I understand that references are stored in the project (vbproj) file for ASP.NET web applications and the Web.Config (http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/37e2zyhb%28v=vs.71%29.aspx) for websites.
I have recently converted a website into a web application. I notice now that the web application will publish (using the Publish option) even if the version information is incorrect in the Web.Config, then when accessing the web application through a browser I get an error.
I was unable to Publish a website if the version of an assembly in the Web.Config was incorrect.
I read that web applications are precompiled (before publish) whereas websites are compiled the first time the website is accessed through a browser.
Therefore, I believe what I have said should be the other way around i.e. I should be able to publish websites with an incorrect version in the Web.Config (because they are not compiled) and I should not be able to publish a web application.
What am I missing?
After some further research; I have discovered that ASP.NET web applications are built using MSBuild and ASP.NET websites are built using ASPnet_Compiler.
ASPnet_Compiler looks in the Web.Config for referenced assemblies (add assembly tag) at build time, whereas MSBuild looks in the project file (vbproj) at build time.
Web applications are deployed without the vbproj. I believe the project file is used for linking. Therefore at runtime a web application uses the information in the Web.Config to identify assemblies to look for in the local bin folder and then the GAC (for aspx pages only)i.e. namesapces still have to be manually imported into the code behind partial classes.
If anyone has any comments or better answer then please post.
Related
We recently converted a website made with .Net WebForms from a Web Site project, to a Web Application Project.
This is all well and good, except it's now a pain because to change any of our code-behind files we have to rebuild the whole site, whereas before all we had to do was save the code-behind file.
This means changing pages in logged in areas requires not only rebuilding the whole Web Application, but then logging in again for a user.
Is there a way to remove the precompile option while running locally so we can debug as we used to with a Web Site project?
I have tried removing the <compilers> section from the web.config, and also removed the <compilation> too, but neither seem to have made a difference.
EDIT:
I realise now I wasn't very clear. I'm talking about debugging the site locally, not when publishing.
No.
Web Application projects load from a DLL; they have no option to compile source at runtime.
You should specify a fixed validation & decryption keys in Web.config so that users don't need to log in again after deploying (more detail).
This is not as straight forward as I had hoped.
I created a Web Site project on my development machine using the Visual Studio C# template for a WebSite Project. (Visual studio 2010 .net 4.0). The project name is C:\Nova5\WebSite3. It consists solely of:
the Bin subdirectory
Nova.svc file
web.config file
It has been tested to run correctly by:
Setting the website as the startup project, then
Run Debug-->Start Debugging
When tested, the NovaDataService information page is correctly displayed. It also correctly works when used through my client project.
I followed the recommended procedure described at
Walkthrough: Converting a Web Site Project to a Web Application Project in Visual Studio to covert the Web Site to a Web Application.
I now have the following problems and/or difficulties:
If I use the recommended procedure for testing the web site:
-- File | Open | Web Site
-- Build Web Site -- Start Debugging
I get the Error: The type 'Nova5WCFServiceLibrary.NovaDataService', provided as the Service attribute value in the ServiceHost directive, or provided in
the configuration element system.serviceModel/serviceHostingEnvironment/serviceActivations could not be found.
Since, I think, the WebSite does work, I skipped this error and moved on to the next part of the article. The next issue (?) is there is no App_Code file in the WebSite. Is this necessary? If it is necessary, how should I create it? Or do I need to create another WebSite project from its template just to have it?
I did not copy the Nova.svc nor the web.config from the WebSite to the Web Application as none of the references I read indicated to do so. Should I copy these files to the Web Application as well?
I now used the "Convert to Web Application" on the Web Application project and recompiled the solution. Everybody is happy. No errors reported. So how do I now test the Web Application project on my development machine (which also has the client application) ?
TIA
I'm connected to a customer's site. There is a bug in an ASP.net MVC site i'm trying to solve.
As i make changes in the various .cs files, the web-server is not changing it's behavior. It seems that the web-site is determined to use the pre-compiled .dll files in the Bin folder.
How can i instruct IIS to recompile the web-site from scratch, in order to pick up the live changes?
I tried deleting my own .dll file:
\Bin\Contoso.dll
But then the web-site crashes.
Note: i am asking how to do this without access to Visual Studio; otherwise i would have changed the web-application into a web-site and redeployed.
You will need to recompile the dll with your changes from your development machine and deploy them. MVC ( I mean asp.net application) uses dll not source code. In short , what you are asking is not possible.
I want to update a class library (a single DLL file) in a production web application. This web app is pre-compiled (published). I read an answer on StackOverflow (sorry, can't seem to find it anymore because the Search function does not work very well), that led me to believe that I could just paste the new DLL in the bin folder and it would be picked up without problems (this would cause the WP to recycle, which is fine with me because we do not use InProc session state).
However, when I tried this, my site blows up and gives a FileLoadException saying that the assembly manifest definition does not match the assembly reference. What in the world is this?! Updating the DLL in Visual Studio and re-deploying the entire site works just fine, but it is a huge pain in the rear. What is the point of having a separate DLL if you have to re-deploy the entire site to implement any changes?
Here's the question: How can I update a DLL on a production web site without breaking the app and without re-deploying all of the files?
The thing to remember is that there are web sites and web applications as far as Visual Studio and ASPNET is considered.
Web Sites typically have all of the aspx and vb files published to the live server and ASPNET Worker Process recompiles the app every time before presentation.
On the other end is the web application, where all of your code behind files get compiled down to a single DLL file and you simply deploy your aspx pages and you bin folder with the DLL file to production.
There is also a "hybrid" known as "Precompiled Web Sites" (see the link for the official MSDN overview) where you don't have the single DLL layout of a web application, but all the compile work of the website is done for you. There are several "modes" to this depending on your needs.
It seems to me that your error is caused because your site is set up as a web site with some kind of precompilation in place. Using the pre-compiled model is a little more "strict" in that is assumes certain files/signatures are in place. Having an updated version of the DLL file causes a break since the precompilation wants a name and a version of the file.
If possible, your best bet would be to convert to a web application, since you can add the additional DLLs into production without a problem. Otherwise, take a look at this matrix to see what form of precompilation you need for your application.
Look at this SO post, might be what you are referring to. The located assembly's manifest definition does not match the assembly reference
Have a look at your reference. Does it say "specific version = true" ? Set it to false, republish your app (you have to do it once, because now your app is still looking for an assembly with a specific manifest) and try it again.
Will a website still work if parts of the site have compilation errors?
It depends on how you have deployed
your website. There basically two main
strategies to deploy
an asp.net application.
1.) PreCompiled deployment
In precompiled deployment you will have all your code-behind files compiled into assemblies. Further, if you are using Web Deployment projects then all those compiled assemblies will be merged into one single assembly.
So In PreCompiled deployment your website cannot be deployed without any error anywhere in the Project.
2.) XCopy deployment
In XCopy deployement you will just copy-paste your entire website to production server without compilation. In this case, only those pages are compiled,loaded and served which are requested via an HttpClient. If you have an asp.net page that has some errors, your website will not show up those error until that has been requested via any HttpClient. Remaining website continues to work without any effect from those with errors.