Urine for a Treat (or: ASP.NET MVC)

Urine for a Treat(or: ASP.NET MVC)
Barry Gervin, ObjectSharp
and
Joey deVilla, Microsoft

First came ASP…

…then cameASP.NET…

…and now,ASP.NET MVC

Model-View-Controller

ASP.NET MVC’s MVC
Controller
Handles input
(HTTP requests)
Controller
Request
Model
Does the thinkin’and persistence
View
Response
View
Visually represents
the model

Routing

mysite.com/object/action/parameter

ConventionOverConfiguration

Testability

Master of Your Domain

ASP.NETtyGoodnessBaked Right In

ASP.NET Runtime
ASP.NET MVC

Microsoft.com/web

Web Platform Installer

RunPee.com (Yes, it’s a real site!)

MovieWhizz

“Classic” ASP.NET vs.ASP.NET MVC

ComparingRuby on RailsandASP.NET MVC

David Heinemeier Hansson

The “Gang of Foreheads”

Programming Language
ASP.NET

C# or Visual Basic
Compiled
Statically typed
Java-esque syntax
Strongly tied to Visual Studio IDE

Ruby on Rails

Ruby
Interpreted
Dynamically typed
Smalltalk-y, Perl-y, Lisp-y syntax
Culturally tied to TextMate

Design Philosophy
ASP.NET

There really should be a form of ASP.NET that actually treats the Web like the Web
“Whatever, man.”
Built as a general purpose framework for web developers using ASP.NET as a base

Ruby on Rails

There really should be a Web programming framework that maximizes joy
“There’s a right way to do things, and it’s this way.”
Extracted from commonalities in 37Signals projects

Database
ASP.NET

“SQL! Whoooo!”
More exposure to the database
Typically, you build a Repository class to act as a go-between for your models and the database
Traditional database building

Ruby on Rails

“SQL! Ewwww!”
DHH’s opinion is that the database is just storage
Database persistence is provided by the model
Database building through migrations

Out soon: ASP.NET MVC 2
A good number of new features including:
Client-side validation based on the model’s validation metadata
Areas to better organize an application
Model validation providers to hook in alternative validation logic when model binding
Metadata providers to allow for alternative sources of metadata for model objects

ASP.NET MVC as Seen by a Former Rails Guy, Techincally
Really fast runtime performance!
Could stand to be a little more “opinionated”
Coming from the world of ActiveRecord, the “M” in MVC feels like it should be short for “Missing”
More lines of code, but Visual Studio’s Intellisense help compensate for that
Where are my plugins?
Could go either way on the lack of RJS

ASP.NET MVC as Seen by a Former Rails Guy, Culturally
Yes, this isn’t the first MVC framework, but the world is a better place when people take a good idea and run with it
Moving from Rails to ASP.NET MVC, I kind of miss that Indie Rockfeeling, but I like the Arena Rock opportunities
“I’m not selling out, I’m buying in!”

Resources

NerdDinner (nerddinner.com)

Professional ASP.NET MVC 1.0,
a.k.a. The “Gang of Foreheads” Book

ASP.NET MVC in Action
(Follow @ManningBooks on Twitter)

Pro ASP.NET MVC Framework
(Highest rating on Amazon.com)

The Official ASP.NET MVC Site
ASP.NET/MVC

You’ve Been Haacked (Phil Haack)
Haacked.com

Scott Hanselman’s Blog
Hanselman.com

ASP.NET MVC aggregator site
ASPDotNetMVC.com

This site will pull downthe pants of your mind

ObjectSharp
ObjectSharp.com

Canadian Developer Connection
blogs.msdn.com/cdndevs