Building a Web 2.0 Portal with ASP.NET 3.5: Learn How to Build a State-of-the-Art Ajax Start Page Using ASP.NET, .NET 3.5, LINQ, Windows WF, and More

Web 2.0 entrepreneur and Microsoft MVP Omar Zabir shows ASP.NET 2.0 developers how to build a cutting edge web portal using ASP.NET, the Microsoft AJAX Framework, Silverlight, and .NET 3.5.First title to show ASP.NET developers how to implement Web 2.0 principles and practices, using post-ASP.NET 2.0 technologies, including ASP.NET AJAX, .NET 3.5 and Silverlight: Many experienced ASP.NET 2.0 developers are under increasing pressure from customers and clients to provide them with the functionality and user experience found at Ajax-enabled sites such as PageFlakes, Google Start and others. Programming Web 2.0 with ASP.NET AJAX and .NET 3.0 assumes readers have mastered the core functionality of ASP.NET 2.0 and are looking for the new skills they need to take their sites to the next level. Newer technologies covered by the book include ASP.NET AJAX, .NET 3.5, Silverlight, LINQ and more.Written by Pageflakes co-founder and Microsoft MVP Omar AL Zabir: Omar AL Zabir is co-founder of PageFlakes (http://www.pageflakes.com/ ), an award-winning Start page. He maintains a popular blog on Microsoft technologies (http://msmvps.com/blogs/omar/) and frequently contributes articles to (see The Code Project ).Includes a complete Web 2.0 application built using Microsoft technologies and services:Building a Web 2.0 Portal includes code for a complete sample application that demonstrates how ASP.NET AJAX, .NET 3.5 and other technologies from Microsoft and third parties can be used to build a state of the art customer facing or enterprise portal. Code will be available for free download from the book site and from a site maintained by the author. Table of Contents 9 Preface 13 Who This Book Is for 14 How This Book Is Organized 14 What You Need to Use this Book 16 Conventions Used in This Book 16 Using Code Examples 17 Safari® Books Online 17 How to Contact Us 18 Acknowledgments 18 Introducing Web Portals and Dropthings.com 19 Defining a Web Portal 20 Defining a Web 2.0 Portal 22 Using a Web Portal 22 How an Ajax-Powered Start Page Is Different 22 Navigating Dropthings 23 Using ASP.NET AJAX 26 Using C# 3.0 and .NET 3.5 27 Summary 28 Additional Resources 29 Architecting the Web Portal and Widgets 30 Object Model 31 Application Components 32 Data Model 32 Solution Files 34 Update Panels 35 Drag-and-Drop Operations 37 Using a Widget Framework 38 Designing the Widget Container 41 Adding Widgets 44 Maximizing the First-Visit Experience 46 Rendering a Second-Visit Experience 48 Improving ASP.NET AJAX Performance 49 Server-Side Rendering Versus Client-Side Rendering 49 Runtime Size Analysis 50 Reducing Extenders and UpdatePanels to Improve Browser Response 53 Comparing Debug Mode Versus Release Mode 54 Adding Authentication and Authorization 54 Preventing Denial-of-Service Attacks 56 Summary 58 Building the Web Layer Using ASP.NET AJAX 59 Implementing the Start Page of a Web Portal 59 Real-Life Example: When Caching Works Against You 61 The Header Area 61 Add Stuff Area: The Widget Gallery 64 The Tab Bar 68 The Widget Area: The Three-Column Widget View 73 Loading the Start Page 74 Building a Custom Drag-and-Drop Extender for a Multicolumn Drop Zone 78 Implementing WidgetContainer 92 WidgetContainer.cs 94 Updating 96 Saving and editing 97 Adding InstanceID 98 Closing the widget 99 Building Widgets 99 Building a Flickr Photo Widget 100 Flickr widget UI controls 105 Building an Atom or RSS Widget 107 Page Switching: Simulating a Nonpostback Experience 110 Using the Profile Object Inside a Web Service 112 Implementing Authentication and Authorization 113 Implementing Logout 116 Handlers 117 Summary 118 Additional Resources 118 Building the Data and Business Layers Using .NET 3.5 119 Introducing LINQ to SQL 119 Building the Data Access Layer Using LINQ to SQL 122 Generating a Data Model Using the Visual Studio 2008 Designer 122 Manipulating Data with a Database Helper 122 Cleaning Up Inactive User and Related Data 127 Introducing Windows Workflow Foundation 130 Building the Business Layer Using WF 131 Mapping User Actions to a Workflow 132 Dealing with First Visit by a New User (NewUserSetupWorkflow) 133 Dealing with the Return Visit of an Existing User (UserVisitWorkflow) 137 Adding a New Tab (AddNewTabWorkflow) 141 Moving Widgets (MoveWidgetInstanceWorkflow) 141 Implementing the