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jmarbutt View Drop Down
DevForce MVP
DevForce MVP


Joined: 04-Jun-2010
Posts: 17 		Post Options Post Options   Quote jmarbutt Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Topic: ASP.net MVC
    Posted: 16-Feb-2012 at 8:16am
When it comes to architecting a simple modular asp.net mvc app, the thing I have found specially moving from MVVM in Silverlight is not to over architect. MVC is extremely simple and by its nature is the architecture you need. 

If you are wanting a more modular approach, you can build your controlers, and views in a separate assembly and pull them in via MEF. Take a look at the first few articles under: http://www.bing.com/search?setmkt=en-US&q=load+mvc+controllers+from+mef

But the biggest thing I can tell you is not to over architect. One of my largest MVC apps has about 300 controllers with about 500-600 views. Many of the controllers inherit from a single abstract base controller that provides things like Index, Search, Grid, Dashboard actions. Many of these actions are handled by the base controller. I also have a few generics defined on the base class for things like EntityType, GridType. Based on the entitytype and grid type I can make the appropriate EF calls to return the data. This made it very simple to basically just have to define the views and extend the controllers that I needed. But when you look at the code it is not a grand "architecture" but very simple. 

When moving to design the UI for mobile site and leverage your current view, I suggest a combination of responsive views via CSS and custom mobile views. The big question in the design world is responsive UI vs custom mobile UI, with MVC you can structure it well enough that you can do both. Essentially build your partial views as responsive while building a shell that is either for mobile or computer. In most projects I have found it easier to just do a complete responsive UI where it can adapt to the screen size. Just google "responsive css" and you will see there are several css frameworks that can assist with this.

When it comes to 3rd party controls, I would also suggest looking at telerik's kendoUI specially if you are going to want it to work on mobile. Kendo is still fairly new and has some kinks to work out but in a lot of cases it can get the job done and is much lighter. Also some of the jquery mobile stuff is good but with any control suite you will find quirks on every platform so there is no real perfect solution. Many are getting there but you always will find that case where one device will drive you nuts.

I have done a ton of Silverlight consulting over the past few years and most of my clients have moved to mvc or other technologies that have a HTML5 front end. Many people may say MS killed Silverlight but the reality is the iPad and such killed Silverlight. 
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floatingleaf View Drop Down
Newbie
Newbie


Joined: 15-Feb-2012
Location: Hereford
Posts: 2 		Post Options Post Options   Quote floatingleaf Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 15-Feb-2012 at 11:34pm
One of the projects is for managing the health and safety issues within a business. I want this to run both as a single copy for each comany that purchases it, but also as a shared (subscription style) portal for smaller businesses and indiividuals. I want to be able to update and add features/modules as simply and self contained as possible.
 
I am also creating for a customer of mine, an information management system that will also need the facility to add new/update modules easily, as it will be setup as an initial version used by my customer and the ones they sell to other companies ideally need to be the same basic codebase, with new customer specific features solely by new modules, or extended versions of existing modules.
Any bug fixes and patches are then simpler to rollout (hopefully).
 
Later I want to support phone browsers and understand that it is simpler to have it running as a separate set of layouts due to the amount of realestate available on screen.
 
I have done apps in asp.net, silverlight and windows forms, but this is my first foray into ASP.NET MVC as ASP.NET does not seem to give me what I want.
 
I also use Telerik controls as well and have an active subscription, but prefer the DevExpress reporting tools.
Also, DevExpress controls seem to be happier with the touch screens, especially the asp.net/asp.net mvc controls.
 
I would have normally looked to Silverlight, but need these two sites to work on non-windows platforms as well, such as ipads and android tablets.
 
 
 
Cheers
Ade
 
 
 
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jmarbutt View Drop Down
DevForce MVP
DevForce MVP


Joined: 04-Jun-2010
Posts: 17 		Post Options Post Options   Quote jmarbutt Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 15-Feb-2012 at 3:10pm
I have used Dev Force for a number of MVC apps also with out any issues.

Out of the items you have listed, here are my responses:

  • custom user and roles - This is not an issue, I generally always use custom user and roles. As long as you follow the typical MVC pattern, you will not have an issue.
  • What are looking for as far as a "single pluggable framework" can you expand on this?
  • You wouldn't have to do anything specific to DevForce for scalability.
  • I do not like to store entities cache between pages. But most of the apps I have worked with are CRM / LOB type apps where 1 user may hit one instant of the data every now and then. Can you tell me a little more about the app you are building with it.
  • I have only used Telerik's controls and KendoUI along with Knockout.JS

If you have any other questions I will see if I can help
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floatingleaf View Drop Down
Newbie
Newbie


Joined: 15-Feb-2012
Location: Hereford
Posts: 2 		Post Options Post Options   Quote floatingleaf Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 15-Feb-2012 at 4:55am
Hi All
 
I was wondering if anyone had any links or examples of using devforce with asp.net mvc 3 (Razor)?
I have so far used devforce in 2 apps (with great success) and want to use it in a couple of new projects.
 
I don't know if all of this is relevant to just devforce. Sorry if some of the info is not relevant.
 
  • I use my own custom user and roles
  • I want to make a single pluggable framework for use with all future projects.
  • How would I need to do for scalability for the site itself.
  • Would I need to store the entity cache between pages.
  • Anyone had experience in using Devforce with DevExpress ASP.Net/MVC controls?

Ade
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