsoft MVP
..Net Developer
Neither a follower nor a lender be.

"Alan Silver" <go****@alansilver.co.uk> wrote in message
news:90**************************@posting.google.c om...
Hello,

This is NOT a troll, it's a genuine question. Please read right
through to see why.

I have been using Vusual Basic and Classic ASP for some years, and
have now started looking at ASP.NET. At first glance, it looks
excellent, albeit nothing that couldn't have been done to Classic ASP.
I have been through a few tutorials and was impressed with how quickly
you can get database info onto a page.

What worries me is if it really is as good as it looks. Some years
ago, MS tried to persuade VB programmers to get into writing web sites
by introducing Web Classes to VB. These looked, at first glance, like
a really quick and easy way to code a web site. The universal opinion
on them was that they were awful when you tried to get anything real
done with them. You spent so much time fighting with the system that
you would have been quicker doing it by hand in the first place.

Same thing happened when MS introduced the Data Environment into VB.
Again, this was supposed to be a RAD tool for getting database-based
apps up quickly. The first impressions were very favourable, but you
quickly found yourself writing more code to fight the system than you
would have done by doing it all by hand in the first place.

There are other examples, but I think the point is clear. That which
appears to be a fantastic way to code initially may turn out to be a
coding nightmare when you try and take the second steps.

So, is ASP.NET the same, or have MS finally got it right? My first
impression is that is it great and could save a lot of time. Trouble
is, I can almost feel myself going back a few years to when I first
tried the Data Environment. That's what worries me, am I going to
start with it and then find it's more bother than it's worth?

Do people do professional sites in ASP.NET and still think it's good?
Maybe this is the wrong place to ask as anyone who hated it and gave
up probably wouldn't be reading here, but I would still like some
reassurance that my time is going to be invested well if I learn
ASP.NET. Given my extensive code library, built up over a number of
years, I can get db-driven web sites up in Classic ASP quite quickly.
I'm not going to drop that unless I know the alternative is a genuine
improvement.

As I said at the start, this is a genuine question, not a troll.
Please reply appropriately. TIA

Nov 19 '05 #8
"WJ" <Jo*******@HotMail.Com> wrote
In short, .Net and its 6000+ classes is an excellent system. not even Java
would match! Unfortunately, it only works on MS/Windows platform!

What about mono?

ME

--
Martin Eyles
ma**********@NOSPAM.bytronic.com
Nov 19 '05 #9
I had mono once. Couldn't stand up for two weeks.

--
HTH,

Kevin Spencer
Microsoft MVP
..Net Developer
Neither a follower nor a lender be.

"Martin Eyles" <ma**********@NOSPAM.bytronic.com> wrote in message
news:10*************@corp.supernews.com...
"WJ" <Jo*******@HotMail.Com> wrote
In short, .Net and its 6000+ classes is an excellent system. not even
Java
would match! Unfortunately, it only works on MS/Windows platform!

What about mono?

ME

--
Martin Eyles
ma**********@NOSPAM.bytronic.com

Nov 19 '05 #10
In article <#I**************@TK2MSFTNGP10.phx.gbl>, Kevin Spencer
<ke***@DIESPAMMERSDIEtakempis.com> writes
excellent, albeit nothing that couldn't have been done to Classic ASP.
Apparently, you know almost nothing about ASP.Net


Correct, and if you read my original post, I made that point quite
clear.
ASP uses VBScript, and is extremely limited in what you can do with it
without using COM objects. ASP.Net can do literally anything, without
having to go outside to COM objects. The .Net platform can do anything
you want, no outside help needed.


With all due respect, I think you misread (or misunderstood) my point. I
wasn't saying that you could do anything in ASP that you can do in
ASP.NET, I said that (as far as I could see from my cursory first look),
nothing that had been done to make ASP.NET what it is couldn't have been
done (ie by MS with some development) to ASP. In other words, they could
have just brought out the next generation of ASP, and included the
classes that .NET has as intrinsic objects.

However, the whole point of asking the question was to get some input on
how much of an improvement ASP.NET actually is, as opposed to my initial
(and unquestionably simplistic) understanding.

--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)
Nov 19 '05 #11
Karl,

Thanks for the reply. Couple of comments ...
Yes, ASP.Net is serious and has been around for long enough now
(~5years) to say so with authority.
That wasn't my question. VB has been around for years and was very
widely used. That doesn't prove that the Data Environment and Web
Classes were any good. I have no doubt that ASP.NET is here to stay, if
only because MS are not developing ASP any further. My question was, are
all these time-saving tools really as good as they look, or do you end
up getting caught by the system?
There won't be another version of classic ASP so you're going to have
to move to either JSP or ASP.Net at some point.
I have already started. I am just trying to get some basic questions
clear. I am a professional developer, I don't have time to play. I need
to get up to speed as fast as possible, so I need to know which tools
are worth using, and will benefit me in the long run, and which tools
will cause problems later. As I said in my original post, I've seen
plenty people caught in issues just like this and was hoping to benefit
from the experience of those who had been using ASP.NET for longer.
The learning curve however is viscious and if you want to build serious
systems, you'll need people who know what they are doing and won't just
take the easy way out (which there are a lot of).


I've noticed this. I have seen loads of tutorials, and they all tell you
how to build a simple form, but no-one seems to write tuturials on how
to go the next step and write a real world page, ie one with multiple
forms, or muti-step forms. As a newbie to this, I find that very
frustrating. I have a site that I'm about to start, and it would be an
excellent chance to try ASP.NEt, but I just can't see any way of knowing
where to start with a complex process.

Anyway, thanks for the reply.

--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)
Nov 19 '05 #12
>But Alan did ask for an honest assessment of ASP.Net and i think that
my caution that it's only as good as the people using it (which i guess
I could have simply said) is still valid.


Isn't that true of any development system? Is ASP.NET any different?

And the reason for my question (as previously stated) was to try and get
it right first time.

--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)
Nov 19 '05 #13
> With all due respect, I think you misread (or misunderstood) my point. I
wasn't saying that you could do anything in ASP that you can do in
ASP.NET, I said that (as far as I could see from my cursory first look),
nothing that had been done to make ASP.NET what it is couldn't have been
done (ie by MS with some development) to ASP. In other words, they could
have just brought out the next generation of ASP, and included the classes
that .NET has as intrinsic objects.
If what you were saying was that ASP.Net could have simply extended ASP, you
are mistaken. ASP.Net is object-oriented, and part of the .Net platform,
which uses managed code. ASP is procedural, and uses scripting.

You must understand that ASP.Net is part of the Microsoft .Net platform, an
initiative which took MS initially 4 years to develop. .Net is a whole set
of technologies, including ASP.Net. Microsoft was not just "upgrading" their
old programming technologies. That was not possible. .Net is an entirely
different paradigm for programming in general.

Aside from the fact that both technologies work with HTTP, web pages, and
HTML, they have very little in common. Yes, some of the objects have the
same names (e.g. Request and Response), and under the covers, perform the
same basic types of functions. But that is at a very low level, beyond the
scope of the programmer who is using the technology. The programming model
works very differently, and for many good reasons.

It just made a lot of good sense to rework the entire technology, and make
it adhere to the .Net paradigm. As an analogy, consider your home computer.
You certainly can upgrade ther peripherals now and again for several years.
Eventually, however, it makes much better sense to swap out the whole
machine, as the mother board and other hardware that is central to the
functionality of your machine is now obsolete.

ASP will be around for many years to come, so if you don't want to "hang
ten," just keep using it.

--
HTH,

Kevin Spencer
Microsoft MVP
..Net Developer
Neither a follower nor a lender be.

"Alan Silver" <al*********@nospam.thanx> wrote in message
news:ZC**************@nospamthankyou.spam... In article <#I**************@TK2MSFTNGP10.phx.gbl>, Kevin Spencer
<ke***@DIESPAMMERSDIEtakempis.com> writes
excellent, albeit nothing that couldn't have been done to Classic ASP.


