I am watching the Live Web Matrix launch and could not help wondering how is Web Matrix being positioned against Expression Web/Suite?
Web Matrix seems to be a rapid deployment platform that has many of the same features that Expression Web was striving for. It seems to me that many of the templates could have been incorporated into that platform. Will we eventually see the templates
and features eventually incorporated into Expression WEB or even VS 2010, or will they remain distinct. What happens to Expression Studio? Does it remain a strictly a designer tool for asp.net web forms? or will it be abandoned?
VS2010 is developer tool, so I see that as quite distinct, but it would be nice to see some integration of those templates, but it looks like expression web could be in trouble.
From my understanding they are targetted at difference audiences.
Expression web is really UI focused development and is supposed to really be for shops that are big enough to really separate out their development areas - those that have dedicated UI people vs middle tier vs backend development.
WebMatrix is really targetted at budding programmers (people who if they wanted to continue that route would likely want to get VS down the line). WebMatrix is there to really lower the bar to developing websites in asp.net.
Marked as answer by Mikesdotnetting on Jan 21, 2011 05:57 PM
I see Expression Web as a professional Web Designer's tool. WebMatrix offers no design view, CSS pickers, proper support for Web Forms, behaviours, layers etc, but what it does introduce is the Razor syntax. And a much lighter weight way of building
dynamic web sites. It is a Developer's tool - not a designer's tool.
As far as the future of the Expression Suite is concerned, there are other forums that cover that. Not many developers use it. It rarely gets mentioned here.
WebMatrix is intended to make ASP.NET more accessible to a new audience to MS web development technologies, rather than replacing the tools of the existing one.
<<WebMatrix offers no design view, CSS pickers, proper support for Web Forms, behaviours, layers etc, but what it does introduce is the Razor syntax>>
I asked this question in post about MVC3 and Razor in VS2010 and the answer seems to be that this is because the razor syntax is new and designer doesn't know anything about it yet. I would hope a design view will eventually be for the razor syntax. It
just helps one locate the code quicker if one can just choose it in the design view and locate in the code view, but I digress.
It appears that MS is really trying to get away from Web forms and make it easy for those to change to MVC style of view model. One way is given folks a simple tool that can do that without the normal web forms tool box or code behind and make it easy to
go back to a classic html type of authoring. One does not really need all those tools if one has to use write most of the code themselves and using html helpers.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying its bad or complaining. I actually like MVC3, Web Matrix and the razor syntax and I can see myself putting together a quick site using the templates and then extending it in VS2010 or Expression. One can also see the
popularity of templated sites as Wordpress and Joomla etc. and MS rather than competing, has jumped into the fray embracing them and making easy to extend them. I would say it's a billant move. It's also a nice way to wean developers off code behind way
of doing things, although MS is very careful to state that developers have a choice; but with Razor does one really???
It appears that MS is really trying to get away from Web forms
They will tell you that is not the case. There will always be Winforms developers who prefer a control-based, event-based approach, but experienced web developers who want to have a look at ASP.NET are more likely to find something they understand with MVC
now.
Mrrgd
I would hope a design view will eventually be for the razor syntax.
That's not even on my wish-list. I have a design view: IE, FF, Safari, Chrome, Opera...
Mrrgd
One way is given folks a simple tool that can do that without the normal web forms tool box or code behind and make it easy to go back to a classic html type of authoring.
I would hope a design view will eventually be for the razor syntax.
That's not even on my wish-list. I have a design view: IE, FF, Safari, Chrome, Opera....
But one has to constantly debug or refresh. It was a nice feature of the MVC2 view engine that the design view was still there. Most of the time I did not use it, but once in a while it was very handy to open the split-view, select the column or button,
and then go right to the specific code. One really can't do that any more by opening it in the browser. I do not think it's a big deal or anything, but it was helpful to me, at least. How difficult would it be to write a view code that would recognize layouts
and razor syntax?
Mrrgd
Member
165 Points
74 Posts
Web Matrix vs Expression Web
Jan 13, 2011 07:44 PM|LINK
I am watching the Live Web Matrix launch and could not help wondering how is Web Matrix being positioned against Expression Web/Suite?
