3 ASP.NET support is divided in two pieces:
5 * Web Forms (Web Applications infrastructure).
7 * Web Services (the SOAP-based rpc system).
10 There is work underway for both systems. The Web Forms
11 support is more advanced at this point, and various ".aspx"
12 programs can be run using the Mono runtime and the XSP page
15 We are now working bug fixing and adding missing features
16 after making the whole pipeline compatible with MS.
18 Tim started work on the Web Services. Although we have a
19 SoapFormatter as part of the remoting infrastructure already
20 (contributed by Jesus), most people will be using the ASP.NET
21 Web Services support. Work for the supporting class libraries
22 just started recently.
24 * Web Forms: The pieces
26 There are a couple of components to the puzzle:
29 * .aspx page parser (converts .aspx to C# code).
31 * System.Web.HttpRuntime support.
33 * Web controls (System.Web.UI.HtmlControls and
34 System.Web.UI.WebControls).
36 * Underlying infrastructure for the controls (System.Web.UI).
38 * HttpRuntime.ProcessRequest is the core of the ASP.NET
43 Gonzalo has been working on an ASP.NET parser that takes .aspx
44 files and generated the code required to run them (the code lives in
45 module `xsp' along with a little web server for testing).
47 Most of the runtime support was written by Patrik Torstensson
48 (now at Intel). This was interesting, because in order to implement
49 some of its features, Patrik had to go into the runtime/JIT engine and
50 he spent a few weeks doing work there.
52 The classes for running ASP.NET are being actively written.
53 Gaurav, Leen and Patrik worked in the core of the classes
54 required to run ASP.NET web application as well as a small
55 embeddable web server.
57 Duncan got our System.Web assembly to compile.
61 Patrik has authored most of the HttpRuntime support (both on
62 the System.Web and on the foundation).
64 We are currently working on this.
68 This is where initial development of the .aspx/.ascx/.asax compiler
69 to C# took place. That compiler is now integrated in System.Web classes
70 mostly under System.Web.Compilation namespace.
72 We added a new web server that works with mono and MS runtime and is
73 being used to debug our classes. It resides in xsp/server. A couple of
74 classes of this new server can be reused/extended to make an apache
75 module/cgi using mono (MonoWorkerRequest and MonoApplicationHost).
77 There is also a bunch of .aspx pages to test the server along with
78 a few user controls under xsp/test.
80 You can check it out from CVS and run 'make install' to test it.
84 A lot of work has been put in the various classes that
85 implement the controls (UI.HtmlControls and UI.WebControls),
86 but they have been coded mostly in the dark, and without being
87 able to test them in real life: Gaurav and Leen worked very
88 hard on this namespace.
90 We can now render all HtmlControls and almost all WebControls.
91 DataGrid and DataList controls are being finished by Gaurav.
92 Xml control needs some work on System.Xml related to XSL.
96 Currently you have to reference in your ASP.NET the control
97 and all of its properties, which works fine if you have a GUI
98 designer, but is harder for people used to develop using text
101 Since we have a parser, we could extend this parser to allow
102 people to still use ASP.NET controls, using a simpler syntax.
103 For example people doing blogs and editing their templates
104 over the web probably do not want to use direct ASP.NET but a
111 2. Get the parser to generate output compatible with ASP.NET.
113 3. Run the sample output with the real Microsoft runtime
114 but using our generated page.
116 4. Run the sample with our classes with the .NET runtime.
118 5. Run the samples with our classes with the our runtime (without
121 6. Finish HttpRuntime.
123 7. Running our sample code with our classes with our runtime.
125 8. Debug and add missing features.
127 We are in step 8. Among the missing features: server side includes,
128 better caching, some configuration stuff, more validators...
132 Testing and fixing HtmlControls, WebControls and validators is an
135 In the CVS module XSP you can find a small web server used for
136 testing and a directory containing sample aspx pages.
138 You have some documentation under doc directory and in the README
139 file of each directory. They explain how to test our System.Web.
140 Testing is really easy!
142 As the server also works with MS runtime, you can use it to check
143 what the expected results are.