What is ASP.Net?

ASP.NET is frameworks that allow us to developed or build web pages and web sites with HTML, CSS, and other scripting language such as JavaScript, VB Script. It is a server side technology. It accepts all .NET compatible languages. This article explains the introduction to ASP.NET Frameworks, basic overview of ASP.NET.

• What is ASP.NET?
• History of ASP.NET
• Features of ASP.NET
• History of ASP.NET Versions
• Development Models in ASP.NET
• ASP.NET Development Tools
• ASP.NET File Extensions
• Extension Frameworks of ASP.NET

What is ASP.NET?
ASP.NET is a Framework that provides a unified Web development model that includes the necessary services for developers to build enterprise level Web applications with minimum coding.
It is a part of the .NET Framework. It is a server side technology. In ASP.NET we can write codes in any language compatible with .NET Framework (C#, Visual Basic .NET, Jscript, J#). The entire .NET Framework is available to any ASP.NET application which includes common language runtime, inheritance, type safety, and so on.

History of ASP.NET
After four years of development and some beta versions, the first stable version of ASP.NET 1.0 was released on 2002 as a part of .NET Framework version 1.0 by Microsoft Corporation. After that Microsoft promoted it heavily and some books had been written about ASP.NET.

Features of ASP.NET
By using ASP.NET, one gets lot of advantages. The common features of ASP.NET is given bellow:

• ASP.NET offers to create web pages which are completely object oriented
• It provides lot of built-in controls that offer graphical development
• ASP.NET codes are compiled which enables performance optimizations, strong typing, early binding, and others benefits
• ASP.NET provides debugging infrastructure that offer to debug both managed and unmanaged codes, all languages supported by the CLR (Common Language Runtime) and script languages
• ASP.NET provides an advanced security infrastructure for authenticating and authorizing
• ASP.NET provides state management facilities that enable us to store information
• ASP.NET provides features to monitor health and performance of the application
• ASP.NET provides and extensible hosting environment that controls the life cycle of an application
• ASP.NET supports XML Web services

History of ASP.NET Versions
To work with modern world and full fill the requirements of developer and user Microsoft has released some versions of ASP.NET Frameworks. Each versions has has new feature & control. The list of ASP.NET Frameworks with their some remarkable features are given bellow:

ASP.NET 1.0
In 16th January,2002 the version of ASP.NET 1.0 was released. This was the first versions of ASP.NET. It was introduced with .NET Framework 1.0 and Visual Studio .NET. The core features are given bellow:

• Support for Object Oriented Programming (OOP)
• Offers the use of DLL

ASP.NET 1.1
In 24th April,2003 the version of ASP.NET 1.1 was released. This was the second versions of ASP.NET. It was introduced with .NET Framework 1.1 and Visual Studio .NET 2003 and Windows Server 2003. The core features are given bellow:

• ASP.NET Mobile controls
• Built-in support for ODBC and databases
• Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) support

ASP.NET 2.0
In 7nth November,2005 the version of ASP.NET 2.0 was released. It was introduced with .NET Framework 2.0 and Visual Studio 2005. The core features are given bellow:

• New Data controls GridView, FormView and DetailsView
• DataSource controls SQLDataSource, Object DataSource, AccessDataSource, XMLDataSource and SiteMapDataSource
• Navigation controls
• Master pages
• Cross Page Postbacks
• Validation Groups
• Themes
• Skins
• Login controls
• Role Management
• Profiles
• Membership Service
• Localization and Globalization

ASP.NET 3.0
In 21st November,2006 the version of ASP.NET 3.0 was released. It was introduced with .NET Framework 3.0 and Visual Studio 2005. The core features are given bellow:

• Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF)
• Windows Communications Foundation (WCF)
• Windows Workflow Foundation (WF), and CardSpace
• ASP.NET Ajax
• LINQ

ASP.NET 3.5
In 19nth November,2007 the version of ASP.NET 3.5 was released. It was introduced with .NET Framework 3.5 and Visual Studio 2008. The core features are given bellow:

• Integrated ASP.NET AJAX
• Support LINQ
• New Data controls LINQ DataSource, ListView and DataPager
• Dynamic Data
• Multi-targeting Framework Support
• Nested master pages
• Javascript debugging

ASP.NET 4.0
In 12th April,2010 the version of ASP.NET 4.0 was released. It was introduced with .NET Framework 4.0 and Visual Studio 2010. The core features are given bellow:

• Introduced ClientIdMode property for Server Control
• Routing
• Introduced Meta tags MetaKeyword and MetaDescription
• Chart Control
• Silverlight

ASP.NET 4.5
In 15th August, 2012 the version of ASP.NET 4.5 was released. It was introduced with .NET Framework 4.5 and Visual Studio 2012. The core features are given bellow:

• Strongly Typed Data Controls
• Model Binding
• Unobtrusive Validation
• Bundling and Minification
• Async Support
• Support for asynchronous modules and handlers
• Friendly URL
• HTML5 Features enhancements
• Support for WebSocket protocol
• oAuth Support

ASP.NET Version 4.5.1
In 17th October,2013 the version of ASP.NET 4.5.1 was released. It was introduced with .NET Framework 4.5.1 and Visual Studio 2013. The core features are given bellow:

• One ASP.NET
• ASP.NET Scaffolding
• ASP.NET Identity

Development Models in ASP.NET
With ASP.NET and others related technology (HTML, CSS, JavaScript, etc) we can develop rich web based applications or web sites. For any successful development we need to follow some development strategy. In order to make our development easy ASP.NET offers three development models. We can follow any of them according to our requirements. The names of development models are given bellow:

1. Web Pages
   It is the simplest single page model which is similar to classic ASP and PHP. It has no state management techniques.
2. MVC (Model View Controller)
   It is MVC (Model, View, and Controller) pattern based development model. It separates any web applications into 3 different components (Models for data, Views for user interface, Controllers for input). It is very light weight. It has no state management techniques. It is the best development standard.
3. Web Forms
   It is the oldest and traditional event driven development model. It has no state management techniques.

ASP.NET Development Tools
ASP.NET supports some development tools that offer graphical development facility:

• WebMatrix
• Visual Web Developer
• Visual Studio

ASP.NET File Extensions
The application developed in ASP.NET contains some files with different file name extensions. The most common extensions are given bellow:

• .asp -classic ASP files
• .aspx –ASP.NET files
• .ascx- user control
• .master –master page
• .config – web site configuration file
• .asmx – web service
• .sitemap – site map
• .cshtml Razor C# file
• .vbhtml Razor VB file

Extension Frameworks of ASP.NET
Day by day Microsoft has released some frameworks that extend the existing functionality of ASP.NET. These frameworks can easily plug into ASP.NET and provides better options that reduce the development time. Some of them are given bellow:

• ASP.NET AJAX
•  ASP.NET MVC
• ASP.NET Razor view engine
•  ASP.NET Dynamic Data
• ASP.NET Web API
• ASP.NET SignalR

ASP.NET is an evolution of Microsoft’s Active Server Page (ASP) technology. Using ASP.NET, we can easily developed highly advanced web sites, web applications based on the .NET framework.