Visual Studio whidbey--web Application Development new feature preview

Visual|web| Program Summary: This article describes some of the new features in Microsoft Visual Studio, code-named "Whidbey", that can speed up and facilitate data-driven Web application development. These new features include better HTML source Editor, better IntelliSense, improved data access support, and full support for XHTML standards.

Content:
• Better HTML source code Editor
• Better visual designers
• Better Web project management
• Better data access support
• Better standard support
• Summary

The Microsoft®visual studio®, the upcoming product code-named "Whidbey", is the best tool for developing data-driven Web applications. The Whidbey development environment is suitable for current and next-generation asp.net development, providing many powerful new features for Web application developers.

Whidbey uses a new Web configuration file to display menu and window layouts that best fit the development of Web applications to meet the specific needs of developers. The Whidbey development environment includes an improved HTML source editor, a visual page designer, and a new project system to support data access and fully support XHTML standards. Together, these features make data-driven Web applications more quickly developed than ever before.

Next, let's introduce some new features in Whidbey that can speed up Web application development.

Better HTML source code Editor
Whidbey version of Visual Studio. NET comes with an improved HTML source editor that enables developers to quickly write and modify pages. The source editor provides new features such as microsoft®intellisense®, tag navigation, and validation.

Intelligent Sensing (IntelliSense) features are available everywhere
IntelliSense is a technique that displays pop-up code hints as you type, significantly improving developer productivity. Although now visual Studio. NET has very good support for IntelliSense, but Whidbey's support for IntelliSense will be even better.

In Whidbey, IntelliSense pops up everywhere. For example, IntelliSense can be used entirely within a single file asp.net page script block. In addition, Whidbey provides IntelliSense support for ASP.net page indicators and inline (inline) CSS style properties.

Whidbey also provides IntelliSense support for all configuration sections (section) within the Web.config configuration file and for generic XML files that contain DTDs or XSD.




HTML source code remains
Whidbey does not change the developer's HTML markup. The formatting of HTML tags, including all white space, capitalization, indentation, carriage returns, and wrapping, can now be kept as it was written, even when switching back and forth between page Design view and source code view.

HTML formatting options
Whidbey enables developers to accurately control the format of HTML tags and asp.net server control tags that are generated by WYSIWYG (WYSIWYG) designers. The case, attribute reference, indentation style, and auto wrap attributes for each HTML tag or server control tag on the page are now configurable. These formatting options can be set to the default format for all tags, and you can optionally overwrite the formatting options for each tag and control, providing flexibility to fully control the markup format.

HTML formatting can be imported and exported from Whidbey to ensure that the markup style is standardized for team development. It is easy for developers to apply HTML formatting rules to existing tags to handle the need to update existing HTML source files with new formatting rules.



Tag navigator (tag Navigator)
The Whidbey tender tml source code Editor features a new tag navigator that enables developers to easily navigate and navigate through complex HTML documents. Tag Navigator displays a "path" within the page's source file by displaying a list of tags that contain the current cursor's mark, clicking on the node to randomly select the hierarchy of code and moving up and down within the HTML hierarchy.

For example, suppose you are editing an HTML page source file that contains multiple layers of nested tables. Nested tables are difficult to edit because they are easily lost in mixed rows and cells. This can be avoided by using the tag navigator because it always shows the current path to the hierarchy in which the table element resides.
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Tag outline (tag outlining)
Markup outlines make it possible to work with large HTML documents more efficiently. You can hide the contents of the tag by right-clicking the HTML tag in the source editor and choosing Collapse tag. Collapsing the HTML source code for different areas of the page allows developers to focus on specific areas that need to be edited.




Flexible browser designation and validation
When in Whidbey, it is easy to specify a dedicated validation standard or browser for an HTML page. Developers can specify that HTML pages be accessed by some kind of browser, such as Netscape®navigator 4.0 or Microsoft®internet Explorer 6.0, or specify a validation standard, such as XHTML 1.0 Strict or XHTML 1.0 Transitional.

When you type the code, the source editor checks the HTML source code in real time. The invalid source code automatically adds a red wavy underline and describes the cause of the invalidation with a ToolTip (tooltip). Validation errors are also displayed in real time in the Task List window.

In Whidbey, all browsers and standard validation rules are pluggable, and developers are easy to extend and customize. The Whidbey preset has many automated validation targets, including built-in validation support for XHTML standards, XHTML Transitional standards, and all major desktop and mobile browsers.


