Programming for Active Server Pages
Create Dynamic Content Using ASP
By Leon Chalnick
Microsoft's Active Server Pages (ASP) technology is a powerful tool for building Web sites that incorporate dynamic content, like pages built from databases. It will be particularly beneficial to developers already comfortable with Microsoft's Visual Basic. Microsoft presents ASP as the server half of an overall Active Platform; the other half -- Active Desktop -- represents the client side. Both server and desktop use similar technologies:
- Tools.
- HTML.
- VBScript and JScript (Microsoft's version of JavaScript).
- Components (ActiveX and Java).
- System services (like component and directory services on the server and audio, video, and file system on the desktop).
In implementation, however, the active server is entirely independent of Active Desktop -- it is a set of technologies that runs on an NT server running Internet Information Server (IIS). The Active Platform appears to be more of a "vision thing" or marketing concept than a development concern. For example, you do not have to use ActiveX controls in the pages that ASP serves up.
The Active Server Model
Active Server Pages is a 32-bit, multithreaded service that runs under Windows NT 4.0 in the same address space as IIS. Both ASP and IIS 3.0 can be downloaded free of charge from Microsoft's Web site. ASP exploits Microsoft's Internet Server Application Programming Interface (ISAPI), which contributes to its performance.<>