Apparently, you know almost nothing about ASP.Net


Correct, and if you read my original post, I made that point quite clear.
ASP uses VBScript, and is extremely limited in what you can do with it
without using COM objects. ASP.Net can do literally anything, without
having to go outside to COM objects. The .Net platform can do anything you
want, no outside help needed.


With all due respect, I think you misread (or misunderstood) my point. I
wasn't saying that you could do anything in ASP that you can do in
ASP.NET, I said that (as far as I could see from my cursory first look),
nothing that had been done to make ASP.NET what it is couldn't have been
done (ie by MS with some development) to ASP. In other words, they could
have just brought out the next generation of ASP, and included the classes
that .NET has as intrinsic objects.

However, the whole point of asking the question was to get some input on
how much of an improvement ASP.NET actually is, as opposed to my initial
(and unquestionably simplistic) understanding.

--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)

Nov 19 '05 #14
WJ
"Martin Eyles" <ma**********@NOSPAM.bytronic.com> wrote in message
news:10*************@corp.supernews.com...
"WJ" <Jo*******@HotMail.Com> wrote
In short, .Net and its 6000+ classes is an excellent system. not even
Java
would match! Unfortunately, it only works on MS/Windows platform!

What about mono?


I have never used it. Is it in full production status ? Does it do what .Net
does at present ?

John
Nov 19 '05 #15
About your last point, you should consider looking at some of the best
practices examples. The two I would recommend are

The community starter kit:
http://asp.net/Default.aspx?tabindex=8&tabid=47

and the Community Server Forums
https://store.telligentsystems.com/F...ucts.aspx?id=1

which are both freely available. No good documentation for them (yet), but
if you spend time in the code you'll learn a lot.

Karl

--
MY ASP.Net tutorials
http://www.openmymind.net/
"Alan Silver" <al*********@nospam.thanx> wrote in message
news:Ti**************@nospamthankyou.spam...
Karl,

Thanks for the reply. Couple of comments ...
Yes, ASP.Net is serious and has been around for long enough now
(~5years) to say so with authority.


That wasn't my question. VB has been around for years and was very
widely used. That doesn't prove that the Data Environment and Web
Classes were any good. I have no doubt that ASP.NET is here to stay, if
only because MS are not developing ASP any further. My question was, are
all these time-saving tools really as good as they look, or do you end
up getting caught by the system?
There won't be another version of classic ASP so you're going to have
to move to either JSP or ASP.Net at some point.


I have already started. I am just trying to get some basic questions
clear. I am a professional developer, I don't have time to play. I need
to get up to speed as fast as possible, so I need to know which tools
are worth using, and will benefit me in the long run, and which tools
will cause problems later. As I said in my original post, I've seen
plenty people caught in issues just like this and was hoping to benefit
from the experience of those who had been using ASP.NET for longer.
The learning curve however is viscious and if you want to build serious
systems, you'll need people who know what they are doing and won't just
take the easy way out (which there are a lot of).


I've noticed this. I have seen loads of tutorials, and they all tell you
how to build a simple form, but no-one seems to write tuturials on how
to go the next step and write a real world page, ie one with multiple
forms, or muti-step forms. As a newbie to this, I find that very
frustrating. I have a site that I'm about to start, and it would be an
excellent chance to try ASP.NEt, but I just can't see any way of knowing
where to start with a complex process.

Anyway, thanks for the reply.

--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)

Nov 19 '05 #16
>About your last point, you should consider looking at some of the best
practices examples. The two I would recommend are

The community starter kit:
http://asp.net/Default.aspx?tabindex=8&tabid=47
Thanks, I already have this, but was somewhat overwhelmed by it. I'm at
the awkward stage of having done the simple examples and wanting to move
to real world stuff, but not being near the understanding required for
big projects like this. There's just too much in there to fathom out at
the moment. I need to know where to start.
and the Community Server Forums
https://store.telligentsystems.com/F...ucts.aspx?id=1
Thanks for the link. I'll get this one and have a look.
which are both freely available. No good documentation for them (yet),
but if you spend time in the code you'll learn a lot.


<g> It's knowing where to start that's the problem. There are so many
files there, and they interact so much, you can't just pick out a single
one and look at that.

Anyway, I'll see what I can see from this one. Thanks again for the
links. Any more pointers, especially to intermediate examples and
explanations would also be very welcome.

--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)
Nov 19 '05 #17
Kevin,

Thanks for the reply. I see what you are saying. I wasn't criticising
ASP.NET, I don't know enough about it to do that yet (!!), I was saying
that at first look it seemed that they could just have extended ASP and
done the same. I understand your analogy and assume that I'm missing
large parts of the picture so far (that much I knew!!).

I'm still trying to learn it, and you don't learn if you don't ask
questions, even stupid ones!!
ASP will be around for many years to come, so if you don't want to
"hang ten," just keep using it.


I'll probably keep using ASP as well, simply because I have a large code
base invested in it already and it's good when I need something doing
quickly, but I definitely intend exploring ASP.NET as much as possible
as if it really does hold the potential that it promises, then it will
be a major improvement.

I just have to work out what I'm doing now!! It's a lot harder to learn
than ASP. I picked that up from scratch in about two days ;-)

--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)
Nov 19 '05 #18
Hi Alan,

I don't consider any of your questions "stupid ones." And please feel free
to come on back and ask any you may have. That's what we're all here for!

--
HTH,

Kevin Spencer
Microsoft MVP
..Net Developer
Neither a follower nor a lender be.

"Alan Silver" <al*********@nospam.thanx> wrote in message
news:qr**************@nospamthankyou.spam...
Kevin,

Thanks for the reply. I see what you are saying. I wasn't criticising
ASP.NET, I don't know enough about it to do that yet (!!), I was saying
that at first look it seemed that they could just have extended ASP and
done the same. I understand your analogy and assume that I'm missing large
parts of the picture so far (that much I knew!!).

I'm still trying to learn it, and you don't learn if you don't ask
questions, even stupid ones!!
ASP will be around for many years to come, so if you don't want to "hang
ten," just keep using it.


I'll probably keep using ASP as well, simply because I have a large code
base invested in it already and it's good when I need something doing
quickly, but I definitely intend exploring ASP.NET as much as possible as
if it really does hold the potential that it promises, then it will be a
major improvement.

I just have to work out what I'm doing now!! It's a lot harder to learn
than ASP. I picked that up from scratch in about two days ;-)

--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)

Nov 19 '05 #19
>Hi Alan,

I don't consider any of your questions "stupid ones." And please feel
free to come on back and ask any you may have. That's what we're all
here for!


<g> Thanks for the vote of confidence.

Anyway, before we leave this particular thread, I noticed that my
original question hasn't actually been answered (directly anyway) ...

I was mainly asking about the visual tools that seem to make the coding
that was needed in ASP redundant. For example, in ASP Web Matrix (which
is what I was using before I posted here), there is a feature where you
can connect to a database, drag bits onto your form and make it into a
grid and in about 3 picoseconds (maybe slightly more) you have a paging
grid of data from your database. The attraction of this is immense, but
I was (and still am) slightly worried if it was really as good as it
seems when you try using it for serious work. My concerns came from a
similar experience with the Data Environment and bound controls in VB.
They also promised minimal coding for this sort of thing, but once you
got past the very basic examples, you ended up writing lots of code to
try and get past the deficiencies inherent in the system.

So, do the data (and other) tools in ASP.NET and the IDEs suffer from
the same problem, or are they actually powerful enough to use on serious
applications? I'm convinced of the improvement of ASP.NET, I'm just not
sure how much to rely on these tools and how much to do it by hand.

Thanks for all the help.

--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)
Nov 19 '05 #20
Alan,

I had a similar experience with those databound controls back in VB6 and
would never use them in .NET.

I'm sure that most developers here code their own data access tier.