Code refactoring
Code refactoring makes it easy and systematic to modify code. In Whidbey, code refactoring is supported in areas where code can be written, including code-behind (Code-behind) and single file asp.net pages.

Smart Task (Intellitask)
Microsoft®intellitask is like a super smart code-processing clipboard that developers can use to easily apply standard code snippets anywhere in the source editor to improve development efficiency. By simply right-clicking, you can inject common code into the page. The Whidbey preset has more than 200 Web applications developing dedicated Intellitask code snippets. Better yet, developers can add their own code templates to Intellitask to quickly modify the code in the future.

A better visual designer
Whidbey has an improved visual designer that makes it easy to build asp.net Web applications. With this new designer tool, developers can build rich data-driven Web applications without even having to write a single line of code.

asp.net Master page designer
Use master page to create a common look for asp.net Web application pages. Developers can use master page to create a single-page layout and then apply it to multiple content Page pages. For example, you can use the master page to ensure that each page contains the same standard headers, footers, and navigation bars.

Whidbey fully supports the WYSWIYG authoring of ASP.net Master page. When master page is created, it can be applied to a new ASP.net page within a Web site. Whidbey also supports authoring ASP.net pages based on master page, where designers can view the combined appearance of the page and copy everything from master page that cannot be edited on the content page.


Quick Task (Smart tasks)
With the smart Tasks feature, developers can perform many of the most common design tasks directly from the designer interface.

A common task List pops up automatically when the new control is dragged and dropped into the designer. Use common task lists to quickly configure control properties and perform some common operations. For example, when you add a GridView control to a page, you can quickly sort, page, or edit the GridView by using a common task list, and you can quickly associate a validation control with a common task list when you add a TextBox control to a page.

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Improved asp.net template editing
Whidbey provides improved template editing capabilities. These new features can be leveraged when working with data controls, such as DataList and GridView controls.

When you add a control to a template, you can easily specify that a data-binding expression is associated with a control property. For example, if you drag and drop a TextBox control to a template, you can bind its Text property to a specific field in the data source of your control. The Edit DataBindings dialog box provided by the template Editing designer makes it easy to bind specific fields by field name.



Improved table editing
Whidbey has good HTML table editing capabilities. With the Improved Insert Table dialog box, you can quickly control the appearance of the newly inserted table. In addition, you can graphically resize tables and the size of each row and column in the designer.




Mobile device Support
Asp. NET controls can display different content for different devices. For example, a calendar control differs in a WAP browser from what it displays in an HTML browser. This ability is called adaptive display (Adaptive Rendering).

Whidbey fully supports adaptive display, and its built-in WYSIWYG designer supports the arbitrary overwriting of device properties, templates, and tags on the page. This allows developers to better optimize the browser experience of different users.

A better Web project system
Whidbey provides more flexibility and functionality for developers to manage files in Web projects. The new Web project system has new tools for easy access, compilation, and publishing of Web applications.

File system support
Whidbey allows developers to choose to create new Web applications within any folder. When you create a file system project, you do not need to have microsoft®internet information Services (IIS) or Microsoft®front page®server Extensions (FPSE) installed on the machine. By simply specifying a folder, you can start creating a Web page.




Whidbey with a built-in ASP.net Web server, developers can develop and debug Web applications on computers that do not have IIS installed, and do not require administrator access.

The built-in Web server further provides developers with a more secure way to build Web applications on the development machine, because the Web server cannot be accessed remotely (only by a local web browser), and it shuts down automatically when exiting the Whidbey development environment.

Local IIS Support (no FPSE required)
In addition to supporting file system projects, Whidbey now makes it easier for developers to manage IIS projects. When you create a new IIS project, the developer can view all the WEB sites and applications that are configured on the machine, and even create a new IIS Web application or virtual directory directly from the "New Web Site" dialog box.

Local development of IIS Web applications no longer requires FPSE. You can create and fully manage Web sites without having to install or configure FPSE.



FTP Support
Whidbey built-in supports the use of standard File Transfer Protocol (FTP) to edit and update remote Web projects. Developers can use FTP to quickly connect to a remote Web site in the New Web site and Open Web Site dialog boxes.



