What is ASP.NET?

Question

I've been strictly in a C++ environment for years (and specialized statistical languages). Visual Studio until 2001, and Borland since. Mostly specialized desktop applications for clients.

I'm not remaining willfully ignorant of it, but over the years when I've dipped into other things, I've spent my time playing around with JavaScript, PHP, and a lot of Python.

Is "ASP.NET" the language? Is C# the language and "ASP.NET" the framework? What's a good answer to "What is ASP.NET"? Is there a correspondence between ASP.NET and anything I'd be familiar with in C++?

I know I can google the same title, but I'd rather see answers from this crowd. (Besides, in the future, I think that Google should point here for questions like that.)

Piggery

Answer 1

ASP.NET is a web application framework developed and marketed by Microsoft, that programmers can use to build dynamic web sites, web applications and web services. It was first released in January 2002 with version 1.0 of the .NET Framework, and is the successor to Microsoft's Active Server Pages (ASP) technology. ASP.NET is built on the Common Language Runtime (CLR), allowing programmers to write ASP.NET code using any supported .NET language.

ASP.NET (Wikipedia)

That's on the second result searching on Google so I'm guessing (half-expecting) that you don't understand what that means either.

Webpage development started with simple static HTML pages. That meant the client asked for a page by means of an URL and the server sent the page back to him/her exactly as it has been designed. Sometime after that several technologies emerged in order to provide a more "dynamic" or personalized experience.

Several "server side languages" were developed (PHP, Perl, ASP...) which allowed the server to process the Web page before sending it back to the client. This way when a client requested a webpage the server could interpret the request, process it (for example connecting to a database and fetching some results) and send it back modifying the contents and making them "dynamic". The fact that the process took place on the server stands for the name of "server side".

So the original ASP (predecessor of the ASP.NET) was a server side language that was focused on serving web pages. In such way it supported several shortcuts such as the possibility to intercalate HTML and ASP source into the file which was on that time much popular due to PHP implementation. It was also (as most of these languages) a dynamic language and it was interpreted.

ASP.NET is an evolution of that original ASP with some improvements. First it does truly (try to) separate the presentation (HTML) from the code (.cs) which may be implemented by using Visual Basic or C# syntax. It also incorporate some sort of compilation to the final ASP pages, encapsulating them into assemblies and thus improving performance. Finally it has access to the full .NET framework which supports a wide number of helper classes.

So, summing up, it is a programming language located on the server and designed to make webpages.

Inhabitancy

Your "summing it up" is wrong though. ASP.Net is NOT the programming language. C# or VB.Net are the programming language, ASP.Net is the framework that translates them into code for web pages. – Reciprocity

Answer 2

I was going to write a lengthy answer but I felt that Wikipedia had it covered:

ASP.NET is a web application framework developed and marketed by Microsoft, that programmers can use to build dynamic web sites, web applications and web services. It was first released in January 2002 with version 1.0 of the .NET Framework, and is the successor to Microsoft's Active Server Pages (ASP) technology. ASP.NET is built on the Common Language Runtime (CLR), allowing programmers to write ASP.NET code using any supported .NET language.

So ASP.NET is Microsoft's web development framework and the latest version is 4.0.

How do I get started? Check out the following resources:

• Learn ASP.NET
• ASP.NET Documentation
• ASP.NET Developer Center

Bo

Answer 3

ASP.NET is the framework, just like .NET

The code itself, will be a mix of HTML, JavaScript(for Client-Side) and any .NET compatible language. So C#, VB.NET, C++.NET, heck...even IronPython

Indecency

Answer 4

ASP.NET is a framework, it delivers:

1. A class hierachy you hook into, that allows both usage of supplied components, as well as development of your own.
2. Integration with and easy access to the underlying webserver.
3. An event model, which is probably the "best" thing about it.
4. A general abstraction from the underlying medium of HTML and HTTP.

Not sure if ASP.NET compares to any C++ frameworks you may be familiar with. Web frameworks usually tend to be unique due to the statelessness of HTTP and the relatively low-tech technologies involved (HTML, scripting, etc).

Lauren

Answer 5

Let's say it's a technique from MS to build web applications. ASP stands for Active Server Pages, .NET is the framework behind it.

C# and VB.NET are the languages which can be used, but I guess other .NET languages also can be used.

Exarate

Answer 6

Take a look at MS' info for those who don't know or understand the platform.

http://www.asp.net/get-started

Anaximander