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Configuration is an often-overlooked aspect of web application development. Many times, budgetary or time constraints force developers to sidestep proper configuration practices in the hope that it will somehow speed up the development time table. In reality, proper configuration practices such as using custom configuration sections and strongly typed configuration files may take a bit more time in the beginning, but you quickly make that time back up over the course of the development process.

In this chapter, you have learned about the new configuration tools available in ASP.NET 2.0 and how to use them to manage application settings, connection strings, users, roles, and the profile object. You have looked at guidelines to help you determine the best location to store configuration data and built a strongly typed configuration class. You have also seen how to create custom configuration settings for advanced configuration scenarios and how to read and write configuration settings to a database. In fact, you can even serialize and deserialize objects to and from XML for storage in that database. So, you should be well equipped for just about any configuration scenario that’s thrown at you.

Exception management should be a high priority on your project checklist because it has the potential to impact a variety of different areas. When your application handles routine exceptions without missing a step, it builds user confidence in the application and in you as the developer of the application. It can also save time and money because you end up getting fewer calls from users with system issues that need to be addressed. Exception management can also help smooth out the development, testing, and maintenance phases by continually capturing and logging exceptions as they occur.

In this chapter, you reviewed basic exception-handling techniques, built custom exception classes, created custom error pages, and implemented global error handling. You also got a general overview of logging exceptions and storing them in a database, which you can apply to other technologies, such as third-party exception-handling and logging tools. As your next step, consider downloading and learning a specific exception-management tool so you can use it in your next project.

Using a consistent look and feel throughout your application helps build the perception that it is well built, well thought out, and reliable. Before ASP.NET 2.0, however, maintaining a consistent look and feel was difficult because there was no formal structure for making global layout, behavior, and visual changes aside from the inherent support for CSS in HTML. The introduction of Master Pages, themes, and control skins gives you a distinct advantage in terms of global site maintenance. As you use them on projects, you’ll find they are major time-savers.

It should be obvious at this point that HTTP Handlers can be used to accomplish a variety of different tasks. In this chapter alone, you have seen them used to ensure files download with the appropriate names, generate reports, create thumbnail images, and even implement a content-management system.

Keep HTTP Handlers in the back of your mind when you’re analyzing business issues because they can be very powerful solutions in certain situations. You may also want to look into HTTP Modules and Handler Factories if you want a more in-depth understanding of the HTTP Pipeline and how you can use it to your advantage.

Developing login forms and user administration sections in ASP.NET 1.x used to be a time-consuming process, but you have seen in this chapter how the new user-management tool and features in ASP.NET 2.0 can help reduce that timeframe significantly. You have also seen how to effectively manipulate templated controls so you can fit them into any page layout or color scheme, and how to use the new Membership and Roles objects to easily access common user and role functions. Now you just need to figure out what to do with all that extra time you’ll have when you finish your next project early.

This chapter has exposed you to a number of profile topics such as properties, profile groups, Anonymous Identification, and even profile migration. You were able to implement a targeted advertisement using profiles and even store an entire shopping cart in a custom property. You should have a solid enough foundation with profiles at this point to feel comfortable implementing some fairly advanced personalization tasks.

Portals are a very popular means of displaying a wide variety of information to people in a consolidated fashion, and many people are already fairly comfortable with portal technology because of its adoption on major websites. As such, you can rest assured that you’ll be seeing more and more application requirements focusing on portal technology.

In this chapter, you have had a chance to see the pieces of the Web Part Framework and how they fit together. You’ve built Web Parts, created custom verbs for Web Parts, connected Web Parts to other Web Parts, and learned how to manage Web Parts using the Catalog, Editor, and Connection Zones. You should be well equipped to start implementing portal technology into your own applications, and you’ll probably have a jump on SharePoint developers when SharePoint starts using the ASP.NET Web Part Framework as well.

We spent a great deal of time discussing the SqlQuery tool in this chapter, but I think you’ll find that an object-oriented SQL query builder can definitely save you a lot of time and hassle in certain situations. As mentioned before, the SqlQuery tool is by no means a complete solution. There are still certain keywords and clauses that it does not support, and you can always add more common search functionality to it as you find the need.

You also learned a great deal about paging using the new features in the features in SQL Server 2005, which should help you make your data applications more efficient. Paged data can definitely boost performance for most applications, and the SqlQuery tool makes using paged data a breeze. It also makes it easier for your users to look through large sets of data.

Finally, you learned how to build search forms and how to make interchangeable forms to give users advanced and simple search options. People definitely appreciate flexibility, so these types of features can help boost user acceptance and the overall usability of an application.

In this chapter, you learned that developing against a reporting framework helps you make reports quicker, more accurately, and with more consistency. You learned how to make search forms and how to toggle between a simple and advanced search form using the reporting framework. You also built a reusable paging component that is far superior to the built-in paging component available on the GridView control. Plus, you explored the performance to functionality trade-offs regarding data binding in the PreLoad versus the PreRender method, and you saw how to allow for either scenario using the BindInPreLoad property.

Creating a reusable reporting framework takes a lot of time, effort, and thought, but it definitely pays off in the long run. No doubt, you’ll continue to create search pages reports, so you might as well not reinvent the wheel each time you do. This chapter has given you a better understanding of the thought process and design considerations that go into building reusable components and frameworks for reporting.

Web-based wizards are great for breaking down complicated tasks into smaller, more manageable chunks. They make it easy to display instructions, help enforce business processes, and gather data in an appropriate sequence. Plus, most people are very familiar with wizards because of their growing popularity over the past few years so they will feel right at home when they see one in your web application.