Friday, January 20, 2012

What is the difference between website and webapplication ?

Web Application project model

  • Provides the same Web project semantics as Visual Studio .NET 2003 Web projects.
  • Has a project file (structure based on project files).
  • Build model - all code in the project is compiled into a single assembly.
  • Supports both IIS and the built-in ASP.NET Development Server.
  • Supports all the features of Visual Studio 2005 (refactoring, generics, etc.) and of ASP.NET 2.0 (master pages, membership and login, site navigation, themes, etc).
  • Using FrontPage Server Extensions (FPSE) are no longer a requirement.

Web Site project model

  • No project file (Based on file system).
  • New compilation model. (Read here or here for more details) and ...
  • Dynamic compilation and working on pages without building entire site on each page view.
  • Supports both IIS and the built-in ASP.NET Development Server.
  • Each page has it's own assembly.
  • Defferent code model. (Read here for more details)

Ok, all is great, but you want to create your web site now. Which model should you use?

  • You need to migrate large Visual Studio .NET 2003 applications to VS 2005? use the Web Application project.
  • You want to open and edit any directory as a Web project without creating a project file? use Web Site project.
  • You need to add pre-build and post-build steps during compilation? use Web Application project.
  • You need to build a Web application using multiple Web projects? use Web Application project.
  • You want to generate one assembly for each page? use Web Site project.
  • You prefer dynamic compilation and working on pages without building entire site on each page view? use Web Site project.
  • You prefer single-page code model to code-behind model? use Web Site project.

For more information please visit

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd547590.aspx

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