Questions from a Technical Manager Moving from 1.1 to 2.0

[Chris S]

We are moving from ASP.Net 1.1 to ASP.Net 2.0. As we do not have the luxury
of spending weeks trying out different techniques, I'd like to rely on some
tried and true methods, but need some feedback so we don't stray too far
from best practices.



ASP.Net User Controls (ascx files)

Our team is very comfortable with the use of ASP.Net User Controls which do
things like display header information, display simple navigation, and
perform basic session state logic. In reading about the Master Page methods
in ASP.Net 2.0, I am not entirely comfortable with switching over, as we
have so much reusable User Control code from past projects. Is it
acceptable practice to continue using User Controls in ASP.Net 2.0?



VS 2005 Web Application Projects vs. "New Web Site"

I have seen the Web Application Project plug-in available for VS 2005, and
understand it emulates the VS 2003 paradigm more closely. Is this commonly
used when creating ASP.Net 2.0 projects, or is this something that may cause
more problems than it will solve?

Link: http://weblogs.asp.net/scottgu/archive/2006/04/05/442032.aspx



Manually Customizing GridView Using Code

It seems that everywhere I've looked, we are encouraged to use the GridView
in the WYSIWYG. My team is much more comfortable (after a couple of years
of using the DataGrid) with manual control over these types of controls.
Can we continue to manually wire events, manipulate data input and binding,
and perform similar tasks that we did earlier using the GridView? Or do we
really have to use the WYSIWYG for all of those items?



User Authentication / System Access

We typically relied on some reusable components (STPs included) and the
web.config User Authentication and User Authorization settings to manage
system access. In looking at some of the new 2.0 Membership components, I'm
not entirely convinced it will improve the speed and/or usability of our
system. Should we continue to rely on our existing method, involving the
web.config settings + our custom items, or is this frowned upon?





I have to say, we are all a little nervous about moving to 2.0, as we were
getting very comfortable with the 1.1 method of implementation. At the same
time, I understand that support for 1.1 is dying rapidly, so I am forcing
our new projects to use 2.0. Any feedback is greatly appreciated.



Thanks so much,

Chris

 

[Mark Rae]

ASP.Net User Controls (ascx files)

Our team is very comfortable with the use of ASP.Net User Controls which
do things like display header information, display simple navigation, and
perform basic session state logic. In reading about the Master Page
methods in ASP.Net 2.0, I am not entirely comfortable with switching over,
as we have so much reusable User Control code from past projects. Is it
acceptable practice to continue using User Controls in ASP.Net 2.0?

Yes absolutely. However, MasterPages really are superb, so you might
consider at least re-writing specifically the UserControls which provide
your basic page "skeleton"...

VS 2005 Web Application Projects vs. "New Web Site"

I have seen the Web Application Project plug-in available for VS 2005, and
understand it emulates the VS 2003 paradigm more closely. Is this
commonly used when creating ASP.Net 2.0 projects, or is this something
that may cause more problems than it will solve?

IMO, WAP is far better than the native ASP.NET 2 web site architecture. I
can't imagine I'll ever create another "web site" again... You should also
consider web deployment projects too.

Manually Customizing GridView Using Code

It seems that everywhere I've looked, we are encouraged to use the
GridView in the WYSIWYG. My team is much more comfortable (after a couple
of years of using the DataGrid) with manual control over these types of
controls. Can we continue to manually wire events, manipulate data input
and binding, and perform similar tasks that we did earlier using the
GridView? Or do we really have to use the WYSIWYG for all of those items?

Personally, I (almost) never use any of the WYSIWYG stuff that you refer to,
much preferring to code everything myself, and that includes all of the
"data" webcontrols in ASP.NET 2. I think that partly stems from having
started web programming in Notepad, combined with the horror of the VS.NET
2003 "design view" and its inability to leave my HTML formatting alone. This
is, actually, fixed in VS.NET 2005, but I still much prefer to code
everything.

User Authentication / System Access

We typically relied on some reusable components (STPs included) and the
web.config User Authentication and User Authorization settings to manage
system access. In looking at some of the new 2.0 Membership components,
I'm not entirely convinced it will improve the speed and/or usability of
our system. Should we continue to rely on our existing method, involving
the web.config settings + our custom items, or is this frowned upon?

I've never had a need to use the Membership / Role stuff thus far. Same with
the new Profile architecture. Some people love it, though, but I can't see
the point myself...

I have to say, we are all a little nervous about moving to 2.0, as we were
getting very comfortable with the 1.1 method of implementation. At the
same time, I understand that support for 1.1 is dying rapidly, so I am
forcing our new projects to use 2.0. Any feedback is greatly appreciated.

You're going to have to do it eventually - proactive is always better than
reactive...

 

[Chris S]

Mark-

Thanks so much for the responses. I feel a bit more comfortable with the
new version just knowing we can rely on some of our tried and true methods.
At the same time, I'm going to try taking advantage of some of the newer
items, and will take a long look at MasterPages to see if its something we
can deploy and retain a lot of our existing code.

The biggest thing, however, is that it sounds like WAP is pretty commonly
used- I think our team will be happy to use it.

Best,
Chris

 

[Mark Rae]

Thanks so much for the responses. I feel a bit more comfortable with the
new version just knowing we can rely on some of our tried and true
methods.

No worries, but let me ask you a question: why are you not still using ASP
Classic? Or even Windows 3.1?

At the same time, I'm going to try taking advantage of some of the newer
items, and will take a long look at MasterPages to see if its something we
can deploy and retain a lot of our existing code.

Once you have written your first MasterPage / content page combination, you
really will wonder how you mnanaged without it...

The biggest thing, however, is that it sounds like WAP is pretty commonly
used- I think our team will be happy to use it.

Definitely!