DashboardFacade 145 Implementing the WorkflowHelper Class 147 Summary 151 Building Client-Side Widgets 152 Delaying Server-Side Widget Loading 153 Delaying RSS/Atom Widget Loading 153 Delay Flickr Photo Widget Loading 155 Problems with Delaying Widget Loading 155 Content Proxy 156 Content Proxy Web Service 157 Challenges with the Proxy Web Service 160 Building a Client-Side RSS Widget 160 Building a Client-Side Flickr Widget 164 Summary 169 Optimizing ASP.NET AJAX 170 Combining Multiple Ajax Calls into One Call 170 Timing and Ordering Ajax Calls to the Server 172 Bad Calls Make Good Calls Time Out 172 Real-Life: Resolving Timeout Error Reports 174 Common problems 175 Browsers Fail to Respond with Two or More Calls in Queue 176 Caching Web Service Responses on the Browser 179 Using HTTP GET Calls Instead of HTTP POST 183 Working with the this Function 184 Summary 186 Creating Asynchronous, Transactional, Cache-Friendly Web Services 187 Scalability Challenges with Web Services 187 Real-Life: Fixing a Traffic Jam in the Request Pipeline 189 Asynchronous Web Methods 189 Modifying the ASP.NET AJAX Framework to Handle Web Service Calls 193 Initializing the Cache Policy 194 Developing Your Own Web Service Handler 195 Basics of Asynchronous Web Service Handlers 195 Adding Transaction Capability to Web Methods 201 Adding Cache Headers 204 Real-Life: Exception Handling 206 Using the Attributes 207 Handling the State Object 207 Making an Asynchronous and Cache-Friendly Proxy 207 Scaling and Securing the Content Proxy 209 Maintaining Speed 209 Connection management 211 DNS resolution 211 Avoiding Proxy Abuse 212 Defending Against Denial-of-Service Attacks 213 Summary 214 Improving Server-Side Performance and Scalability 215 Instrumenting Your Code to Identify Performance Problems 216 Optimizing the HTTP Pipeline 217 Optimizing ASP.NET 2.0/3.5 Before Going Live 218 Optimizing Queries in the ASP.NET Membership Tables 219 Real-Life: Querying ASP.NET Membership Tables 219 Optimizing the ASP.NET 2.0/3.5 Profile Provider Before You Go Live 221 Real-Life: Optimizing Stored Procedures 221 Accessing the Use of Profile Provider 224 Using Email for a Username 227 Real-Life: Troubleshooting Using Email for a Username 227 Changing a Username in the ASP.NET 2.0/3.5 Membership Provider 228 Rendering Page Parts As JavaScript 229 Using HttpModule 234 The HttpModule in detail 236 ASP.NET Production Challenges 237 Fixing Cookie Authentication Problems 237 Generating the key 238 Each machine requires a key 238 Redirecting Traffic from an Old Web Site to a New One 239 Real-Life: Avoiding Downtime When Switching Hosting Providers 239 Summary 241 Improving Client-Side Performance 242 Understanding Web Caching 242 Basics of Web Caching 242 Types of Web Caches 243 Web Cache Problems 244 How Web Caches Work 244 Controlling Response Cache 245 HTML metatags and HTTP headers 245 Cache control in response header 245 Pragma HTTP headers 246 Controlling caches with the Expires HTTP header 246 Cache-control HTTP headers 247 ETag, last-modified headers 248 Principles for Making the Best Use of Cache 249 How to Configure Static Content Caching in IIS 251 Content Delivery Networks 252 Examining Web Site Performance Without a CDN 253 Different Types of CDNs 254 Optimizing Internet Explorer JavaScript Performance 256 Reducing IE Symbolic Lookups 256 Evaluating local variables 257 Reducing symbolic lookup on DOM elements 258 Speeding symbolic lookup by caching DOM elements, properties, and functions 258 Mitigating Internet Explorer Memory Leak 260 Avoid using event handlers as closures 260 Use out-of-scope functions 262 Remove DOM elements 263 Reducing the Web Service Call Payload 264 Loading the UI on Demand 265 Using Read-Ahead Caching for Ajax Calls 268 Hiding HTML Inside 268 Summary 271 Solving Common Deployment, Hosting, and Production Challenges 272 Deploying Your Web Site in a Web Farm 272 Web Farm Pros and Cons 273 Real-Life: Building an Inexpensive Web Farm 274 Real-Life: Adding Backup and Reporting Servers 276 Designing a Reasonable Hosting Configuration 277 Thirteen Production Disasters That Could Happen at Anytime 278 The Hard Drive Crashes, Overheats 278 The Controller Malfunctions 278 The RAID Malfunctions 279 Pros and cons of RAID 1 280 Pros and cons of RAID 5 280 The CPU Overheats and Burns Out 281 The Firewall Goes Down 281 The Remote Desktop Stops Working After a Patch Installation 282 Remote Desktop Exceeds Connection Limit and Login