Tonight I finished exploring the new security and web parts features of ASP.NET 2.0. The new security features are server controls for user login, password recovery, and new user registration. These server controls eliminate much of the repetitive coding required to implement a user registration and login system. For the PasswordRecovery server control I had to work through some SMTP errors because it emails a new password. My web.config file needed a section for the mail settings.
By default the password needs to be fairly complex with at least one non-alphanumeric character. That means the password needs to use a special character. I did not like that so I did some research and found an additional web.config section that can be added to change that requirement.
I especially like the web parts which allow you to easily create a custom web portal. I worked through the Browse, Display, Edit, and Catalog display modes. Web parts can use web services or user controls. The ASP.NET 2.0 For Dummies book did not provide any interesting user controls and the web service example was no longer active so I had to find a replacement web service. I’ll have to develop some user controls to display RSS feeds so I can create an useful web portal to run on my local web server. Microsoft has had “web parts” for a long time but this is the first simple implementation I’ve been able to understand.
I have the new AJAX extensions for ASP.NET 2.0 installed so I will need to spend some time learning how they work as well.
