Article
Beginning ASP.NET Using VB.NET - Chapter 14: ASP.NET Server Controls
Summary
This chapter introduced a variety of ASP.NET server controls available to use within any web form. Numerous examples were provided to illustrate how to use ASP.NET server controls within an ASPX page, as well as specific examples for working with these controls programmatically. By now you should have a good basic understanding of ASP.NET server controls, including:
- The syntax for declaring an ASP.NET server control
- The benefits of ASP.NET server controls, such as the rich object model, automatic browser detection, a variety of properties, events, and re-usability
- The various ASP.NET server control families (intrinsic, validation, rich, and data rendering controls)
ASP.NET server controls derive their methods, properties and events from the various classes and objects that make up the .NET Framework and provide an object-oriented way to write dynamic web forms. All ASP.NET server controls are declared using same tag element naming conventions, similar to well-formed XML, and provide a uniform way to declare properties, and assign event handler methods.
Some insight into the ASP.NET page lifecycle, in relation to ASP.NET server controls was provided. The Page object's Page_Load and Page_Unload methods were explained to provide a context for when and why these methods are implemented. We also covered the basics of event handling as related to the Page object's IsPostback property.
The ASP.NET validation controls covered in this chapter, and the examples herein, should serve to open a gateway to understanding the tools you have at your disposal for creating web forms that are capable of validating data. Although we only scratched the surface of the possibilities of the various data rendering controls, such as the DataGrid, DataList and Repeater, you should be able to see their advantages in rendering a variety of types of data.