ASP.Net 2.0 Web Parts in Action: Building Dynamic Web Portals

Description

"A must for every ASP.NET developer using Web Parts."
-- Scott Guthrie, General Manager, Microsoft Developer Division

"Squeezes the full potential out of ASP.NET Web Parts."
-- Andres Sanabria, from the Foreword

"Great book, great author, great style, there's nothing even close."
-- Paul Wilson, ASP.NET MVP and ASPInsider

"Impressive detail. Well done!"
-- Joe Litton, Microsoft Certified Professional

"Brisk and to the point."
-- Stuart Caborn, ThoughtWorks

The static Web is going out of style. Its click-and-wait user experience is giving way to dynamic personalized content and intuitive interactions. With ASP 2.0, a web developer can compose a page out of separate working parts "Web Parts" that independently communicate with the server to produce rich interactive portals like Yahoo!, Google/ig, and Live.com. The new Web Parts API makes it easy to centrally manage a portal's parts.

ASP.NET 2.0 Web Parts in Action is packed with annotated code, diagrams, and crystal-clear discussions. You'll develop a sample project from design to deployment, adding content zones, personalization, and a custom look-and-feel. Since any website is invariably a work-in-progress, you'll appreciate learning how to upgrade your portals on the fly. Along the way you'll pick up handy code instrumentation techniques and a few tricks to help your portals manage themselves. As an added bonus, the book introduces the Microsoft Ajax Library ("Atlas") and shows how you can add Ajax to a web part. You'll even create a Live.com gadget.

This book is for web developers familiar with ASP.NET.

 

Table of Contents

Foreword
Preface
Acknowledgments
About this book
About the title
About the cover illustration

Part 1 Portals and web parts

1 Introducing portals and web parts

1.1 Introduction

1.2 What is a portal?

1.3 Using the ASP.NET 2.0 portal framework

1.4 Introducing Adventure Works Cycles database

1.5 Summary

2 Web parts: the building blocks of portals

2.1 Introduction

2.2 Exploring web parts

2.3 Understanding the WebPart class

2.4 Understanding web part internals

2.5 Applying themes and styles

2.6 Adding web parts to the Adventure Works Solution

2.7 Summary

3 Using web part connections

3.1 Dissecting connections

3.2 Creating simple connections

3.3 Sorting out connection types

3.4 Using transformers

3.5 Adventure Worksimplementing connections for HR

3.6 Summary

4 The Web Part Manager

4.1 Introduction

4.2 The Page Lifecycle

4.3 Page display modes

4.4 Web part authorization

4.5 Importing and exporting web parts

4.6 Using WebPartManager with master pages

4.7 Adventure Worksadditions to the HR code

4.8 Summary

5 Working with zones

5.1 Introduction

5.2 Classifying zones

5.3 Custom rendering of zones

5.4 Using WebPartChrome

5.5 Explaining parts

5.6 Zone additions to the Adventure Works Portal

5.7 Summary

6 Understanding personalization

6.1 Introduction

6.2 Defining personalization

6.3 Personalization in action

6.4 Lifecycle of personalization data

6.5 Working with personalization data

6.6 Personalization of the Adventure Works portal

6.7 Summary

Part 2 Extending the portal framework

7 Creating an enhanced editing experience

7.1 Introduction

7.2 Supplying custom editing controls

7.3 Improving usability

7.4 Summary

8 Useful portal customizations

8.1 Introduction

8.2 Making common tasks accessible

8.3 Versioned personalization data

8.4 Creating an area for tool zones

8.5 Adding a CatalogZone dialog

8.6 Summary

9 Portal management

9.1 Introduction

9.2 Preparing for deployment

9.3 Recovering from errors gracefully

9.4 When all else fails

9.5 Summary

10 Into the future

10.1 Introduction

10.2 Reflecting on the portal

10.3 A world of web portals

10.4 Ajax behavior

10.5 Introducing Live.coma modern mega-portal

10.6 Call to action
 
appendix Creating the Adventure Works project
index