A .NET Control to handle Ratings and reviews

[Rob Dob]

Hi,

Does anyone know of a good, cheap, prefereably free ,net control that I can
use that will aloow users to not only rate something i.e.: 1-5 stars but
also post comments on whatever they are rating. i.e. a possible a picture..
etc.

Thanks,

[Jon Davis]

"Rob Dob" <ro************@yahoo.comwrote in message
news:%2****************@TK2MSFTNGP02.phx.gbl...

Hi,

Does anyone know of a good, cheap, prefereably free ,net control that I
can use that will aloow users to not only rate something i.e.: 1-5 stars
but also post comments on whatever they are rating. i.e. a possible a
picture.. etc.

Thanks,

I built such a control in-house but it took about a month of development,
QA'ing, cleaning up, tweaking, etc. Keep in mind, it's not as simple as it
seems, if only because:

a) A comment thread needs to be associated with something, i.e. an article.

b) The users' info needs to be retained. Cookies work, but if the users are
already logged in on your site you should store the user data on the
database.

c) Retaining a thumbnail image of the user requires you to host the user
data on the server anyway, unless you just expect the users to keep
referencing an external URL to a thumbnail graphic (cookies can be used to
pre-populate this). But I don't recommend that, because thumbnail images'
dimensions should be imposed by you, and you also run the risk of hacks,
attacks, and privacy invasions by allowing users to reference external URLs
for images. Rather, you should load the image on the server after having
loaded the image into a bitmap (System.Drawing.Image) to validate that it's
indeed an image and to impose the thumbnail resizing.

Good luck,
Jon

[Jon Davis]

"Jon Davis" <jo*@REMOVE.ME.PLEASE.jondavis.netwrote in message
news:uy**************@TK2MSFTNGP05.phx.gbl...

>
"Rob Dob" <ro************@yahoo.comwrote in message
news:%2****************@TK2MSFTNGP02.phx.gbl...

>Hi,

Does anyone know of a good, cheap, prefereably free ,net control that I
can use that will aloow users to not only rate something i.e.: 1-5 stars
but also post comments on whatever they are rating. i.e. a possible a
picture.. etc.

Thanks,

I built such a control in-house but it took about a month of development,
QA'ing, cleaning up, tweaking, etc. Keep in mind, it's not as simple as it
seems, if only because:

a) A comment thread needs to be associated with something, i.e. an
article.

b) The users' info needs to be retained. Cookies work, but if the users
are already logged in on your site you should store the user data on the
database.

c) Retaining a thumbnail image of the user requires you to host the user
data on the server anyway, unless you just expect the users to keep
referencing an external URL to a thumbnail graphic (cookies can be used to
pre-populate this). But I don't recommend that, because thumbnail images'
dimensions should be imposed by you, and you also run the risk of hacks,
attacks, and privacy invasions by allowing users to reference external
URLs for images. Rather, you should load the image on the server after
having loaded the image into a bitmap (System.Drawing.Image) to validate
that it's indeed an image and to impose the thumbnail resizing.

Good luck,
Jon

... a few other reasons why it took longer for us ...

- Comment threads were "owned" by other users who were responsible for the
subject being commented on, who could "moderate" (allow or delete) the
comment posts and the ability to post.
- Ratings had to be retained on the database because a user cannot rate
twice (and cookies are no good as anyone can edit or reset their cookies)
- Metadata about the users had to be captured and utilized, such as to
display the username, avatar, and a URL link to the user's profile page.
etc.

What I'm getting at and the point of my replies is that the .NET control you
ask for is difficult to genericize. Most commenting functionality is rather
proprietary.

Jon

[Jon Paal [MSMD]]

google:

rating control asp.net
"Rob Dob" <ro************@yahoo.comwrote in message news:%2****************@TK2MSFTNGP02.phx.gbl...

Hi,

Does anyone know of a good, cheap, prefereably free ,net control that I can use that will aloow users to not only rate something
i.e.: 1-5 stars but also post comments on whatever they are rating. i.e. a possible a picture.. etc.

Thanks,