Introducing Web Parts

Web parts are a set of server controls that are available in ASP.NET 2.0 that allow you to componentize your page into manageable sections. You can edit, move around holding the web part, change its settings at runtime, and can completely personalize your web page. When we say personalize, this refers to setting your preferences in the web page. Let’s say, for example, that an application displays a home page, which has several sections such as a weather report, local map information, stock quotes, and your email section. You can have the weather report at the bottom-right of the web page, or you may choose not to have this web part in your web page at all; another user may prefer to have this web part at the top-right corner of the web page. So, personalization is about setting one’s preferences in an application. These settings are saved for each user so that the next time the user logs in, he/she will find the same settings configured by him/her.

The web parts introduced in ASP.NET 2.0 are not a completely new concept. This was first introduced in Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services, which is an application used for collaboration, document management, content management, workflows, reporting, and so on. The web parts in SharePoint offer personalization and customization. The web parts can be extensible in the sense that they can be developed in an enterprise and can be deployed in the portal, where other users of the portal leverage the features of this web part in the portal.