High Performing ASP.Net Application Development - Best Practices

As a server-side web application development framework, ASP.Net is used widely for creating dynamic and high performing websites, internet applications and web services. Microsoft has further designed the framework to allow programmers to write code in several .NET supported languages including C# and VB.Net. You can always use ASP.Net to reap a number of benefits including less coding, rapid development, enhanced security and easy maintenance. At the same time, you can also use a set of rich server and client-side controls to accomplish a variety of tasks without writing longer lines of code, while enjoying complete control over the application. However, it is also important to understand and use some best practices for high performing ASP.Net application development.

5 ASP.Net Best Practices for Developing High-Performing Web Applications

1) Use HTML and CSS instead of Control Adapters

Since the release of .Net 2.0, developers use control adapter to render customized code according to individual devices and environments. But you have option to render customized code by using HTML and CSS. You can render customized code by using CSS media queries and standards-compliant HTML to improve the application’s performance. It is also recommended to use HTML and CSS instead of control adapters. Many developers even prefer converting the existing control adapters into HTML and CSS to improve the application’s performance.

2) Use CSS Stylesheets instead of Controls’ Style Properties

ASP.Net web server controls allow programmers to change their look and feel by using in-line style properties. However, they also have option to set the formatting value of these web controls through CSS stylesheets. For instance, instead of using the forecolor property of a web control, you can use CSS stylesheets to set the color of the control. The use of CSS stylesheets will help you in avoiding setting values for individual web controls. Also, you can use centralize style values to easily change the look and feel of these web controls.

3) Avoid Using Page and Control Callback Methods

Often programmers are required to update specific part of a web page without refreshing the page completely. It is a common practice among ASP.Net developers to accomplish partial page update through Page and Control callback methods. But programmers do not realized that use of these Page and Control callback methods affect the application’s performance by creating issues related to routing and friendly URLs. You can always improve the performance of your ASP.Net application by disabling the callback methods. The partial page updates can be performed more efficiently by using AJAX, MVC, SignalR, Web API or UpdatePanel.

4) Use Dynamic Browser Capability Detection Feature

The popularity of a website or internet application, nowadays, depends on its compatibility with various devices and web browsers. While using earlier versions of ASP.Net, programmers were required to detect supported features for each browser by storing these supported features in XML files. But the static method of detecting the supported features for individual browser can have a huge impact on the performance and popularity of the application. So you must detect the supported features for each browser dynamically by using specially designed frameworks like Modernizr. The framework will use a specific property or method against the browser to detect if the browser produces the desire results.

5) Enable Auto Generated Client Side Validations

Most web programmers rely on the request validation feature of ASP.Net to prevent perceived threat by identifying and stopping bad requests. But you must remember that the request validation feature is not effective in fully combating cross site scripting attacks. To eliminate the threat of cross site scripting attacks, it is important to validate all user input, and encode the output. ASP.NET MVC 2 further allows developers to keep the client-side and server-side validations separate. You can simply enable the client side validations to protect the website from cross site scripting attacks by adding client side validation.

On the whole, you have to learn several ASP.Net best practices to rapidly develop high performing websites and web applications. Also, you must avail latest version of ASP.Net to avail several new features and capabilities. These features will help you in improving the performance of the ASP.Net applications without putting any extra time and effort. You can get in touch with a custom .net development company who can help you develop web apps that are stable, scalable and secure.

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Improve website performance, scalability and save money - ASP.Net

ASP.Net, a server-side script, helps in delivering database driven and dynamic content by applying minimal effort to the clients. But this is not the only reason why it is used so widely by the developers. There are several techniques and tools which can be conveniently employed to improve the performance and scalability of the website. At the same time, ASP.Net is also a cost effective method to achieve these ends.

Measurement of time

In order to optimize the performance of any website it is important to find out where maximum time is spent on a website. A free tool called Fiddler can be used to achieve this end. It has a timeline feature that stores all the requests made on a website and how long each of them took. If you want you can also save an archive before further performance improvements can be added. Besides this, there is another tool, Keynote, which can also be used to measure the performance of a website. There are agents throughout the Internet which collect performance report at various intervals of the day. These reports can then be compared with the other primary Internet retailers to review the performance.

Http Compression

This is another way to improve the performance of the website. ASP.Net includes this technique to reduce bandwidth usage as well as increase the pace of loading for the webpages. This concept is quite similar to the way one generally compresses files on the system to save spaces. The IIS web servers are capable to compress both dynamic and static files by using the HTTP Compression component that is found in the web.config file. In this regard, it is important to note that smaller files are delivered at a greater speed on the Internet.

Minimizing and Consolidating

Minification is a process through which the file sizes can be reduced significantly. The contemporary websites mostly have various kinds of JavaScript and CSS files. Browsers generally have limited connections to the web server. As a result, the time taken to download all the files is quite long. Tools, like, YUI Compressor and AjaxMinifier help in minimizing. These files can then be also consolidated into a single file (or couple of files). This way the browser just needs to make a single request to the web server to get them.

