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Heavily Data-Driven Classic ASP Websites - Should You Still Upgrade?
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Nearing my 11th year of doing Internet development for small businesses, I still have clients from a
decade ago that are running heavily data-driven Classic ASP systems. They are not
alone as many other small businesses are still using Classic ASP as well. It is
not like small businesses have loads of reserve cash for constant programming.
While developers can point out the advantages to .NET solutions, small businesses are usually
reluctant to forego the expense of updating old Classic ASP apps to .NET, which is completely understandable...... to a point.
Should your small business upgrade its existing Classic ASP Website to .NET? Lets analyze.
Microsoft Only
As you have probably figured out by now, I am talking about Microsoft based applications in this article.
The reasoning is simple - popular scripting languages such as PHP really do not
do anything differently than they did years ago. It is still the same old
processes that will never gain enhancement due to their scripted, un-managed,
un-compiled coding nature. There is virtually little upgrading that can be done.
Those using out-dated Microsoft based Websites, especially Websites that are still in
Classic ASP,
can gain significant benefits from upgrading their applications to the latest features
that Microsoft offers in the .NET Framework. Database reporting and interaction has
come a long way in recent years. .NET applications built in Visual Studio 2008 combined
with SQL Server 2005 allow you to perform complex data operations in much easier ways.
The Visual Studio Environment
Visual Studio is the coding environment of choice for developers building .NET applications.
With Visual Studio, you can build and manage your application in a true, traditional
software environment.
Built in to the Visual Studio environment are many drag and drop controls for easily
creating slick database features that are easy to navigate. The majority of the coding
is already done for you. All you need to do is pop the control in to the page and
supply a data source for it (i.e. database query). All of the long winded coding for
formatting and paging data is basically included. By simply changing properties of the
control, you can easily alter the look and feel of the report. It is ten times faster
than Classic ASP and it will also execute much faster on the Website.
One more benefit of .NET Visual Studio applications is their code management. You have
probably heard the phrase "Object Oriented Programming" before. Classic ASP was not
an Object Oriented environment. It is impossible to be object oriented with scripting
languages, which Classic ASP was. Having an Object Oriented environment to develop in
allows us to easily re-use code and keep it organized. This makes Website management
much easier and allows you to build faster over the long run.
SQL Server 2005 - Robust Data Operations
In addition to the benefits of .NET coding in the Visual Studio environment,
SQL Server databases have also come a long way in
recent years. SQL Server 2005 has many enhancements for writing more robust
stored procedures. A perfect example is the ability in SQL Server 2005 to take
a set of database records and pre-order them before you pull them. This allows
you to easily order data that may not be in the database in a desirable
last in/first out fashion. Ordering reports by DATE with paged results immediately
comes to mind.
SQL Server 2005 is also heavily integrated with Visual Studio. You do not need
to manage each one separately. In Visual Studio, you can build all your
database queries including stored procedures and easily port them to the elements
of your application where they will be used. Once again, faster development over
the long run.
Brief Overview
The above is a brief overview of the advantages of .NET applications built in Visual Studio
with SQL Server 2005 Databases on the back-end. I could go on forever about the benefits that
.NET has over any of the other Web development technologies of today. But that is not
what this article is about. What you really want to know is
this - should I upgrade my out-dated application to more State of the Art Microsoft
technologies?
To Upgrade or Not to Upgrade?
It is a difficult question to answer because there must be some profound benefit
to doing so. Any out-dated data-driven application modified to the latest .NET
features is going to receive performance and display benefits - without
question. But will those benefits be enough to justify the cost?
The first thing to look at is speed of your application. Does your
Website have database reports that are taking many seconds to load? Are those
reports easy to navigate? Are there any quirks? This is certainly one area
that you may want to consider improving.
Slower means less production from Website administrators. Slow loading pages
tend to annoy front-end users.
Database pages that load slowly may also be the result of multiple elements of the
Web page being data-driven. For example, if you build a Website about your favorite
Rock Band then the home page may have one data-driven section for upcoming tour dates
and another for band news. Not only will .NET speed these pages up but it will also
allow you to build modules of each section that can easily popped in to other pages
of your Website. You may decide that you also
want the tour dates section from the home page to appear on the bands Bio page.
Simply add one line of code and the same feature that appears on the home page
will now appear on the Bio page.
How complex is your Website? Does it contain many drop down lists, checkboxes,
radio buttons, etc... to help you navigate through data? Many of these data
management options could probably be removed in exchange for a cleaner interface
that contains built-in sorting and
data editing capabilities that the .NET data controls offer. By simply adding a control to
a Web page and setting a few properties, you can have a report that sorts data
and allows you to edit the data in a much more efficient way without having to
constantly re-build the entire page.
Upgrade Moving Forward
Those benefits may not be enough to justify overhauling your existing application
in it's entirety. However,
you do not need to upgrade the entire Website to .NET. You can run Classic ASP,
applications built with older versions of .NET, and modern day .NET on the same
Website. What your best strategy might be is to identify those features that are
not up to par and upgrade them only. Then, from that point forward, build everything
with the most current technologies.
This brings me to another point I would like to make. I often find clients with Classic ASP
Websites that want to add new features. Often times, the new
features are similar to ones that exist. Thus, they want to copy old code and use it
to create new features because it is faster (i.e. less expensive) in the short-term.
I would not recommend this. I would spend the extra couple of
hours of time it is going to take in favor of a more robust, managed solution. In the
long run, it is going to mean getting development done faster.
The first time you upgrade a feature there is going to be a small amount of additional time involved
to get the .NET framework in place. It is not hard but it is a managed solution. In order
to properly manage code in the Visual Studio environment, you need to get the foundation
in place. But once it's done, it is done. From that point forward, you can roll out
production faster than ever.
Closing
Regardless of whether you upgrade your existing Website in entirety to the latest
of what .NET has to offer, you should at least be building new features with the
latest release. It just does not make any sense not to.
This is especially true if you are still on a Classic ASP system. You should also
consider upgrading your more complex data features to .NET to take advantage of faster
reporting, enhanced report viewing, and better navigation. Keep in mind
that components of these pages can easily be re-used in other parts of the application.
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