Introduction to ASP.Net - Pass Christian University

Introduction to ASP.NET Learn how to use Microsoft's visual Web developer to create exciting, interactive, and polished Web sites with ASP.NET.

You'll begin this hands-on course by adding powerful controls to your Web pages, giving visitors the ability to interact with your Web site.

You'll find out how to connect to a database, read the information stored inside, and display it exactly the way you want.

You'll find out how style sheets make it easy to give every page of your Web site the same clean, consistent, and professional look, and you'll learn how to create master pages to ensure that each page you create uses a common set of controls.

Using ASP.NET's powerful membership features, you'll develop a true community-based Web site that allows users to register, log in, create and update profiles, and post messages to a forum.

You'll explore the issue of Web security, and you'll discover some simple things you can do to protect your site and prevent the most common types of attacks.

Recommended Courses:

Students who enrolled in Introduction to ASP.NET were also interested in the following courses:

Introduction to C Sharp Programming

Introduction to Microsoft Access 2003

Introduction to Database Development

Introduction to PHP and MySQL

Intermediate Microsoft Access 2003

Introduction to SQL

Syllabus:

All courses run for six weeks, with a two-week grace period at the end. Two lessons are released each week for the six-week duration of the course. You do not have to be present when the lesson is released, but you must complete each lesson within two weeks of its release.

A new section of each course starts on the second or third Wednesday of each month. If enrolling in a series of two or more courses, please be sure to space the start date for each course at least two months apart.

Week One

Wednesday - Lesson 01

In this first lesson, you'll download and install free software that will help you start creating your own Web sites using ASP.NET. What exactly is ASP.NET? You'll find that out here, too. You'll also see just what makes a Web site tick and we'll work together with a Web browser. You'll discover how the better sites don't just send Web pages to a browser, but rather they create and customize pages right on the spot to produce an exciting user experience.

Friday - Lesson 02

Today, you'll start creating Web pages that include buttons and text boxes, which visitors can use to submit information. You'll see how you can write ASP.NET programs that read this information and use it to create a new Web page in response. The sequence of events that does this is called a postback, and it's a crucial and exciting element of developing interactive Web sites.

Week Two

Wednesday - Lesson 03

In this lesson, you'll delve further into creating interactive Web sites, picking up a few programming tricks that will help make your life easier. One such technique is the use of object-oriented programming. Many people have heard of this type of programming, and you'll discover how easy it really is to master. You'll also add another control to your Web site, a list box. Then you'll see how you can write code that will run on the Web server in response to the user interacting with your Web page by pushing buttons.

Friday - Lesson 04

An exciting way to fancy up a Web site is to customize its overall look. You can choose a site's colors, fonts, borders, and general look using a technology called styles. Today, you'll combine everything you've learned so far to make some really attractive pages that incorporate various styles and controls.

Week Three

Wednesday - Lesson 05

While creating Web sites with ASP.NET, you're free to make use of an entire programming language, and you're free to pick from two exciting ones: VB.NET and C# (pronounced C Sharp). In this course, we'll focus on VB.NET, and in this lesson, you'll see how you can keep track of small pieces of information using variables. Then, to try out some of the techniques we'll go over, you'll create a really cool calendar—and see just how incredibly easy it is to do. But then the excitement really begins as you find out how to store large amounts of data in a database. Professional Web sites make use of databases to store information on millions of customers, and with your newfound knowledge of databases, you'll be able to build Web sites that do this, too.

Friday - Lesson 06

In order to make use of a database, your Web server needs to connect to it. Then the data can start flowing, whether it consists of only a small amount of data or information on millions of customers. Today, you'll see how to connect to a database. Then you'll learn two ways to display this data on a Web page in the browser. You'll find out how to display data in a grid fashion using a control called a GridView, and how to display it in more of a tabular fashion using a DetailsView control. These controls are so easy to use that you'll have a fancy data-processing Web site up in no time.

Week Four

Wednesday - Lesson 07

In this lesson, you'll start getting into the nuts and bolts of databases. You'll see how data is stored using relationships, whereby a customer in the database might, for example, be related to several orders that he or she made. You'll see that databases are all about relationships, and as such are called relational. As you explore relational data techniques, you'll make use of yet another control for displaying data called the FormView control. This control is incredibly powerful and can display data exactly the way you want it to.

Friday - Lesson 08

We'll continue exploring relational data today, and you'll discover how to use a simple, special language called SQL to read data from a database. These days, most database systems use SQL, and we'll make sure you get the skills you need to work with it. We'll also discuss another control called a Repeater that lets you display several pieces of data in exactly the format you choose.

