Desktop Application vs Web Application

An Application is a set of instructions to achieve a particular task for end users. An application can be divided into two general classes: Desktop Application and Web Application.

1. Desktop Application: The application developed to run in a particular system is called Desktop Application.
2. Web Application: The application developed to run in server system so that it will be run on different client systems is called Web Application or Web-based Applications.

Benefits of a Web Application:

• A web application is any application that uses a web browser as a client. The application can be as simple as a message board or a guest sign-in book on a website, or as complex as a word processor or a spreadsheet.
• A web application relieves the developer of the responsibility of building a client for a specific type of computer or a specific operating system. Since the client runs in a web browser, the user could be using an IBM-compatible or a Mac. They can be running Windows XP or Windows Vista. They can even be using Internet Explorer or Firefox, though some applications require a specific web browser.
• Web applications commonly use a combination of server-side script (ASP, PHP, etc) and client-side script (HTML, Javascript, etc.) to develop the application. The client-side script deals with the presentation of the information while the server-side script deals with all the hard stuff like storing and retrieving the information.

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What is a Client?

The 'client' is used in client-server environment to refer to the program the person uses to run the application. A client-server environment is one in which multiple computers share information such as entering information into a database. The 'client' is the application used to enter the information, and the 'server' is the application used to store the information.

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Visual Studio Tips and Tricks!

Editor’s Favorites CTRL+SHIFT+B or F7 to build your solution CTRL+] to jump between matching braces! The IntelliSense Suggestion Box CTRL+K+P it re-opens the suggestion box. CTRL+J shows only members in the IntelliSense completion list. Format your Code CTRL+K+D to auto-format your code CTRL+K+C to Comment a block of code CTRL+K+U to Uncomment a block of code CTRL+E+D or CTRL+E+C or CTRL+E+U CTRL+M or CTRL+L will collapse/expand all outlining. CTRL+M+O or CTRL+M+P to open and close all regions of code. CTRL+K, CTRL+C/CTRL+U to comment/uncomment a selection. Debugging F10, F11 Step Over, Step Into a statement CTRL+ALT+H display the Thread List window. CTRL+ALT+M display the Memory window. CTRL+ALT+C ALT+7 display the call stack window. ALT+3 display the Watch window General Keyboard shortcuts F7 Toggles between design and code views. F9 Toggles breakpoint. F12 Go to definition of a variable, object, or function. Ctrl+Shift+7 Ctrl+Shift+8 Quickly navigate forward and backwards in the go to definition stack. Shift+F12 Find all references of a function or a variable. Ctrl+M, Ctrl+M Expand and collapse code outlining in the editor. Ctrl+K, Ctrl+C Ctrl+K, Ctrl+U Comment and uncomment line(s) of code, respectively. Shift+Alt+Enter Toggles between full screen mode and normal mode. Ctrl+I Incremental Search.

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Difference between .NET 2.0/3.0/3.5 Framework

NET framework 2.0:

It brings a lot of evolution in class of the framework and re-factor control including the support of

• Generics
• Anonymous methods
• Partial class
• Null-able type
• The new API gives a fine grain control on the behavior of the run time with regards to multithreading, memory allocation, assembly loading and more
• Full 64-bit support for both the x64 and the IA64 hardware platforms
• New professionalization features for ASP.NET, such as support for themes, skins and webparts.
• .NET Micro Framework

.NET framework 3.0:

Also called WinFX, includes a new set of managed code APIs that are an integral part of Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 operating systems and provides

• Windows Communication Foundation (WCF), formerly called Indigo; a service-oriented messaging system which allows programs to inter-operate locally or remotely similar to web services.
• Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF), formerly called Avalon; a new user interface subsystem and API based on XML and vector graphics, which uses 3D computer graphics hardware and Direct3D technologies.
• Windows Workflow Foundation (WF) allows for building of task automation and integrated transactions using work-flows.
• Windows CardSpace, formerly called InfoCard; a software component which securely stores a person's digital identities and provides a unified interface for choosing the identity for a particular transaction, such as logging in to a website

.NET framework 3.5:

It implement Linq evolution in language. So we have the folowing evolution in class:

• Linq for SQL, XML, Dataset, Object
• Addin system
• p2p base class
• Active directory
• ASP.NET Ajax
• Anonymous types with static type inference
• Paging support for ADO.NET
• ADO.NET synchronization API to synchronize local caches and server side datastores
• Asynchronous network I/O API
• Support for HTTP pipelining and syndication feeds.
• New System.CodeDom namespace.

In simplly,

• .Net framework 2.0 shipped with Visual Studio 2005
• .Net framework 3.0 is same framework as .Net 2.0 + Windows Communication Foundation (WCF)+ Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) + Windows Workflow Foundation (WF)
• .Net framework 3.5 is all the above (.Net 3.0) + LINQ technologies and will ship with the next VS including VB 9.0 and C#

Note:

Earlier .NET 2.0, there have been 2 versions of .NET released. They are as follows :

• .NET 1.0 – released on January 16, 2002.
• .NET 1.1 – released on April 24, 2003.
• .NET 2.0 – Released on November 7, 2005.

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