In ASP you probably have a library of include files that handle your
data access. In ASP.NET you'll want to create a set of classes that
will do this. My recommendation would be to check out CodeSmith or
LLBLGen Pro and see the kind of code that people generate with these.

The data and business logic tiers are where you'll find the real value
in ASP.NET, and I think these will be the most stable parts of this
system.

IMO the front-end is very idiosyncratic, and it's very difficult to
figure out a good architecture -- there's so many options and examples
that you can go down many dead ends before finding a good one.

*** Sent via Developersdex http://www.developersdex.com ***
Don't just participate in USENET...get rewarded for it!
Nov 19 '05 #21
Good points, Jim.

I'd add that *no* autogenerated data access code
can be as effective as optimized hand-coding.

As an example, just see the difference in speed between an
autogenerated query and the execution of a stored procedure.

Parameterized queries, which I don't think any of the code generation
tools can do, if I'm not mistaken, is another example.

The use of the Cache object is another.

In sum, relying on automatic code generators is OK
when you're learning how to code, but that code
tends not to scale very well.


Juan T. Llibre
ASP.NET MVP
===========
"Jim Corey" <jc****@nospamcharter.net> wrote in message
news:eY****************@TK2MSFTNGP11.phx.gbl...
Alan,

I had a similar experience with those databound controls back in VB6 and
would never use them in .NET.

I'm sure that most developers here code their own data access tier.

In ASP you probably have a library of include files that handle your
data access. In ASP.NET you'll want to create a set of classes that
will do this. My recommendation would be to check out CodeSmith or
LLBLGen Pro and see the kind of code that people generate with these.

The data and business logic tiers are where you'll find the real value
in ASP.NET, and I think these will be the most stable parts of this
system.

IMO the front-end is very idiosyncratic, and it's very difficult to
figure out a good architecture -- there's so many options and examples
that you can go down many dead ends before finding a good one.

*** Sent via Developersdex http://www.developersdex.com ***
Don't just participate in USENET...get rewarded for it!

Nov 19 '05 #22
Hi Alan,
I was mainly asking about the visual tools that seem to make the coding
that was needed in ASP redundant. For example, in ASP Web Matrix (which is
what I was using before I posted here), there is a feature where you can
connect to a database, drag bits onto your form and make it into a grid
and in about 3 picoseconds (maybe slightly more) you have a paging grid of
data from your database. The attraction of this is immense, but I was (and
still am) slightly worried if it was really as good as it seems when you
try using it for serious work.


Good question. I use the drag-n-drop capabilities of the IDE from time to
time, but not for most of what I do. For example, I developed my own data
classes, as the projects I work on use databases quite a lot. For a small
app with a single or just a couple of database connections, I would expect
that the tools in the IDE would be sufficient. However, for a larger app,
the tools add a lot of unnecessary overhead. However, for adding WebControls
and other Controls to a page, the drag-n-drop tools can be quite effective.
I just wouldn't depend on them too much.

Actually, there are quite a few programmatic considerations that make
ASP.Net faster to develop. The object-oriented nature of the .Net platform
includes things like inheritance and polymorphism, which can make
code-writing much more efficient. Again, for example, take my data classes.
Once written, I have used them in several dozen applications. I only had to
write them once.

Good object-oriented design can considerably reduce the amount of code you
work with. By making good use of inheritance, you can create base classes
that contain functionality common to many uses, and inherit these classes to
create extensions that handle specific issues with very little additional
code.

It takes a bit of time to develop your own reusable classes, but once done,
they're done, and you can reuse them all over the place. Fortunately, the
CLR has thousands of ready-made classes that can be used or extended by your
own inherited classes. The key is good architecture and design. A little
extra time spent up-front designing can save hundreds of hours of coding in
the long run.

--
HTH,

Kevin Spencer
Microsoft MVP
..Net Developer
Neither a follower nor a lender be.
"Alan Silver" <al*********@nospam.thanx> wrote in message
news:9+**************@nospamthankyou.spam...
Hi Alan,

I don't consider any of your questions "stupid ones." And please feel free
to come on back and ask any you may have. That's what we're all here for!


<g> Thanks for the vote of confidence.

Anyway, before we leave this particular thread, I noticed that my original
question hasn't actually been answered (directly anyway) ...

I was mainly asking about the visual tools that seem to make the coding
that was needed in ASP redundant. For example, in ASP Web Matrix (which is
what I was using before I posted here), there is a feature where you can
connect to a database, drag bits onto your form and make it into a grid
and in about 3 picoseconds (maybe slightly more) you have a paging grid of
data from your database. The attraction of this is immense, but I was (and
still am) slightly worried if it was really as good as it seems when you
try using it for serious work. My concerns came from a similar experience
with the Data Environment and bound controls in VB. They also promised
minimal coding for this sort of thing, but once you got past the very
basic examples, you ended up writing lots of code to try and get past the
deficiencies inherent in the system.

So, do the data (and other) tools in ASP.NET and the IDEs suffer from the
same problem, or are they actually powerful enough to use on serious
applications? I'm convinced of the improvement of ASP.NET, I'm just not
sure how much to rely on these tools and how much to do it by hand.

Thanks for all the help.

--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)

Nov 19 '05 #23
>I had a similar experience with those databound controls back in VB6 and
would never use them in .NET.
Ah ha, so my suspicions were not unfounded.

Please can you be more specific. Remember I'm new at ASP.NET, so I'm not
sure of my way round yet. What pointers would you give for what to avoid
and what to use?
I'm sure that most developers here code their own data access tier.

In ASP you probably have a library of include files that handle your
data access. In ASP.NET you'll want to create a set of classes that
will do this.
Sounds sensible. I'm very new here, so this isn't going to be immediate.
Please could you post some simple example code to get me started?
My recommendation would be to check out CodeSmith or
LLBLGen Pro and see the kind of code that people generate with these.
What are these?
The data and business logic tiers are where you'll find the real value
in ASP.NET, and I think these will be the most stable parts of this
system.

IMO the front-end is very idiosyncratic, and it's very difficult to
figure out a good architecture -- there's so many options and examples
that you can go down many dead ends before finding a good one.


That's why I'm asking all these questions ;-)

Thanks for the reply

--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)
Nov 19 '05 #24
Kevin and Juan,

Thanks for your replies. You are both confirming what I suspected, all I
need now is some pointers in the right direction. Remember I'm new at
this and have almost no idea of how to go about it. Any chance you could
provide some simple examples of good practice code? This would really
help me get going.

All the tutorials seem to rely on the simplicity of the IDE's data
tools. I haven't yet found any tutorials that explain best practices
like you are suggesting.

Any further help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks again.
I was mainly asking about the visual tools that seem to make the coding
that was needed in ASP redundant. For example, in ASP Web Matrix (which is
what I was using before I posted here), there is a feature where you can
connect to a database, drag bits onto your form and make it into a grid
and in about 3 picoseconds (maybe slightly more) you have a paging grid of
data from your database. The attraction of this is immense, but I was (and
still am) slightly worried if it was really as good as it seems when you
try using it for serious work.


Good question. I use the drag-n-drop capabilities of the IDE from time to
time, but not for most of what I do. For example, I developed my own data
classes, as the projects I work on use databases quite a lot. For a small
app with a single or just a couple of database connections, I would expect
that the tools in the IDE would be sufficient. However, for a larger app,
the tools add a lot of unnecessary overhead. However, for adding WebControls
and other Controls to a page, the drag-n-drop tools can be quite effective.
I just wouldn't depend on them too much.

Actually, there are quite a few programmatic considerations that make
ASP.Net faster to develop. The object-oriented nature of the .Net platform
includes things like inheritance and polymorphism, which can make
code-writing much more efficient. Again, for example, take my data classes.
Once written, I have used them in several dozen applications. I only had to
write them once.

Good object-oriented design can considerably reduce the amount of code you
work with. By making good use of inheritance, you can create base classes
that contain functionality common to many uses, and inherit these classes to
create extensions that handle specific issues with very little additional
code.