Use of Browser Cache

This factor hugely improves the performance of a website. There are local cache locations in the browsers where copies of CSS, JavaScript and image files are stored from various websites. These default files stored here cannot be used next time a browser visits the website. When the browser downloads the same page again, he will find it already existing but cannot decide whether the information is updated. Hence, the web server must be contacted every time for a file and check whether the file is fresh. This takes a long time. To solve this issue the option is to take the help of expirations.

Data cache

ASP.Net is known for providing Cache objects that are impressive for storing data on the web server. It checks the database just once in a day and keeps the results appearing the Cache object. This enables the webpages to load faster and they also do not require waiting for the database response any longer.

Use CSS for indexing

This is another effective way for decreasing the number of requests required to get a page. This can be achieved by amalgamating a number of small image files into a larger file and ten make use of the CSS to index the larger image. As a result the individual images required for a webpage can be seen. There are several tools which can perform this task. They also the CSS styles needed to access every image.

Tools to test performance

Google Page speed and YSlow are tools which can be utilized to derive recommendations for improving the performance. These tools are quite effective in suggesting exactly which alterations should be made to ensure success.

Cost effective ownership

This is another USP of ASP.Net although it affects the owner of the website instead of the developer. Finding dot Net developers is not a big deal. The customers mostly opt for ASP.NET as it is cheaper and support for it is also easily available.

Owing to such advantages the ASP.Net open source server side framework is preferred to develop web applications when compared to the other frameworks. You can get in touch with a custom asp.net web development company who can help you develop web apps that are stable, scalable and secure.

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Is ASP.Net Shopping Cart a Good Option for e-Commerce Sites?

Both new and existing businesses, nowadays, prefer selling their products and services online. But each business has to consider several factors while creating a web store. Along with deciding the process to fulfill the orders and a payment gateway, the business must choose the right shopping cart solution. While comparing the shopping cart solution, it is important to focus on some key features, along with the user experience. A constant increase is also noted in the number of ecommerce platforms using shopping cart solutions based on ASP.Net. It is also a good idea to understand some of the major benefits of using an ASP.Net shopping cart.

Understanding Major Benefits of ASP.Net Shopping Cart Software

Easy to Use

You have option to choose from several shopping cart solutions written in ASP.Net. Most shopping carts are designed with simple and easy-to-use features. Further, these software applications can be integrated smoothly with ecommerce applications. So you can easily pick the right solution that will make your web store popular by delivering the ultimate shopping experience.

Flexible Product Management

You must choose a shopping cart solution that allows customers to add, edit and delete items in a quick and flexible way. Many web store owners rely on ASP.Net shopping cart solutions to enable customers to add, edit and delete items at their own pace before moving to the billing process. These solutions are designed with robust features to make product management quick and convenient.

Currency Converter

The ecommerce application will enable you to offer your products to customers residing in different regions. So the customers will want to know the prices of the products in their local currencies. The ASP.Net shopping cart solutions are designed with currency converters. So the customer can easily check the total amount due in local currency. The feature will encourage customers to visit your web store at regular intervals.

Integrated with Multiple Payment Gateway Systems

To deliver the ultimate shopping experience, you must allow customers to pay for the items in a number of ways. For instance, the customers must have option to pay through their credit cards, online bank accounts, Google Pay or PayPal. The ASP.Net shopping cart solutions work smoothly with several payment gateway systems. So the software will allow your customers to pay for the products without any inconvenience.

Safe Shopping Experience

The constant increase in online frauds is having a huge impact on the popularity of ecommerce. While buying products from a new web store, often customers hesitate to share sensitive information like credit card details. But the shopping cart solutions written in ASP.Net can avail the security features of .Net platform. The solution can further provide user authentication and password protection. So the ASP.Net shopping cart will contribute towards increasing your ecommerce site’s reputation and credibility.

Easy to Manage and Customize the Sites

Unlike conventional websites, an ecommerce site has to be updated and customized at frequent intervals. In addition to adding new products and modifying existing products, the seller also has to offer discounts and deals. The ASP.Net shopping cart makes it easier for you to update and customize the ecommerce site. It includes a strong administration panel to facilitate site management without affecting the shopping experience of users.

Option to Save Customer Data

There are several customers who leave the web store after checking the available products. Normally, these people add items to the shopping cart, but leave before moving to the billing process. The ASP.Net shopping carts are designed with features to track customer data, and save the information to a database. So it becomes easier for you to seduce such customers by offering attractive discounts and offers.

You also have option to choose from a wide range of ASP.Net shopping cart solutions for your ecommerce site. Some of these ASP.Net shopping carts are open source and free, whereas others are commercial. Also, you can consider creating a custom-made shopping cart for your ecommerce application using ASP.Net. You can get in touch with a custom .net development company who can help you develop web apps that are stable, scalable and secure.

We provide .net application development services. If you would like to hire asp.net programmers for your development needs, please contact us at Mindfire Solutions.