Few questions about asp

[Nightfire]

I've been using php for a while now and I think I've got the basics all sorted. I'm wanting to have a play with asp now, but I have no idea where to start.

Is asp still used or is it that asp.net thing used?
Where can I learn it?
What do I need to run it and where can I get it from?
Is VB a part of ASP?

And can you give me any other info I might find useful? :)

[whammy]

Hmm... ASP is not ASP.NET (ASP.NET is much more object-oriented programming, and it's compiled code!), I have to learn that still - but ASP is still pretty widely used, as far as I know, since most ASP programmers are still learning or have yet to learn ASP.NET (the documentation and knowledge base for it is just now becoming readily available and a lot more comprehensive).

VBScript is a scripting language used with ASP (it's not exactly VB, but a lighter scripting version of it - although very very similar), you can also use JScript with ASP.

But you'll find VBScript much more user-friendly with ASP, with a lot more documentation and examples (and VBScript is almost surely already installed on your Windows system, so you can test some things just using VBScript files to see how stuff works!).

Try this:

MsgBox "I have VBScript on my computer!"
MsgBox MonthName(Month(Now()))
MsgBox WeekdayName(WeekDay(Now()))

and save it to your desktop as "test.vbs" and double-click on it. You can't use "MsgBox" in server-side ASP (although it does work (along with some other VBScript stuff) in IE client-side as an alternative to javascript - but yech!) - you'd rather Response.Write the values to a page. But that's a quick way to test simple scripts. :)

Where can you learn ASP? I haven't found any really good tutorials on the 'net that equal the book I bought, but you can check out:

http://www.w3schools.com/asp (I put this link first since I know you have programming experience)
http://www.haneng.com
http://www.4guysfromrolla.com
http://learnasp.com
http://www.liquidrage.com

are a few good sites... not to mention there's always the Microsoft documentation, although sometimes it's rather cryptic...

.... and if you're using a Windows OS, it probably comes with a version of PWS (Personal Web Server) or IIS (Internet Information Services) which will act as your ASP server on your machine. If it's not already installed, it's a simple process. Let us know what OS you're using and I'm sure someone can help you with installing it.

If you're already familiar with PHP, then ASP will be a cinch for ya. (It works the other way around too). Since they both really do pretty much the same things. The syntax is just a bit different - PHP syntax is more C++ type syntax, whereas ASP/VBScript is much more like BASIC. But it's still the same stuff.

[Nightfire]

Thanks for that :)

[Nightfire]

Got a lot of problems trying to install PWS on Win98se:

Microsft Transaction Server Setup
An unknown error occurred while making MTS specific changes to the system registry.
____________________

Windows Setup
Setup of "Transaction Server Core Components" failed. The specific error code is 0x2cfe670

Setup will continue but the component may not function properly.
_____________________

Microsoft Transaction Server Setup
Microsoft Transaction Server setup was not completed successfully
_____________________


Hmmm, after 4 installations, I've got less errors :D Maybe trying it another 4 times might cure the problem :p

[whammy]

It might. To be honest with you I was NEVER able to install PWS on Win98 SE (and GEE that error looks familiar!). !!!

I changed my OS to ME, and Microsoft says that PWS isn't supported on this platform.

But lo and behold, I figured one day that ME is just an updated version of Windows 98, so I stuck in the Win 98 SE CD, ran the setup.exe, and it installed (and is still working) with no problems. I think Win 98 is just buggy when it comes to PWS. :mad:

Perhaps someone has a solution for installing it on Win 98. I just said "**** it" and tried my scripts out on brinkster while I was using Win98. :(

[Nightfire]

Think I'm gonna have to use my other HDD with XP on. Not getting anywhere with 98se

[dominicall]

Hi Nightfire

If you want a good reference for learning ASP using VBscript then I would thoroughly recommend the Wrox book 'Beginning ASP 3'.

I've been building a site in ASP for the last 6 months or so and both from an initial learning perspective and as an ongoing reference I've found it great.

Admittedly, I'd be programming in VBA (Visual Basic for Applications) before so didn't have to learn VB from scratch, but it's a very intuitive language to learn so if you already work with PHP you should have no problem with VBscript.

Definitely worth spending a few pounds, dollars, etc... on

Dominic

:thumbsup:

[whammy]

Actually, that is the book I initially learned from. It is a great beginning book... and I think anyone here that isn't familiar with all of the basics of ASP (and there are a few) should go out and buy it.

It's only $50 or so (at least when I bought it, it may be cheaper now!)... but it will help you out SO much. I abandoned it at about the 12th chapter since I had to write applications at that point for a living, but looking back at the book I have since learned nearly everything in the later chapters by experience - and a lot of things the book doesn't explain, and wouldn't have trouble figuring anything else out, I don't think.

[Nightfire]

w00t! 15th time I tried installing it and it's working *whispers* on 98se :D

Right, time to test this asp lark out.