It takes a bit of time to develop your own reusable classes, but once done,
they're done, and you can reuse them all over the place. Fortunately, the
CLR has thousands of ready-made classes that can be used or extended by your
own inherited classes. The key is good architecture and design. A little
extra time spent up-front designing can save hundreds of hours of coding in
the long run.


--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)
Nov 19 '05 #25
In terms of data classes, look into the ADO .NET classes available to
you, such as DataSet, SqlDataAdapter, SqlDataCommand, etc. - I wrote
front ends to most of these to simplify my DB coding - it's now very
simple from a coding standpoint but powerful in functionality.

I taught myself most of the ASP .NET/C# that I know (with some help
from these boards where needed!) and I tell you that I absolutely love
it. I come from a C, C++ background (I used to LOVE C++, now I LOVE C#)
and writing .cgi (using C) to accomplish this functionality. Now I use
C# and ASP .NET and will *never* go back.

The DataGrid alone is very simple yet extremely flexible and powerful.
And ASP .NET 2.0 is bringing out the GridView, which I absolutely
cannot wait for!

James

Alan Silver wrote:
Kevin and Juan,

Thanks for your replies. You are both confirming what I suspected,
all I need now is some pointers in the right direction. Remember I'm
new at this and have almost no idea of how to go about it. Any chance
you could provide some simple examples of good practice code? This
would really help me get going.

All the tutorials seem to rely on the simplicity of the IDE's data
tools. I haven't yet found any tutorials that explain best practices
like you are suggesting.

Any further help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks again.
I was mainly asking about the visual tools that seem to make the

coding >> that was needed in ASP redundant. For example, in ASP Web
Matrix (which is >> what I was using before I posted here), there is
a feature where you can >> connect to a database, drag bits onto your
form and make it into a grid >> and in about 3 picoseconds (maybe
slightly more) you have a paging grid of >> data from your database.
The attraction of this is immense, but I was (and >> still am)
slightly worried if it was really as good as it seems when you >> try
using it for serious work.

Good question. I use the drag-n-drop capabilities of the IDE from
time to time, but not for most of what I do. For example, I
developed my own data classes, as the projects I work on use
databases quite a lot. For a small app with a single or just a
couple of database connections, I would expect that the tools in
the IDE would be sufficient. However, for a larger app, the tools
add a lot of unnecessary overhead. However, for adding WebControls
and other Controls to a page, the drag-n-drop tools can be quite
effective. I just wouldn't depend on them too much.

Actually, there are quite a few programmatic considerations that
make ASP.Net faster to develop. The object-oriented nature of the
.Net platform includes things like inheritance and polymorphism,
which can make code-writing much more efficient. Again, for
example, take my data classes. Once written, I have used them in
several dozen applications. I only had to write them once.

Good object-oriented design can considerably reduce the amount of
code you work with. By making good use of inheritance, you can
create base classes that contain functionality common to many uses,
and inherit these classes to create extensions that handle specific
issues with very little additional code.

It takes a bit of time to develop your own reusable classes, but
once done, they're done, and you can reuse them all over the place.
Fortunately, the CLR has thousands of ready-made classes that can
be used or extended by your own inherited classes. The key is good
architecture and design. A little extra time spent up-front
designing can save hundreds of hours of coding in the long run.


Nov 19 '05 #26
What pointers would you give for what to avoid

and what to use?

If you use Visual Studio, you have the opportunity to drag and drop
controls like 'SqlConnection'. These are the kind of things I (and I
suspect most) avoid. I think they exist mainly so that MS reps can do
quick, flashy demos.

CodeSmith, at http://www.ericjsmith.net/codesmith/default.aspx
is a fascinating tool, although to be honest it took me a couple of
looks to figure out what was going on. You can point at a set of tables
and get class and data access code generated, and these would be
separate from the code for your pages. Check the forums for templates
you can download.


*** Sent via Developersdex http://www.developersdex.com ***
Don't just participate in USENET...get rewarded for it!
Nov 19 '05 #27
Hi alan,

The best I can give you is a URL to download the FREE Microsoft .Net SDK,
which contains tutorials, articles, sample code, and a complete reference:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/d...displaylang=en

--
HTH,

Kevin Spencer
Microsoft MVP
..Net Developer
Neither a follower nor a lender be.

"Alan Silver" <al*********@nospam.thanx> wrote in message
news:CZ**************@nospamthankyou.spam...
Kevin and Juan,

Thanks for your replies. You are both confirming what I suspected, all I
need now is some pointers in the right direction. Remember I'm new at this
and have almost no idea of how to go about it. Any chance you could
provide some simple examples of good practice code? This would really help
me get going.

All the tutorials seem to rely on the simplicity of the IDE's data tools.
I haven't yet found any tutorials that explain best practices like you are
suggesting.

Any further help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks again.
I was mainly asking about the visual tools that seem to make the coding
that was needed in ASP redundant. For example, in ASP Web Matrix (which
is
what I was using before I posted here), there is a feature where you can
connect to a database, drag bits onto your form and make it into a grid
and in about 3 picoseconds (maybe slightly more) you have a paging grid
of
data from your database. The attraction of this is immense, but I was
(and
still am) slightly worried if it was really as good as it seems when you
try using it for serious work.


Good question. I use the drag-n-drop capabilities of the IDE from time to
time, but not for most of what I do. For example, I developed my own data
classes, as the projects I work on use databases quite a lot. For a small
app with a single or just a couple of database connections, I would expect
that the tools in the IDE would be sufficient. However, for a larger app,
the tools add a lot of unnecessary overhead. However, for adding
WebControls
and other Controls to a page, the drag-n-drop tools can be quite
effective.
I just wouldn't depend on them too much.

Actually, there are quite a few programmatic considerations that make
ASP.Net faster to develop. The object-oriented nature of the .Net platform
includes things like inheritance and polymorphism, which can make
code-writing much more efficient. Again, for example, take my data
classes.
Once written, I have used them in several dozen applications. I only had
to
write them once.

Good object-oriented design can considerably reduce the amount of code you
work with. By making good use of inheritance, you can create base classes
that contain functionality common to many uses, and inherit these classes
to
create extensions that handle specific issues with very little additional
code.

It takes a bit of time to develop your own reusable classes, but once
done,
they're done, and you can reuse them all over the place. Fortunately, the
CLR has thousands of ready-made classes that can be used or extended by
your
own inherited classes. The key is good architecture and design. A little
extra time spent up-front designing can save hundreds of hours of coding
in
the long run.


--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)

Nov 19 '05 #28
And the best place to get updated info
which includes ASP.NET 2.0, is :

http://beta.asp.net/

Tons of good info there...

Juan T. Llibre
ASP.NET MVP
===========
"Kevin Spencer" <ke***@DIESPAMMERSDIEtakempis.com> wrote in message
news:uI****************@TK2MSFTNGP09.phx.gbl...
Hi alan,

The best I can give you is a URL to download the FREE Microsoft .Net SDK,
which contains tutorials, articles, sample code, and a complete reference:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/d...displaylang=en

--
HTH,

Kevin Spencer
Microsoft MVP
.Net Developer
Neither a follower nor a lender be.

"Alan Silver" <al*********@nospam.thanx> wrote in message
news:CZ**************@nospamthankyou.spam...
Kevin and Juan,

Thanks for your replies. You are both confirming what I suspected, all I
need now is some pointers in the right direction. Remember I'm new at
this and have almost no idea of how to go about it. Any chance you could
provide some simple examples of good practice code? This would really
help me get going.

All the tutorials seem to rely on the simplicity of the IDE's data tools.
I haven't yet found any tutorials that explain best practices like you
are suggesting.

Any further help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks again.
I was mainly asking about the visual tools that seem to make the coding
that was needed in ASP redundant. For example, in ASP Web Matrix (which
is
what I was using before I posted here), there is a feature where you
can
connect to a database, drag bits onto your form and make it into a grid
and in about 3 picoseconds (maybe slightly more) you have a paging grid
of
data from your database. The attraction of this is immense, but I was
(and
still am) slightly worried if it was really as good as it seems when
you
try using it for serious work.

