Introduction to ASP.NET MVC Chapter 1 ASP.NET MVC Development

Introduction to ASP.NET MVC Contents Introduction to ASP.NET MVC The case for ASP.NET MVC Tooling up 2

Introduction to ASP.NET MVC 1. The Case for ASP.NET MVC Introduction to ASP.NET MVC What is ASP.NET MVC? ASP.NET Web Forms – issues Web development – state of play ASP.NET MVC architecture ASP.NET MVC benefits ASP.NET Web Forms or MVC? 3

Introduction to ASP.NET MVC What is ASP.NET MVC? Introduction to ASP.NET MVC ASP.NET MVC is a web development platform from Microsoft A significant evolution for web developers using the Microsoft platform ASP.NET MVC emphasises the best of the ASP.NET platform and agile development: Clean architecture Design patterns Testability 4

ASP.NET Web Forms – Issues Introduction to ASP.NET MVC Traditional ASP.NET Web Forms were a great step forward when they first emerged Much better than classic Active Server Pages (ASP) Simple, especially for relatively small applications However, there are some significant issues with ASP.NET Web Forms ViewState transmission can be onerous The ASP.NET page life cycle is complicated and subtle The ASP.NET code-behind model encourages developers to mix presentation logic and application logic Web Forms attempt to encapsulate the intricacies of HTML and HTTP, but this can sometimes be an obstacle It's difficult to automate unit testing for ASP.NET Web Forms 5

Web Development – State of Play Introduction to ASP.NET MVC Key features of Web development today: Ajax Web standards REST (Representational State Transfer) Agile and test-driven development 6

ASP.NET MVC Architecture Introduction to ASP.NET MVC The controller is probably the most interesting player Processes user input Works with the model to handle the request Manages application logic E.g. navigating a multi-step process, authentication, etc. Prepares the data to be displayed This is known as "view data" in ASP.NET MVC Controller Model HTTP Request View Response HTML View data 7

Introduction to ASP.NET MVC ASP.NET MVC Benefits Introduction to ASP.NET MVC Here are the key benefits of ASP.NET MVC: Model-View-Controller architecture Extensibility (ASP.NET MVC components are pluggable) Reusable and consistent model classes Testability Flexible routing system Tight control over HTML (standards-compliant) Leverages strengths of the ASP.NET platform Simplified JavaScript/Ajax integration 8

Introduction to ASP.NET MVC ASP.NET Web Forms or MVC? Introduction to ASP.NET MVC ASP.NET Web Forms is still appropriate for: Small Web applications MVC would be overkill Simple Intranet-style Web applications Fast networks, so you don't care about ViewState transmission overheads Quick-to-market apps Maybe you don't really care about unit testing or long-term maintenance Web apps where you have a lot of corporate data Where you just want to display the data in data grids Scenarios where the drag-and-drop simplicity of Web Forms outweighs its weaknesses A word about migration… You can mix ASP.NET WebForms and MVC in the same Web app Allows you to migrate WebForms to MVC piecemeal, if you want to 9

Introduction to ASP.NET MVC 2. Tooling Up Introduction to ASP.NET MVC Core development tools MVC4 Downloading and installing MVC 4 10

Core Development Tools Introduction to ASP.NET MVC The following tools include ASP.NET MVC by default: Visual Studio 2010 (any edition) Visual Web Developer 2010 Express (free) The following tools don't include ASP.NET MVC by default (you must download ASP.NET MVC separately from http://www.asp.net/mvc/) Visual Studio 2008 with SP1 (any edition) Visual Web Developer 2008 Express with SP1 (free) 11

Introduction to ASP.NET MVC ASP.NET MVC 4 builds on ASP.NET MVC 1, 2, and 3 Adds features to simplify code and support deeper extensibility Installs side-by-side with ASP.NET MVC 2 Key new features: Expressive views, including the new Razor view engine Internet and Intranet project templates HTML 5 support Extensible scaffolding with MvcScaffold integration Hooks for Dependency Injection and global action filters JavaScript and Ajax improvements Model validation improvements Controller improvements Page caching and data caching 12

Downloading and Installing MVC 4 Introduction to ASP.NET MVC Download available from MVC 4 home page http://www.asp.net/mvc/mvc4 We'll install via installer executable C:\AspNetMvc4\Products\AspNetMVC4ToolsUpdateSetup.exe Effect: Adds new ASP.NET MVC 4 project templates Extends existing APIs, adds new APIs 13

Introduction to ASP.NET MVC Summary Introduction to ASP.NET MVC The case for ASP.NET MVC Tooling up 14