For the average website, ASP.Net is a simple solution when implemented with Microsoft’s Visual Studio 2008 Express Edition. This version of the Visual Studio is free to download and use for any of your .NET projects. The Express Edition allows you to easily get a website up and running with cutting edge built-in functionality to include Web 2.0 and Ajax.
In addition, the Express version allows you create a “Master” page so that your website can have a consistent look and feel. These pages serve as a template and then your subsequent pages pull all the content from this page and allow you to place small areas of text in each of your other pages. This gives you an easy-to-use and uniform template to ensure all of your pages are easy to manipulate and are consistent. However, if you want your pages to look or behave differently then you should not create or use a “Master” page.
If you are new to web development, ASP.NET can be a great resource. The average website requires very little cutting edge technology that’s available with ASP.NET. However, it’s available to you if you decide to implement it in the future.
Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 Express Edition is a great tool that’s easy to use. The only thing that may be difficult is understanding the “Master” page template feature. Again, this feature creates a vanilla website for you to use, which provides for a simple and clean way to build and design your website.
Remember, the Express Edition is not the complete Visual Studio product, but is a tool designed for students and hobbyists. Hard-core hobbyists and enterprise developers should get the complete edition of Visual Studio, which is not free.