Good question. I use the drag-n-drop capabilities of the IDE from time to
time, but not for most of what I do. For example, I developed my own data
classes, as the projects I work on use databases quite a lot. For a small
app with a single or just a couple of database connections, I would
expect
that the tools in the IDE would be sufficient. However, for a larger app,
the tools add a lot of unnecessary overhead. However, for adding
WebControls
and other Controls to a page, the drag-n-drop tools can be quite
effective.
I just wouldn't depend on them too much.

Actually, there are quite a few programmatic considerations that make
ASP.Net faster to develop. The object-oriented nature of the .Net
platform
includes things like inheritance and polymorphism, which can make
code-writing much more efficient. Again, for example, take my data
classes.
Once written, I have used them in several dozen applications. I only had
to
write them once.

Good object-oriented design can considerably reduce the amount of code
you
work with. By making good use of inheritance, you can create base classes
that contain functionality common to many uses, and inherit these classes
to
create extensions that handle specific issues with very little additional
code.

It takes a bit of time to develop your own reusable classes, but once
done,
they're done, and you can reuse them all over the place. Fortunately, the
CLR has thousands of ready-made classes that can be used or extended by
your
own inherited classes. The key is good architecture and design. A little
extra time spent up-front designing can save hundreds of hours of coding
in
the long run.


--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)


Nov 19 '05 #29
>In terms of data classes, look into the ADO .NET classes available to
you, such as DataSet, SqlDataAdapter, SqlDataCommand, etc. - I wrote
front ends to most of these to simplify my DB coding - it's now very
simple from a coding standpoint but powerful in functionality.
OK, thanks. That's a good place to start. As long as I have some idea
what to look for and what to avoid, I can make some progress (I hope!!)

I guess I can go through the demos and tutorials, and look for the ones
with these sort of controls.

Thanks
I taught myself most of the ASP .NET/C# that I know (with some help
from these boards where needed!) and I tell you that I absolutely love
it. I come from a C, C++ background (I used to LOVE C++, now I LOVE C#)
and writing .cgi (using C) to accomplish this functionality. Now I use
C# and ASP .NET and will *never* go back.

The DataGrid alone is very simple yet extremely flexible and powerful.
And ASP .NET 2.0 is bringing out the GridView, which I absolutely
cannot wait for!

James

Alan Silver wrote:
Kevin and Juan,

Thanks for your replies. You are both confirming what I suspected,
all I need now is some pointers in the right direction. Remember I'm
new at this and have almost no idea of how to go about it. Any chance
you could provide some simple examples of good practice code? This
would really help me get going.

All the tutorials seem to rely on the simplicity of the IDE's data
tools. I haven't yet found any tutorials that explain best practices
like you are suggesting.

Any further help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks again.
>> I was mainly asking about the visual tools that seem to make the

coding >> that was needed in ASP redundant. For example, in ASP Web
Matrix (which is >> what I was using before I posted here), there is
a feature where you can >> connect to a database, drag bits onto your
form and make it into a grid >> and in about 3 picoseconds (maybe
slightly more) you have a paging grid of >> data from your database.
The attraction of this is immense, but I was (and >> still am)
slightly worried if it was really as good as it seems when you >> try
using it for serious work.
>
> Good question. I use the drag-n-drop capabilities of the IDE from
> time to time, but not for most of what I do. For example, I
> developed my own data classes, as the projects I work on use
> databases quite a lot. For a small app with a single or just a
> couple of database connections, I would expect that the tools in
> the IDE would be sufficient. However, for a larger app, the tools
> add a lot of unnecessary overhead. However, for adding WebControls
> and other Controls to a page, the drag-n-drop tools can be quite
> effective. I just wouldn't depend on them too much.
>
> Actually, there are quite a few programmatic considerations that
> make ASP.Net faster to develop. The object-oriented nature of the
> .Net platform includes things like inheritance and polymorphism,
> which can make code-writing much more efficient. Again, for
> example, take my data classes. Once written, I have used them in
> several dozen applications. I only had to write them once.
>
> Good object-oriented design can considerably reduce the amount of
> code you work with. By making good use of inheritance, you can
> create base classes that contain functionality common to many uses,
> and inherit these classes to create extensions that handle specific
> issues with very little additional code.
>
> It takes a bit of time to develop your own reusable classes, but
> once done, they're done, and you can reuse them all over the place.
> Fortunately, the CLR has thousands of ready-made classes that can
> be used or extended by your own inherited classes. The key is good
> architecture and design. A little extra time spent up-front
> designing can save hundreds of hours of coding in the long run.
>


--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)
Nov 19 '05 #30
>Hi alan,

The best I can give you is a URL to download the FREE Microsoft .Net SDK,
which contains tutorials, articles, sample code, and a complete reference:


Kevin,

Thanks for the URL. I already have that, I got a CD. I went through the
Web Matrix stuff in there, which was fine as far as it went, but a) it
only really dealt with simple stuff and b) it used all the sorts of
quick tools that got me suspicious enough to start this thread in the
first place!!

Once you go into the main SDK stuff, too many of the tutorials are based
around VS.NET which I don't have. I couldn't follow them. Having said
that, I've now got the Visual Web Developer Express tool, which I think
is very closely related to VS.NET, so maybe I can try those again.

Thanks again

--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)
Nov 19 '05 #31
>>> What pointers would you give for what to avoid
and what to use?

If you use Visual Studio, you have the opportunity to drag and drop
controls like 'SqlConnection'. These are the kind of things I (and I
suspect most) avoid. I think they exist mainly so that MS reps can do
quick, flashy demos.
Thanks. Any others to avoid? ;-)
CodeSmith, at http://www.ericjsmith.net/codesmith/default.aspx
is a fascinating tool, although to be honest it took me a couple of
looks to figure out what was going on. You can point at a set of tables
and get class and data access code generated, and these would be
separate from the code for your pages. Check the forums for templates
you can download.


Thanks, I'll take a look at that.

--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)
Nov 19 '05 #32
>And the best place to get updated info
which includes ASP.NET 2.0, is :

http://beta.asp.net/

Tons of good info there...


Information overload, here I come !!

I'll be back ;-)

--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)
Nov 19 '05 #33
>CodeSmith, at http://www.ericjsmith.net/codesmith/default.aspx is a
fascinating tool, although to be honest it took me a couple of looks to
figure out what was going on. You can point at a set of tables and get
class and data access code generated, and these would be separate from
the code for your pages. Check the forums for templates you can download.


OK, I had a look at the site, but I think I missed the point. What would
I need it for? It looks like it generates code. Well don't Web Matrix,
Visual Web Developer and VS.NET do the same sorts of things? It looks
like you have to learn yet another set of syntax to achieve what they
already do.

Presumably I'm wrong, otherwise there wouldn't be any point to it. Since
he spent time developing it and you recommended it, obviously there's
more to it ;-)

Please enlighten me. Thanks

--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)
Nov 19 '05 #34
In some sense it's just another tool to generate code. The nice thing is
I can write templates to look at any piece of metadata (like a schema, an
xml or xsd file, etc), and have it write code over and over. Code for stored
procs, for middle tier data objects, or for bound columns in a data grid
- anything at all really. Then next week when I add two columns to a database
table I can re-gen all the code again and not worry about tracking down which
files to change . The code is exactly like I want it since I wrote the template.
So, it is just a tool - a codegenerator. For some applications and processes
it is a great fit and far more capable than using the IDE and SDK tools alone.

--
Scott
http://www.OdeToCode.com/blogs/scott/
CodeSmith, at http://www.ericjsmith.net/codesmith/default.aspx is a
fascinating tool, although to be honest it took me a couple of looks
to figure out what was going on. You can point at a set of tables
and get class and data access code generated, and these would be
separate from the code for your pages. Check the forums for
templates you can download.