Week Five

Wednesday - Lesson 09

In this lesson, we'll step away from the world of databases and see how you can make all the pages in your Web site look similar using Master Pages. With the help of Master Pages, you can provide a common set of controls to all your pages, much like the navigation links you see across the top of many Web sites. You'll discover how you can set these controls up once and make them appear on all the pages of your Web site.

Friday - Lesson 10

Today, you'll get to pull together everything you've learned and start building your own community Web site, much like the popular ones you often hear about. You'll build a site that includes login and registration boxes so people can register with your site and then log in. You'll find out what pages are necessary and what data you need to include. You'll create a Master Page that contains a navigation bar that will be accessible throughout your site. And you'll set up the styles to give a common set of colors and fonts throughout your site.

Week Six

Wednesday - Lesson 11

In this lesson, you'll finish building your community Web site. You'll put together pages that let users create profiles. Your users will be able to type in the text for their profiles and provide images to go with them. You'll also create a page that lets visitors view the profiles of other users. You'll find out how to present your users with a list of everybody in the community. And you'll even create a forum where people can exchange messages. It's hard to believe you could accomplish all this in just two lessons, but with ASP.NET, it's incredibly easy!

Friday - Lesson 12

To end this course, we'll cover the important topic of Web security. You'll learn how to protect your Web sites from hackers and prevent some common types of attacks. You'll also see how to make smooth transitions between the different pages of your sites to provide a nice user experience. Finally, we'll go through some advanced topics you can explore on your own if you'd like to learn even more about the world of ASP.NET programming. You'll leave today armed with the knowledge you need to build some really great, sophisticated, interactive Web sites.

This course includes a knowledgeable and caring instructor who will guide you through your lessons, facilitate discussions, and answer your questions. The instructor for this course will be Jeffrey Kent.

Jeffrey A. Kent is a Professor of Computer Science, teaching both traditional and online classes. He has taught a number of computer programming languages, including C, C++, Java, and Assembly, but his favorite is Visual Basic. He has authored several computer programming books on Visual Basic, the most recent being Visual Basic 2005 Demystified. He's also an attorney, and has combined both careers by writing applications for law firms.

Requirements:

Microsoft .NET Framework version 2.0 or better and Visual Web Developer 2005 Express Edition or Visual Web Developer 2008 Express Edition, both available from http://www.asp.net (software must be installed and fully operational before the course begins); Windows 2000 (with Service Pack 4), Windows XP (with service Pack 2), or Windows Vista; 192 MB RAM or more, 500 MBytes Free Disk Space (full installation requires 1.3 GByte free disk space); Internet access, e-mail, the Microsoft Internet Explorer or Mozilla Firefox Web browser, and the Adobe Flash and PDF plug-ins (two free and simple downloads you obtain at http://www.adobe.com/downloads by clicking Get Adobe Flash Player and Get Adobe Reader). Note: This course is not suitable for Macintosh users.

Student Reviews:

"Another excellent web development course! The courses I have taken are so informative and for me it is a great way to learn. Jeff is an awesome instructor. I had no problem following the lessons and doing the course work. Everything worked out just as the lessons said it would. This course was a challenge and I would recommend a basic web course before taking ASP.NET. It was well worth the time and effort and I definitely want to continue taking more classes. Thank you!"

"Good course and it was very informative. Thank you for providing the links to related information that is available on the web. Very good writing style. It was easy to understand."

"I enjoyed this class and learned a basic knowledge of asp.net. I would recommend this course to anyone looking to gain an understanding of asp.net. The instructor was very helpful and informative."

"I really enjoyed this course. The instructor's writing style was very clear and the lessons were written very well. He provided examples throughout and made it simple to learn!"

"I really liked the informal, real-world instructional style. Jeff made a concerted effort to explain and describe things in a way that was accessible to non-programmers. I would definitely be interested in taking another of his courses."

"I think this is an excellent mode of learning. It takes a special sort of instructor to be able to pull this together and make everyone feel that they are engaged in the class. I wish I had Jeff around all the time to translate everything Microsoft says!"

"This was the best ed2go class I've taken to date. I feel as if I learned a lot of realistically useful information, that I can now expand upon my online studies through books and dialogue with others and actually become PROFICIENT in ASP.NET. The teacher's writing style was engaging, the examples were well-written and easy to understand, and the assignments were accessible and HELPFUL. Thank you for a wonderful class!"