Asp.Net 4.0: An Overview-Part-I

Asp.net 4.0 introduces a lot of new features and controls that can be broadly categorized as depicted below.
1. Server Side enhancements
2. New Controls
3. ASP.Net MVC enhancements
4. Dynamic Data

This post covers only the First part i.e. Server Side enhancements.
Server Side Enhancements
A) Caching Enhancements
B) Shrinking Session State
C) Performance Monitoring Improvements 
D) Shrinking Web.config
E) Shrinking session state
F) View state on individual controls
 
Caching Enhancements
Prior to Asp.net 4.0, page output is stored in memory in a private area of the ASP.NET cache. If the Caching is done for large number of pages, the output cache puts additional pressure on the web server by consuming memory and generating frequent updates to the cache object. ASP.NET 4.0 introduces new concept of  storing page responses outside the ASP.NET worker process. The new Cache API enables the usage of any of the storages that includes storing cache data in disk, storing cache data using custom cache providers, storing cache data on a separate server and storing cache data on a cloud database
 Creating custom output-cache provider is as simple as deriving a new class from the newly introduced System.Web.Caching.OutputCacheProvider type.
This provider needs to be registered in the web.config, by using the new providers subsection of the outputCache element, as shown in the following example
<caching>
   <outputCache defaultProvider="AspNetInternalProvider">
   <providers>
     <add name="DiskCache" type="MyCProvider.MyCacheProvider.DiskOutputCacheProvider, DiskCacheProvider"/>
   </providers>
    </outputCache>
    </caching>

DefaultProvider in ASP.net is AspNetInternalProvider that can be altered by changing the default output-cache provider used for a Web application by specifying a different provider name.

If the above description is exciting, here is another perk.
different output-cache providers per control and per request can be selected by choosing a different output-cache provider for different Web user controls declaratively by using the new providerName attribute in a control directive, as shown below.
<%@ OutputCache Duration="60" VaryByParam="None" providerName="DiskCache" %>
Specifying a different output cache provider for an HTTP request adds a twist. Instead of declaratively specifying the provider, new GetOutputCacheProviderName method is overridden the in the Global.asax file
public override string GetOutputCacheProviderName(HttpContext context)
{
if (context.Request.Path.EndsWith("Advanced.aspx"))
return "DiskCache";
else
return base.GetOutputCacheProviderName(context);
}
There is one additional enhancement called Output Cache Substitution, which can be used to cache the output of web pages that contain dynamic data:
<asp: Substitution ID= "cacheSubstitution" runat="server" MethodName="Test" />      
 
Hurry spoils the Curry..let’s not cover the other details in this post and take some time to digest the new knowledge described here.
The next post will explore the remaining features.
Till Next we connect……….
Happy learning