Web Matrix seems to be a rapid deployment platform that has many of the same features that Expression Web was striving for. It seems to me that many of the templates could have been incorporated into that platform. Will we eventually see the templates and features eventually incorporated into Expression WEB or even VS 2010, or will they remain distinct. What happens to Expression Studio? Does it remain a strictly a designer tool for asp.net web forms? or will it be abandoned?
VS2010 is developer tool, so I see that as quite distinct, but it would be nice to see some integration of those templates, but it looks like expression web could be in trouble.
PNasser
Contributor
2811 Points
531 Posts
Re: Web Matrix vs Expression Web
Jan 13, 2011 09:41 PM|LINK
From my understanding they are targetted at difference audiences.
Expression web is really UI focused development and is supposed to really be for shops that are big enough to really separate out their development areas - those that have dedicated UI people vs middle tier vs backend development.
WebMatrix is really targetted at budding programmers (people who if they wanted to continue that route would likely want to get VS down the line). WebMatrix is there to really lower the bar to developing websites in asp.net.
Mikesdotnett...
All-Star
154927 Points
19867 Posts
Moderator
MVP
Re: Web Matrix vs Expression Web
Jan 13, 2011 10:11 PM|LINK
I see Expression Web as a professional Web Designer's tool. WebMatrix offers no design view, CSS pickers, proper support for Web Forms, behaviours, layers etc, but what it does introduce is the Razor syntax. And a much lighter weight way of building dynamic web sites. It is a Developer's tool - not a designer's tool.
As far as the future of the Expression Suite is concerned, there are other forums that cover that. Not many developers use it. It rarely gets mentioned here.
WebMatrix is intended to make ASP.NET more accessible to a new audience to MS web development technologies, rather than replacing the tools of the existing one.
Beginning ASP.NET Web Pages with WebMatrix | My Site | Twitter
Mrrgd
Member
165 Points
74 Posts
Re: Web Matrix vs Expression Web
Jan 14, 2011 01:45 AM|LINK
<<WebMatrix offers no design view, CSS pickers, proper support for Web Forms, behaviours, layers etc, but what it does introduce is the Razor syntax>>
I asked this question in post about MVC3 and Razor in VS2010 and the answer seems to be that this is because the razor syntax is new and designer doesn't know anything about it yet. I would hope a design view will eventually be for the razor syntax. It just helps one locate the code quicker if one can just choose it in the design view and locate in the code view, but I digress.
It appears that MS is really trying to get away from Web forms and make it easy for those to change to MVC style of view model. One way is given folks a simple tool that can do that without the normal web forms tool box or code behind and make it easy to go back to a classic html type of authoring. One does not really need all those tools if one has to use write most of the code themselves and using html helpers.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying its bad or complaining. I actually like MVC3, Web Matrix and the razor syntax and I can see myself putting together a quick site using the templates and then extending it in VS2010 or Expression. One can also see the popularity of templated sites as Wordpress and Joomla etc. and MS rather than competing, has jumped into the fray embracing them and making easy to extend them. I would say it's a billant move. It's also a nice way to wean developers off code behind way of doing things, although MS is very careful to state that developers have a choice; but with Razor does one really???
Just my two cents worth...
Mikesdotnett...
All-Star
154927 Points
19867 Posts
Moderator
MVP
Re: Web Matrix vs Expression Web
Jan 14, 2011 04:23 AM|LINK
I agree.
Beginning ASP.NET Web Pages with WebMatrix | My Site | Twitter
Mrrgd
Member
165 Points
74 Posts
Re: Web Matrix vs Expression Web
Jan 14, 2011 10:49 AM|LINK
But one has to constantly debug or refresh. It was a nice feature of the MVC2 view engine that the design view was still there. Most of the time I did not use it, but once in a while it was very handy to open the split-view, select the column or button, and then go right to the specific code. One really can't do that any more by opening it in the browser. I do not think it's a big deal or anything, but it was helpful to me, at least. How difficult would it be to write a view code that would recognize layouts and razor syntax?