Intranet/Internet portals

[dw]

Hi, all. We're choosing tools for developing intranet and Internet portals
for our university and want to know what options are available. Don't laugh,
but we're still using ASP for our Web apps! We're vaguely familiar with
ASP.NET 2.0's portal tools, but need info. We'd like to know:
- How easy it is to build a flexible, reliable, data-driven portal for a
higher ed site using ASP.NET 2.0?
- What portal-specific features does ASP.NET 2.0 offer?
- How difficult/easy is it to maintain such a portal?
- Can such a portal be tied to a SQL Server or Oracle db on the backend
easily?
- From beginning to end, on average, how much time would it take to
build such a portal with ASP.NET vs. some of the other tools?
- Are there any example sites for higher ed?
- Any in-depth documentation on ASP.NET 2.0's portal development tools?
- We need a dynamic site that will capture the students' eye and keep
them coming back. Are there guidelines on how to build portals to hook your
audience and make the experience so dynamic and fresh that they'd actually
want to use the site each day?

We know that's asking a lot, but your guidance is much appreciated. Thank
you

 

[bruce barker]

it all depends on how complex you site is. some thoughts

1) asp.net is still months from beta2 (current version does not have a go
live license), and who knows how long before release code.
2) asp.net is stronger with programming tools than design tools
3) database support for oracle and sqlserver is very good



| Hi, all. We're choosing tools for developing intranet and Internet portals
| for our university and want to know what options are available. Don't
laugh,
| but we're still using ASP for our Web apps! We're vaguely familiar with
| ASP.NET 2.0's portal tools, but need info. We'd like to know:
| - How easy it is to build a flexible, reliable, data-driven portal for
a
| higher ed site using ASP.NET 2.0?
| - What portal-specific features does ASP.NET 2.0 offer?
| - How difficult/easy is it to maintain such a portal?
| - Can such a portal be tied to a SQL Server or Oracle db on the
backend
| easily?
| - From beginning to end, on average, how much time would it take to
| build such a portal with ASP.NET vs. some of the other tools?
| - Are there any example sites for higher ed?
| - Any in-depth documentation on ASP.NET 2.0's portal development
tools?
| - We need a dynamic site that will capture the students' eye and keep
| them coming back. Are there guidelines on how to build portals to hook
your
| audience and make the experience so dynamic and fresh that they'd actually
| want to use the site each day?
|
| We know that's asking a lot, but your guidance is much appreciated. Thank
| you
|
|

 

[dw]

Thanks, bruce. I've seen the Web Parts Controls, and have read that they can
be used for portal development. Is that true? Thanks.

 

[JiangZemin]

Hi,
check out DotNetNuke at www.DotNetNuke.com.
There are several higher education portals in their showcase:
http://www.dotnetnuke.com/Community/Showcase/tabid/541/Default.aspx

also, like someone else said, ASP.NET 2.0 is still in beta.
I dont think itd be legal to put a ASP.NET 2.0 system into production right
now.
more comments below:

Hi, all. We're choosing tools for developing intranet and Internet portals
for our university and want to know what options are available. Don't
laugh, but we're still using ASP for our Web apps! We're vaguely familiar
with ASP.NET 2.0's portal tools, but need info. We'd like to know:
- How easy it is to build a flexible, reliable, data-driven portal for
a higher ed site using ASP.NET 2.0?

Depends on the skill level of your programmers. But with 1.1, web
development is unbelievably easy, for reasonably competent programmers (not
web designers).

- What portal-specific features does ASP.NET 2.0 offer?
- How difficult/easy is it to maintain such a portal?

Depends on how much your requirements change.

- Can such a portal be tied to a SQL Server or Oracle db on the backend
easily?

Yes, very easily. In fact that is the whole point.

- From beginning to end, on average, how much time would it take to
build such a portal with ASP.NET vs. some of the other tools?

To setup DotNetNuke out-of-the-box, itd probably take no more than an hour
or two (but again, it depends a lot on your programmers), assuming you
already have IIS and SQL machines lying around. More time to customize it,
of course; depending on your requirements.

- Are there any example sites for higher ed?

Yes, check the showcase link above (there are more than i thot thered be in
fact)
http://www.dotnetnuke.com/Community/Showcase/tabid/541/Default.aspx

- Any in-depth documentation on ASP.NET 2.0's portal development tools?

this is for v1.1, but:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/t...tnuke-20/104-1015077-4014332?v=glance&s=books

- We need a dynamic site that will capture the students' eye and keep
them coming back. Are there guidelines on how to build portals to hook
your audience and make the experience so dynamic and fresh that they'd
actually want to use the site each day?

That depends a lot on your environment and the people youre working with,
and their motivation for creating and sharing content, not so much the
ASP.NET technology. I think that people/organizational issues are probably
the biggest hurdle to overcome in this area, more than whether or not to use
..NET (which could probably handle anything you're trying to do, cheaply and
effectively).
Featurewise, some suggestions would be to include stuff like RSS
aggregators, discussion boards, and #1: actually put useful stuff on the
portal!

We know that's asking a lot, but your guidance is much appreciated. Thank
you

HTH,
Premier JiangZemin

 

[dw]

Thanks, JiangZemin. Those were some excellent answers! Exactly what I was
looking for.