OK, I had a look at the site, but I think I missed the point. What
would I need it for? It looks like it generates code. Well don't Web
Matrix, Visual Web Developer and VS.NET do the same sorts of things?
It looks like you have to learn yet another set of syntax to achieve
what they already do.

Presumably I'm wrong, otherwise there wouldn't be any point to it.
Since he spent time developing it and you recommended it, obviously
there's more to it ;-)

Please enlighten me. Thanks

Nov 19 '05 #35
>In some sense it's just another tool to generate code. The nice thing
is I can write templates to look at any piece of metadata (like a
schema, an xml or xsd file, etc), and have it write code over and over.
Code for stored procs, for middle tier data objects, or for bound
columns in a data grid - anything at all really. Then next week when I
add two columns to a database table I can re-gen all the code again and
not worry about tracking down which files to change . The code is
exactly like I want it since I wrote the template.

So, it is just a tool - a codegenerator. For some applications and
processes it is a great fit and far more capable than using the IDE and
SDK tools alone.


Thanks Scott, I get the point now. I think it's a bit beyond me at the
moment, but worth bearing in mind for when I (hopefully) have more idea
what I'm doing ;-)

--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)
Nov 19 '05 #36
Hi Alan!

Two years ago my software company (http://www.factordigital.com) has elected
..NET as its core technology. Before that we used ASP.

The difference I noticed is that with .NET you must be more strict with your
development process. Things that in ASP could be resolved within seconds of
code "hammering" are no longer resolved by the same way in .NET.

In .NET you have to think very well before coding, or else you are wasting
time.
The advantage is that .NET gives you a excelent way of structuring your
code, with classes, objects, collections, and lots of that coding-artillery
that wasn't available in ASP...
Regards, Manuel C

"Alan Silver" wrote:
Hello,

This is NOT a troll, it's a genuine question. Please read right
through to see why.

I have been using Vusual Basic and Classic ASP for some years, and
have now started looking at ASP.NET. At first glance, it looks
excellent, albeit nothing that couldn't have been done to Classic ASP.
I have been through a few tutorials and was impressed with how quickly
you can get database info onto a page.

What worries me is if it really is as good as it looks. Some years
ago, MS tried to persuade VB programmers to get into writing web sites
by introducing Web Classes to VB. These looked, at first glance, like
a really quick and easy way to code a web site. The universal opinion
on them was that they were awful when you tried to get anything real
done with them. You spent so much time fighting with the system that
you would have been quicker doing it by hand in the first place.

Same thing happened when MS introduced the Data Environment into VB.
Again, this was supposed to be a RAD tool for getting database-based
apps up quickly. The first impressions were very favourable, but you
quickly found yourself writing more code to fight the system than you
would have done by doing it all by hand in the first place.

There are other examples, but I think the point is clear. That which
appears to be a fantastic way to code initially may turn out to be a
coding nightmare when you try and take the second steps.

So, is ASP.NET the same, or have MS finally got it right? My first
impression is that is it great and could save a lot of time. Trouble
is, I can almost feel myself going back a few years to when I first
tried the Data Environment. That's what worries me, am I going to
start with it and then find it's more bother than it's worth?

Do people do professional sites in ASP.NET and still think it's good?
Maybe this is the wrong place to ask as anyone who hated it and gave
up probably wouldn't be reading here, but I would still like some
reassurance that my time is going to be invested well if I learn
ASP.NET. Given my extensive code library, built up over a number of
years, I can get db-driven web sites up in Classic ASP quite quickly.
I'm not going to drop that unless I know the alternative is a genuine
improvement.

As I said at the start, this is a genuine question, not a troll.
Please reply appropriately. TIA

Nov 19 '05 #37
>Hi Alan!

Two years ago my software company (http://www.factordigital.com) has elected
.NET as its core technology. Before that we used ASP.

The difference I noticed is that with .NET you must be more strict with your
development process. Things that in ASP could be resolved within seconds of
code "hammering" are no longer resolved by the same way in .NET.

In .NET you have to think very well before coding, or else you are wasting
time.
The advantage is that .NET gives you a excelent way of structuring your
code, with classes, objects, collections, and lots of that coding-artillery
that wasn't available in ASP...
Manuel,

Thanks for the comment. What sort of issues need to be considered? I
must admit that a lot (most?) of my ASP followed the "hammering it out
and seeing what's missing" approach. I never have the patience for
planning in advance. What would I have to consider?

Thanks again
Regards, Manuel C

"Alan Silver" wrote:
Hello,

This is NOT a troll, it's a genuine question. Please read right
through to see why.

I have been using Vusual Basic and Classic ASP for some years, and
have now started looking at ASP.NET. At first glance, it looks
excellent, albeit nothing that couldn't have been done to Classic ASP.
I have been through a few tutorials and was impressed with how quickly
you can get database info onto a page.

What worries me is if it really is as good as it looks. Some years
ago, MS tried to persuade VB programmers to get into writing web sites
by introducing Web Classes to VB. These looked, at first glance, like
a really quick and easy way to code a web site. The universal opinion
on them was that they were awful when you tried to get anything real
done with them. You spent so much time fighting with the system that
you would have been quicker doing it by hand in the first place.

Same thing happened when MS introduced the Data Environment into VB.
Again, this was supposed to be a RAD tool for getting database-based
apps up quickly. The first impressions were very favourable, but you
quickly found yourself writing more code to fight the system than you
would have done by doing it all by hand in the first place.

There are other examples, but I think the point is clear. That which
appears to be a fantastic way to code initially may turn out to be a
coding nightmare when you try and take the second steps.

So, is ASP.NET the same, or have MS finally got it right? My first
impression is that is it great and could save a lot of time. Trouble
is, I can almost feel myself going back a few years to when I first
tried the Data Environment. That's what worries me, am I going to
start with it and then find it's more bother than it's worth?

Do people do professional sites in ASP.NET and still think it's good?
Maybe this is the wrong place to ask as anyone who hated it and gave
up probably wouldn't be reading here, but I would still like some
reassurance that my time is going to be invested well if I learn
ASP.NET. Given my extensive code library, built up over a number of
years, I can get db-driven web sites up in Classic ASP quite quickly.
I'm not going to drop that unless I know the alternative is a genuine
improvement.

As I said at the start, this is a genuine question, not a troll.
Please reply appropriately. TIA


--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)
Nov 19 '05 #38
ARt
One of the ways to pick up on how to do things in .NET is to peruse the
patterns and practices site. They have developed code blocks that are
supposed to help you develop your applications properly. Most people I know
don't use the code blocks because they've all developed their objects,
methods, classes, etc.

If you are new to .NET these code blocks are a really good way to see how to
properly develop a class structure for the most common programming
requirements.

Here is a link to the code blocks.

http://www.microsoft.com/resources/practices/code.mspx

"Kevin Spencer" wrote:
excellent, albeit nothing that couldn't have been done to Classic ASP.


Apparently, you know almost nothing about ASP.Net ASP uses VBScript, and is
extremely limited in what you can do with it without using COM objects.
ASP.Net can do literally anything, without having to go outside to COM
objects. The .Net platform can do anything you want, no outside help needed.
For example, I'm currently writing some classes that parse binary meta-data
from GeoTiff files. Try doing that with the Scripting.FileSystemObject of
Classic ASP.

That siad, ASP.Net is much more complex and difficult to use than ASP. So,
if you don't like learning and studying, you might want to stick with
Classic ASP. But once you DO learn ASP, you will be MUCH more productive.
It's a short-term vs. Long-term issue. In the short term your work will be
slowed way down as you learn the object model and syntax, etc. You will have
to learn about some low-level concepts that VB 6 and earlier didn't handle,
such as strict data typing and Obect-oriented programming concepts. In the
long term, the CLR has some awesome classes that enhance productivity
extensively.

