Active Server Pages ASP.Net

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Active Server PagesASP.Net

• Jim Fawcett
• CSE686 Internet Programming
• Summer 2005

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Important Note!

• You cant run Asp.Net applications those with
  .aspx extensions from the current college
  server. It does not have .Net installed.
• I will be running .Net applications from a new
  server that does have .Net installed and will
  become the college server sometime soon.
• You can run all the applications from the lecture
  5 web page, as that links to the new server.

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Moving Your Projects

• Visual Studio, by default, will build Asp.Net
  applications in two files
• Web site files are placed in a folder with the
  project name under C\inetpub\wwwroot.
• Your solution and project files go in a folder
  with the project name underC\Documents and
  Settings\YourAccountName\My Documents\Visual
  Studio Projects\
• You can move the website folder into any parent
  directory you wish as long as you do two things
• Make the new directory virtual and enable
  annonamous access
• Edit the WebApplication.csproj.webinfo to provide
  the correct url.
• Make sure the Application name shows in the
  virtual directory properties on the Virtual
  Directory tab. You may have to hit Remove and
  Add.

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Changing Project Virtual Directories
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Server-Side Programs

• You can run any .Net executable that resides in a
  virtual directory simply by requesting it from a
  browser
• http//localhost/http//localhost/AspApps/PickCour
  se/PickForm.aspx
• Provided that directory permissions allow this.
• On Windows platforms most server-side processing
  takes the form of Active Server Page (ASP)
  applications or ASP.Net applications.
• Note that the examples Ive placed on the college
  server will not run from there, as that server
  does not have .Net installed.
• To run the examples, just FTP the code folder to
  any directory on your local machine, in Windows
  Explorer right click on the folder, select
  properties, and select web sharing.
• Now you can open, for example, drives.aspx with
  the browser URLhttp//localhost/lecture5/drives.
  aspx

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Traditional ASP

• Traditional (pre .Net) ASP provides interpreted
  application scripts running in the memory space
  of the IIS web server.
• A traditional ASP page consists of a mix of HTML,
  sent directly to the requesting browser and
  Javascript or Vbscript executed on the server,
  usually to generate html for display or interact
  with a backend database.
• Traditional ASP uses a set of standard server
  side COM objects and can use custom COM objects
  as well.
• Deploying custom COM objects to remote servers
  has been a major problem.

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Server-Side Objects

• Traditional ASP provides seven objects used for
  server-side programming
• Application
• starts when IIS starts and runs until IIS shuts
  down
• ASPError
• ASPError object is returned by Server.GetLastError
  (), and has the propertiesSource, Category,
  File, Line, Description, ASPDescription
• ObjectContext
• Access to COM objects
• Request
• Provides methodsForm(), QueryString(),
  Cookies(), ServerVariables()
• Response
• Provides methodsWrite(), Clear(), End(),
  Flush(), Redirect(), Buffer, Expires,
  IsClientConnected(), PICS()
• Server
• Provides methods Execute(), Transfer(),
  MapPath(), URLEncode(), HTMLEncode(),
  GetLastError()
• Session
• starts when a user requests first page and ends
  with a timeout

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ASP .Net

• ASP.Net supports the traditional style, but adds
  processing power of compiled C and a pervasive
  object model.
• We can create user-defined classes in C and use
  them on ASP pages. Any .Net language can be used
  this way.
• Web controls are based on CLR objects. Control
  state is sent back and forth between client and
  server.
• An ASP.Net page can easily be turned into a
  server control that can be used on any other ASP
  page.
• ../lectures/cse686codeL5.htm

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ASP Environment
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ASP Page Contents

• An ASP page can contain
• Instructions for the server
• HTML content, intended for the client
• Code in C, VB, Jscript.Net. The Code will
• generate HTML for client
• get or send data to a database on this or a
  remote server
• interact in some way with the servers file
  system
• Traditional script, e.g. Javascript or Vbscript
• Embedded ASP.Net server controls
• Means to collect information from, and present
  information to, client
• Control state is preserved in transactions
  between client and server
• Traditional HTML controls
• Also manages information between client and
  server. Preserving state requires more work on
  programmers part.

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ASP Applications

• You can build an ASP application using notepad to
  create an aspx page, a C code page, and a
  web.config file.
• c\su\cse686\code\AspApps\BasicAsp
• http//localhost/AspApps/BasicAsp/PickAgain.aspx
• Most often, you will build ASP solutions using
  Visual Studio.net.

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ASP.Net Application Files

• An ASP Application generated by the Visual
  Studio.Net application wizard consists of
• A solution in the local directory you chose for
  building the app
• A set of files in a virtual directory on your
  development machine. When the application is
  complete you will simply copy these files to the
  web server you want to use to deploy the
  application.
• c\su\cse686\code\aspapps\pickCourse
• http//localhost/AspApps/PickCourse/PickForm.aspx

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ASP Application Files (continued)

• WebForm1.aspx
• An ASP page providing the user interface for the
  application
• WebForm1.aspx.cs
• A C WebForm, with structure somewhat like a
  WinForm
• Web.config
• Allows you to set debug tracing and other session
  related properties
• AssemblyInfo.cs
• Holds assembly deployment information

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Server Controls

• ASP.Net provides a number of Web controls based
  on HTML elements and HTML controls.
• Label, Button, TextBox, DropDownList, ListBox,
  Image, CheckBox, RadioButton, RadioButtonList,
  Calendar, Table, Panel, DataList, DataGrid,
• These controls have state which is marshalled
  between client and server in a hidden ViewState
  variable.
• Events, like button clicks, that happen on the
  client side, are marshalled back to the server to
  trigger event handlers in C, processed on the
  server.

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Design View
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ASPX Code View
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C Code View
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Lets Build an Application

• Create an ASP.Net Application, using C
• Right click on form and set its layout property
  to flow layout.
• Pull a TextBox, Button, and Label onto the form.
• Switch to HTML view and put a couple of ltbrgt tags
  between each of these controls.
• Double click on the form to generate a Page_Load
  event handler and we will put some code there.
• Double click on the button and well also put
  some code there.
• Run the application.

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References

• Programming Microsoft .Net, Jef Prosise,
  Microsoft Press, 2002
• ASP.NET Unleashed, Second Edition, Stephen
  Walther, SAMS, 2004
• ASP.Net, Tips, Tutorials, and Code, Mitchell, et.
  al., SAMS, 2002
• More examples (a lot in Visual Basic.Net, some in
  C) than most of the other books available on
  ASP.
• www.gotdotnet.com has some interesting tutorial
  material on ASP.Net.