ASP.NET Server Controls available for Measurement Studio .NET version?

[VB.NET/ASP.NET Programmer]

We are moving our VB6 client/server app to the web using ASP.NET (redoing from scratch actually). We use some of the guage controls and sliders, etc.. in Measurement Studio. So that I don't have to use client side scripting, etc.. I would like use pure ASP.NET SERVER controls.

1. Are the newest .NET controls ASP.NET SERVER CONTROLS(speaking about the newest .NET version of Measurement Studio)?

2. Are there any prerequisites for clients to view the created web pages?

[Elton Wells]

1.) The controls that are in the Measurement Studio Technology Preview for Visual Studio .NET are Windows Forms controls. The Technology Preview does not have any ASP.NET UI controls.

2.) It depends on how the controls that you're using choose to render, but typically no. The ASP.NET controls that ship with the .NET Framework will produce something that should work on any browser that supports HTML 3.2. Sometimes the controls will produce richer client-side content, but it will detect the version of the browser that the client is using before doing this and will only produce this richer content if the browser is an up-level browser, where up-level browser is defined as IE5 or higher.


I'm curious to hear more about what you would expect from Measurement Studio ASP.NET controls. What would you expect to be sent to the client? How much and what kind of client-side interaction would you expect? What kind of applications would you use the controls for?

- Elton

[VB.NET/ASP.NET Programmer]

For example, if i am using the NI knob controls on a web page, currently i have to use client side scripting to set the .value property of the knob. If this was a server control I could avoid client side scripting and just program in VB.NET (to set the .value property of the knob).

For more info see my other message here: http://exchange.ni.com/servlet/ProcessRequest?RHIVEID=101&RPAGEID=135&HOID=50650000000800000096760000&UCATEGORY_0=_47_%24_7_&UCATEGORY_S=0)

[Elton Wells]

Sorry, I didn't state my questions clearly. I understand how setting the Value property would be different between ASP.NET controls and client-side controls. What I was asking is once you've set the Value property on an ASP.NET knob control and the page renders, what would you expect the control to send to the client? For example, one possibility is that it could send an image that's rendered to reflect the properties that you set on the server. This would work great as long as you were just using the knob as an output control, but this would not let you change the value on the client. Would you find this limiting? Would you expect to be able to interact with what is sent to the client? If the control didn't send an image, what would
you expect to be sent to the client and how would you expect client interaction to work with what is sent?

- Elton

[VB.NET/ASP.NET Programmer]

Thanks for the response Elton (as usual).

There is no interaction by the client. I am using it as an output control so I guess an image would be fine. What would you recommend I do? What is the best way to handle this?

Regards,
Robert

[Elton Wells]

Depending on the nature of your application, you could either a.) use a different ASP.NET control to represent your output, or b.) create a dynamic image on the server and send it to the client. There are several articles on the web that discuss creating dynamic images in ASP.NET. For starters, here's one in VB.NET called Creating Graphics On-The-Fly with ASP.NET that you may find helpful.

- Elton

[VB.NET/ASP.NET Programmer]

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