Better Web Publishing
Publishing a Web site to a remote server is easier than ever. Using the Whidbey built-in Publishing feature, it is easy to keep files in your local project synchronized with files on a remote Web server. Whidbey supports automatic logging of all replicated files, enabling developers to quickly identify whether the recently copied files have been updated.




precompiling asp.net web sites
The Whidbey built-in IDE supports precompiling asp.net Whidbey applications. With precompilation, you can automatically check and compile all the code in the site, including code-behind, inline code, and business classes, and publish an output directory containing only the compiled dynamic connection libraries and the application's Web.config files, all HTML tags and. aspx files are removed. In addition, in order to better protect intellectual property, you can choose to clutter the resulting code during precompilation.

The precompilation feature allows developers to easily build and resell asp.net Web applications without having to come with source code. Precompilation can also improve site performance and startup time.

Better data access support
Whidbey makes it easier to access data in Web applications.

Drag-and-drop (drag-and-drop) data access
By dragging and dropping data controls onto a page, developers can easily create data-driven Web pages. With the new asp.net Whidbey data source control, you can easily connect to the database, retrieve and update database records without writing any code (or letting Visual Studio write all the code).

For example, suppose you want to display all the records for the MICROSOFT®SQL Server database table products on a Web page by simply dragging two controls to the page: a SqlDataSource Control and a GridView control. By setting some of their properties, you can implement automatic retrieval and record display on a Web page.





Data access Layer (database access Layer) Designer
Whidbey provides a built-in data access Layer designer that enables the creation and maintenance of a data access layer within a Web application. The data designer enables developers to model database tables and stored procedures into components that encapsulate the Ado.net data access logic process. These data components make it easy to access and update data from Web pages and Business layer objects (business objects).

Powerful object data binding capabilities
Whidbey enables developers to quickly create 3-tier applications with a clear presentation layer, a business layer, and a data-tier structure. With the new ASP.net ObjectDataSource control, you can declare that data controls (such as GridView, DataList, and DropDownList) are bound to a business layer or data-tier control, rather than directly to a database. In order to implement clean functional encapsulation and abstraction in the application, the presentation layer does not need to write any data access code.

The Whidbey development environment automatically guides developers through the process of binding data controls to business-level objects (Business object), prompting developers to select specific methods from business-level objects to select, Insert, UPDATE, and delete data, and developers do not need to write code.

Connection string Management
Using the connection string management feature in Whidbey, you can avoid writing hard-coded (hard-coding) database connection strings in asp.net pages. The Data Connection dialog box and wizards allow developers to choose to store database connection strings in the application's Web.config file.

Storing the database connection string in Web.config makes the connection string easier to manage and more secure. If you want to change the database password, just change one place. The ASP.net Whidbey MMC Administration tool automatically provides an Easy-to-use interface for administrators to modify connection strings. In addition, the tool can also be used for connection string encryption on the production server.

Better standard Support
Using Whidbey, it is easy to create Web applications that meet industry standards and government standards. The Whidbey development environment contains new tools that support both the standard of the world and government standards, such as XHTML standards and accessibility standards.

Designer conforming to XHTML standards
All HTML code generated by Whidbey conforms to XHTML standards. For example, all of the formatting options provided by the sidebar produce HTML code that conforms fully to the XHTML standard. All tags generated by the designer are in the standard format of XHTML (well-formed) and in the correct case.

In addition to XHTML designer support, Whidbey also includes tools to help you write code that conforms to XHTML standards in the source code Editor. When you use the source editor, you can validate the HTML source code according to the XHTML 1.0 Transitional or XHTML 1.0 strict standard. Provides a description of the validation failure if the code is not successfully validated.

Accessibility Checker (accessibility Checker)
Creating Web pages accessible to people with disabilities is a requirement of many government agencies. Now, Whidbey makes it easy for developers to validate and obey accessibility standards.

Developers can use integrated accessibility Checker to quickly identify accessibility issues that arise in applications. Accessibility Checker validates the ASP.net page according to the Section 508 and the Web Content Accessibility Principles (WCAG) standards and automatically prints warnings and error messages to the task list.




Summarize
Microsoft Visual Studio, code-named Whidbey, is the best tool for developing data-driven Web applications. Its improvements in IntelliSense and the Code Editor make Web application development easier and reduce the likelihood of errors occurring. Its better support for data access and mobile devices helps developers create feature-rich Web applications that fit most devices. Its improvements in project systems and deployments also make it easier to publish Web applications than ever before.


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