If you're looking for Drag 'n Drop developer tools, there are plenty to be
had in Visual Studio.Net, and to a lesser extent, other Microsoft .Net tool
sets. However, you will never progress very far by simply using these types
of pre-built capabilities.

So, if all you want to do is some puddle-jumping, a Cessna (ASP) is a good
enough airplane. But if you want to get 150 people from coast to coast in
under 6 hours, the Boeing 747 of ASP.Net is the plane to fly. Sure, you
can't learn to fly it in 6 easy lessons, but once you've mastered it, the
"sky" is the limit!

--
HTH,

Kevin Spencer
Microsoft MVP
..Net Developer
Neither a follower nor a lender be.

"Alan Silver" <go****@alansilver.co.uk> wrote in message
news:90**************************@posting.google.c om...
Hello,

This is NOT a troll, it's a genuine question. Please read right
through to see why.

I have been using Vusual Basic and Classic ASP for some years, and
have now started looking at ASP.NET. At first glance, it looks
excellent, albeit nothing that couldn't have been done to Classic ASP.
I have been through a few tutorials and was impressed with how quickly
you can get database info onto a page.

What worries me is if it really is as good as it looks. Some years
ago, MS tried to persuade VB programmers to get into writing web sites
by introducing Web Classes to VB. These looked, at first glance, like
a really quick and easy way to code a web site. The universal opinion
on them was that they were awful when you tried to get anything real
done with them. You spent so much time fighting with the system that
you would have been quicker doing it by hand in the first place.

Same thing happened when MS introduced the Data Environment into VB.
Again, this was supposed to be a RAD tool for getting database-based
apps up quickly. The first impressions were very favourable, but you
quickly found yourself writing more code to fight the system than you
would have done by doing it all by hand in the first place.

There are other examples, but I think the point is clear. That which
appears to be a fantastic way to code initially may turn out to be a
coding nightmare when you try and take the second steps.

So, is ASP.NET the same, or have MS finally got it right? My first
impression is that is it great and could save a lot of time. Trouble
is, I can almost feel myself going back a few years to when I first
tried the Data Environment. That's what worries me, am I going to
start with it and then find it's more bother than it's worth?

Do people do professional sites in ASP.NET and still think it's good?
Maybe this is the wrong place to ask as anyone who hated it and gave
up probably wouldn't be reading here, but I would still like some
reassurance that my time is going to be invested well if I learn
ASP.NET. Given my extensive code library, built up over a number of
years, I can get db-driven web sites up in Classic ASP quite quickly.
I'm not going to drop that unless I know the alternative is a genuine
improvement.

As I said at the start, this is a genuine question, not a troll.
Please reply appropriately. TIA


Nov 19 '05 #39
Hi Alan

In a (hopefully) clear answer to your question is yes, ASP.NET is nto full
of red-herrings and technological dead-ends.
The Page Object that ASP.NET is built on is very good and efficient and
simple to extend, customise.
ASP.NET makes developing professional, enterprise scale, robust applications
considerably easier than ASP ever could, while presenting a reasonably cheap
maintenance cycle.
My experience is a large online database/catalogue for NHS purposes and has
had to meet certain government and operational requirements, such as
switchable scalability, error reporting.
This site was not written using the Forms architecture but was integrated
into the Page object nonetheless. We have achieved absolute tier-separation,
the XML classes and Remoting classes in .NET are fantastice, the death of
prolific DCOM cannot happen soon enough.
XSLT is the presentation tier and OO takes care of the rest...

ASP.NET enabled this in 4 months (5 meg of code) whereas ASP/VB/C++ would do
this in 12... A very significant improvement.

The learning curve was very steep but it paid for itself almost immediatly
as a good, robust design is easy to implement and prove in ASP.NET.
Testing/debugging is lovely...

It is only as good as the developer and designer allow however and there is
plenty of potential for problems, especially it seems with Grid controls and
the like, so there is care required and it doesn't get you out of the need to
make sure the design is sensible.

I hope this helps and doesn't add to the quagmire of opinion in response to
your question.

I would recommend going down the ASP.NET route, you will not be
disappointed, and your old code-library will not be entirely redundant and
some of it can be reused directly... and the rest translated very easily.

It is also very performant...

"Alan Silver" wrote:
Hello,

This is NOT a troll, it's a genuine question. Please read right
through to see why.

I have been using Vusual Basic and Classic ASP for some years, and
have now started looking at ASP.NET. At first glance, it looks
excellent, albeit nothing that couldn't have been done to Classic ASP.
I have been through a few tutorials and was impressed with how quickly
you can get database info onto a page.

What worries me is if it really is as good as it looks. Some years
ago, MS tried to persuade VB programmers to get into writing web sites
by introducing Web Classes to VB. These looked, at first glance, like
a really quick and easy way to code a web site. The universal opinion
on them was that they were awful when you tried to get anything real
done with them. You spent so much time fighting with the system that
you would have been quicker doing it by hand in the first place.

Same thing happened when MS introduced the Data Environment into VB.
Again, this was supposed to be a RAD tool for getting database-based
apps up quickly. The first impressions were very favourable, but you
quickly found yourself writing more code to fight the system than you
would have done by doing it all by hand in the first place.

There are other examples, but I think the point is clear. That which
appears to be a fantastic way to code initially may turn out to be a
coding nightmare when you try and take the second steps.

So, is ASP.NET the same, or have MS finally got it right? My first
impression is that is it great and could save a lot of time. Trouble
is, I can almost feel myself going back a few years to when I first
tried the Data Environment. That's what worries me, am I going to
start with it and then find it's more bother than it's worth?

Do people do professional sites in ASP.NET and still think it's good?
Maybe this is the wrong place to ask as anyone who hated it and gave
up probably wouldn't be reading here, but I would still like some
reassurance that my time is going to be invested well if I learn
ASP.NET. Given my extensive code library, built up over a number of
years, I can get db-driven web sites up in Classic ASP quite quickly.
I'm not going to drop that unless I know the alternative is a genuine
improvement.

As I said at the start, this is a genuine question, not a troll.
Please reply appropriately. TIA

Nov 19 '05 #40
Allen,

I had the same experiance with the tutorials. I ended up going to the
bookstore and bought Stephen Walthers ASP.NET Unleashed Second Edition. ISBN:
0-672-32542-X. It realy speeded things up for me.

Abraham

"Alan Silver" wrote:
Karl,

Thanks for the reply. Couple of comments ...
Yes, ASP.Net is serious and has been around for long enough now
(~5years) to say so with authority.


That wasn't my question. VB has been around for years and was very
widely used. That doesn't prove that the Data Environment and Web
Classes were any good. I have no doubt that ASP.NET is here to stay, if
only because MS are not developing ASP any further. My question was, are
all these time-saving tools really as good as they look, or do you end
up getting caught by the system?
There won't be another version of classic ASP so you're going to have
to move to either JSP or ASP.Net at some point.


I have already started. I am just trying to get some basic questions
clear. I am a professional developer, I don't have time to play. I need
to get up to speed as fast as possible, so I need to know which tools
are worth using, and will benefit me in the long run, and which tools
will cause problems later. As I said in my original post, I've seen
plenty people caught in issues just like this and was hoping to benefit
from the experience of those who had been using ASP.NET for longer.
The learning curve however is viscious and if you want to build serious
systems, you'll need people who know what they are doing and won't just
take the easy way out (which there are a lot of).


I've noticed this. I have seen loads of tutorials, and they all tell you
how to build a simple form, but no-one seems to write tuturials on how
to go the next step and write a real world page, ie one with multiple
forms, or muti-step forms. As a newbie to this, I find that very
frustrating. I have a site that I'm about to start, and it would be an
excellent chance to try ASP.NEt, but I just can't see any way of knowing
where to start with a complex process.

Anyway, thanks for the reply.

