28-09-2012, 12:29 PM
ASP.NET Website
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Introduction to .NET and ASP.NET
It’s being touted as the “next big thing.” Microsoft has invested millions in marketing,
advertising, and development to produce what it feels is the foundation
of the future Internet. It’s a corporate initiative, the strategy of which was deemed
so important, that Bill Gates himself, Microsoft Chairman and CEO, decided to
oversee personally its development. It is a technology that Microsoft claims will
reinvent the way companies carry out business globally for years to come. In his
opening speech at the Professional Developers’ Conference (PDC) held in Orlando
Florida in July of 2000, Gates stated that a transition of this magnitude only
comes around once every five to six years. What is this show-stopping technology?
It’s .NET
What is ASP.NET?
For years now, Active Server Pages (ASP) has been arguably the leading choice
for Web developers building dynamic Websites on Windows Web servers. ASP
has gained popularity by offering the simplicity of flexible scripting via several
languages. That, combined with the fact that it’s built into every Microsoft
Windows-based Web server, has made ASP a difficult act to follow.
Early in 2002, Microsoft released its new technology for Internet development.
Originally called ASP+, it was finally released as ASP.NET, and represents a leap
forward from ASP both in sophistication and productivity for the developer. It
continues to offer flexibility in terms of the languages it supports, but instead of
a range of simple scripting languages, developers can now choose between several
fully-fledged programming languages. Development in ASP.NET requires not
only an understanding of HTML and Web design, but also a firm grasp of the
concepts of object-oriented programming and development.
What Do I Need?
For the moment, if you’re going to learn ASP.NET, you’ll need a Windows-based
Web server. Open source initiatives are underway to produce versions of ASP.NET
that will run on other operating systems, such as Linux; however, these are not
expected to be available in stable form for a while.
While developers had the option of getting their feet wet with ASP on Windows
95, 98, or ME, using a scaled-down version of IIS called a Personal Web Server
(PWS), ASP.NET requires the real deal. As a bare minimum, you’ll need a computer
equipped with Windows 2000 Professional before you can get started.
Windows XP Professional will work fine too, as will any of the Windows 2000
Server packages and Windows 2003 Server.
Other than that, all you need is enough disk space to install the Web server Internet
Information Services (18 MB), the .NET Framework SDK (which includes
ASP.NET; 108 MB), and a text editor. Notepad or Web Matrix[1] will
be fine for getting started, and are certainly all you’ll need for this book. However,
if you get serious about ASP.NET, you’ll probably want to invest in a development
environment like Visual Studio .NET[2].