Fails 284 The Database Becomes Corrupted When Files Are Copied over the Network 284 The Production Database Was Accidentally Deleted 284 The Hosting Service Formatted the Running Production Server 285 Windows Was Corrupted Until It Was Reinstalled 286 The DNS Goes Down 286 The Internet Backbone Goes Down in Different Parts of the World 287 Choosing the Right Hosting Provider 290 Checklist for Choosing the Right Hosting Provider 290 Choosing a Web Site Monitoring Tool 292 Configuring Proper Performance Counters 294 Monitoring Web Server Performance Counters 294 Monitoring Database Server Performance Counters 297 Summary 300 Index 301 If you think you're well versed in ASP.NET, think again. This exceptional guide gives you a master class in site building with ASP.NET 3.5 and other cutting-edge Microsoft technologies. You learn how to develop rock-solid web portal applications that can withstand millions of hits every day while surviving scalability and security pressures -- not just for mass-consumer homepages, but also for dashboards that deliver powerful content aggregation for enterprises.Written by Omar AL Zabir, co-founder and CTO of Pageflakes, Building a Web 2.0 Portal with ASP.NET 3.5 demonstrates how to develop portals similar to My Yahoo!, iGoogle, and Pageflakes using ASP.NET 3.5, ASP.NET AJAX, Windows Workflow Foundation, LINQ and .NET 3.5. Through the course of the book, AL Zabir builds an open source Ajax-enabled portal prototype (available online at www.dropthings.com), and walks you though the design and architectural challenges, advanced Ajax concepts, performance optimization techniques, and server-side scalability problems involved.You learn how to:Implement a highly decoupled architecture following the popular n-tier, widget-based application modelProvide drag-and-drop functionality, and use ASP.NET 3.5 to build the server-side part of the web layerUse LINQ to build the data access layer, and Windows Workflow Foundation to build the business layer as a collection of workflowsBuild client-side widgets using JavaScript for faster performance and better cachingGet maximum performance out of the ASP.NET AJAX Framework for faster, more dynamic, and scalable sitesBuild a custom web service call handler to overcome shortcomings in ASP.NET AJAX 1.0 for asynchronous, transactional, cache-friendly web servicesOvercome JavaScript performance problems, and help the user interface load faster and be more responsiveSolve scalability and security problems as your site grows from hundreds to millions of usersDeploy and run a high-volume production site while solving software, hardware, hosting, and Internet infrastructure problemsBuilding a Web 2.0 Portal with ASP.NET 3.5 also presents real-world ASP.NET challenges that the author has solved in building educational and enterprise portals, plus thirteen production disasters common to web applications serving millions of users. If you're ready to build state-of-the art, high-volume web applications, this book has exactly what you need. If you think you're well versed in ASP.NET, think again. This exceptional guide gives you a master class in site building with ASP.NET 3.5 and other cutting-edge Microsoft technologies. You learn how to develop rock-solid web portal applications that can withstand millions of hits every day while surviving scalability and security pressures -- not just for mass-consumer homepages, but also for dashboards that deliver powerful content aggregation for enterprises. Written by Omar AL Zabir, co-founder and CTO of Pageflakes, Building a Web 2.0 Portal with ASP.NET 3.5 demonstrates how to develop portals similar to My Yahoo!, iGoogle, and Pageflakes using ASP.NET 3.5, ASP.NET AJAX, Windows Workflow Foundation, LINQ and .NET 3.5. Through the course of the book, AL Zabir builds an open source Ajax-enabled portal prototype (available online at (http://www.dropthings.com) www.dropthings.com ), and walks you though the design and architectural challenges, advanced Ajax concepts, performance optimization techniques, and server-side scalability problems involved. You learn how Building a Web 2.0 Portal with ASP.NET 3.5 also presents real-world ASP.NET challenges that the author has solved in building educational and enterprise portals, plus thirteen production disasters common to web applications serving millions of users. If you're ready to build state-of-the art, high-volume web applications, this book has exactly what you need.