--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)

Nov 19 '05 #41
>I had the same experiance with the tutorials. I ended up going to the
bookstore and bought Stephen Walthers ASP.NET Unleashed Second Edition.
ISBN: 0-672-32542-X. It realy speeded things up for me.


Thanks. That's the sort of comment I want!! Right to the point. The
reviews in Amazon are certainly good.

--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)
Nov 19 '05 #42
>One of the ways to pick up on how to do things in .NET is to peruse the
patterns and practices site. They have developed code blocks that are
supposed to help you develop your applications properly. Most people I
know don't use the code blocks because they've all developed their
objects, methods, classes, etc.

If you are new to .NET these code blocks are a really good way to see
how to properly develop a class structure for the most common
programming requirements.

Here is a link to the code blocks.

http://www.microsoft.com/resources/practices/code.mspx


Thanks for that. I've never seen these before. Looks like there very
useful. More bedtime reading eh?

--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)
Nov 19 '05 #43
Jules,

Thanks for the reply. I'm already convinced of the improvement of
ASP.NET (thanks to everyone here), I'm now at the stage of trying to get
my head round how it all works. Like you say, it's a steep learning
curve and I've precious little spare time to devote to it. Still, I've
had some excellent pointers here, so hopefully I should get somewhere.

Thanks again
Hi Alan

In a (hopefully) clear answer to your question is yes, ASP.NET is nto full
of red-herrings and technological dead-ends.
The Page Object that ASP.NET is built on is very good and efficient and
simple to extend, customise.
ASP.NET makes developing professional, enterprise scale, robust applications
considerably easier than ASP ever could, while presenting a reasonably cheap
maintenance cycle.
My experience is a large online database/catalogue for NHS purposes and has
had to meet certain government and operational requirements, such as
switchable scalability, error reporting.
This site was not written using the Forms architecture but was integrated
into the Page object nonetheless. We have achieved absolute tier-separation,
the XML classes and Remoting classes in .NET are fantastice, the death of
prolific DCOM cannot happen soon enough.
XSLT is the presentation tier and OO takes care of the rest...

ASP.NET enabled this in 4 months (5 meg of code) whereas ASP/VB/C++ would do
this in 12... A very significant improvement.

The learning curve was very steep but it paid for itself almost immediatly
as a good, robust design is easy to implement and prove in ASP.NET.
Testing/debugging is lovely...

It is only as good as the developer and designer allow however and there is
plenty of potential for problems, especially it seems with Grid controls and
the like, so there is care required and it doesn't get you out of the need to
make sure the design is sensible.

I hope this helps and doesn't add to the quagmire of opinion in response to
your question.

I would recommend going down the ASP.NET route, you will not be
disappointed, and your old code-library will not be entirely redundant and
some of it can be reused directly... and the rest translated very easily.

It is also very performant...

"Alan Silver" wrote:
Hello,

This is NOT a troll, it's a genuine question. Please read right
through to see why.

I have been using Vusual Basic and Classic ASP for some years, and
have now started looking at ASP.NET. At first glance, it looks
excellent, albeit nothing that couldn't have been done to Classic ASP.
I have been through a few tutorials and was impressed with how quickly
you can get database info onto a page.

What worries me is if it really is as good as it looks. Some years
ago, MS tried to persuade VB programmers to get into writing web sites
by introducing Web Classes to VB. These looked, at first glance, like
a really quick and easy way to code a web site. The universal opinion
on them was that they were awful when you tried to get anything real
done with them. You spent so much time fighting with the system that
you would have been quicker doing it by hand in the first place.

Same thing happened when MS introduced the Data Environment into VB.
Again, this was supposed to be a RAD tool for getting database-based
apps up quickly. The first impressions were very favourable, but you
quickly found yourself writing more code to fight the system than you
would have done by doing it all by hand in the first place.

There are other examples, but I think the point is clear. That which
appears to be a fantastic way to code initially may turn out to be a
coding nightmare when you try and take the second steps.

So, is ASP.NET the same, or have MS finally got it right? My first
impression is that is it great and could save a lot of time. Trouble
is, I can almost feel myself going back a few years to when I first
tried the Data Environment. That's what worries me, am I going to
start with it and then find it's more bother than it's worth?

Do people do professional sites in ASP.NET and still think it's good?
Maybe this is the wrong place to ask as anyone who hated it and gave
up probably wouldn't be reading here, but I would still like some
reassurance that my time is going to be invested well if I learn
ASP.NET. Given my extensive code library, built up over a number of
years, I can get db-driven web sites up in Classic ASP quite quickly.
I'm not going to drop that unless I know the alternative is a genuine
improvement.

As I said at the start, this is a genuine question, not a troll.
Please reply appropriately. TIA


--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)
Nov 19 '05 #44
Alan,
Your article mentions a comparison between asp and asp.net. Regarding that,
I'd count it as a vast improvement. My top 2 reasons are more valid error
trapping, and validators. Those two things alone, would make a change to
asp.net valid. On the cautious side, browser compatability can be hard to
maintain for some controls and we choose not to implement them.
Nov 19 '05 #45
> Alan,
Your article mentions a comparison between asp and asp.net. Regarding that,
I'd count it as a vast improvement. My top 2 reasons are more valid error
trapping, and validators. Those two things alone, would make a change to
asp.net valid. On the cautious side, browser compatability can be hard to
maintain for some controls and we choose not to implement them.


Such as what? All that I've read said that browser capabilities were
carefully handled by the ASP.NET system. It sounded too good to be true,
but I hadn't seen anyone discuss it more.

--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)
Nov 19 '05 #46
Actually, most controls are handled well across browsers. Where I've had
problems is in Safari mostly. (I work in education and those people really
like macs.) But we have found that some things that work great in IE need
some help in other browsers. Example: Validators sometimes are not fired in
all browsers as you tab thru controls because of how javascript is generated,
so it is important to use the "CausesValidation="true"" attribute for submit
buttons. Also, text boxes are displayed fine in IE when a width attribute
is specified, but in firefox you also need to specify the columns attribute.
So maybe I'm a bit picky on this, but probably all this means is to test your
ASP.net pages in multiple browsers. In summary, all the asp.net controls
work, but not all asp.net controls work "as advertised" in other browsers.
Nov 19 '05 #47
ARt
Bedtime reading is the only way to keep up with Technology:) Glad to help.

"Alan Silver" wrote:
One of the ways to pick up on how to do things in .NET is to peruse the
patterns and practices site. They have developed code blocks that are
supposed to help you develop your applications properly. Most people I
know don't use the code blocks because they've all developed their
objects, methods, classes, etc.

If you are new to .NET these code blocks are a really good way to see
how to properly develop a class structure for the most common
programming requirements.

Here is a link to the code blocks.

http://www.microsoft.com/resources/practices/code.mspx


Thanks for that. I've never seen these before. Looks like there very
useful. More bedtime reading eh?

--
Alan Silver
(anything added below this line is nothing to do with me)

Nov 19 '05 #48
ARt
I think the reason the validator controls don't work in all browsers the same
way is because the validators generate client-side javascript to do what you
ask of the control. As with all clientside javascript you need to test with
all the browsers you plan to support. This is not necessarily an asp.net
issue.

"mrmac" wrote:
Actually, most controls are handled well across browsers. Where I've had
problems is in Safari mostly. (I work in education and those people really
like macs.) But we have found that some things that work great in IE need
some help in other browsers. Example: Validators sometimes are not fired in
all browsers as you tab thru controls because of how javascript is generated,
so it is important to use the "CausesValidation="true"" attribute for submit
buttons. Also, text boxes are displayed fine in IE when a width attribute
is specified, but in firefox you also need to specify the columns attribute.
So maybe I'm a bit picky on this, but probably all this means is to test your
ASP.net pages in multiple browsers. In summary, all the asp.net controls
work, but not all asp.net controls work "as advertised" in other browsers.

Nov 19 '05 #49

Agreed, that is the root issue.
Nov 19 '05 #50

This thread has been closed and replies have been disabled. Please start a new discussion.

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