MVC

I've been working on a few projects now using MVC 1.1 and I have kind of mixed feelings about it. ASP.Net was and is an excellent framework for building complex application on the web. However, MVC is also an excellent framework for lighter weight web apps.


On the surface, it appears as though we've taken a few steps back from asp.Net, and at first it did feel a lot like ASP. (ie no code behind and custom controls built to return string HTML) And if not thought through this can become spaghetti.. fast.


However, the concept of MVC sits very well with SOA/Ajax/REST Here is a nice article on REST and MVC http://blog.wekeroad.com/2007/12/06/aspnet-mvc-using-restful-architecture/


The problem lies with developers. MVC is architecturally great, but when utilized in the wrong can appear sloppy and crap. The beauty of traditional ASP.Net was that it separated the UI from code, and promoted a different way of thinking. However, MVC does not bring with it the rigid structure asp.net did, and developers can easily fall back in the "easy way" of doing things and code business logic right into the UI. Just like traditional asp.


I was working on a project recently writing and online eshop written using MVC 1.1, and saw snippets of how brilliant MVC could be... but also saw how easy it is to slip back into old (ASP) habits. The end result, was an application that was very difficult to maintain. simply because of the amount of logic written directly in the mark control sets available at the time were very limited. For example, we could not use grids like we do in asp.net, but had to create tables with repeating sections using a for loop. Sound familiar? if you have ever seen traditional asp code, you will be well aware of the nightmare of maintain code like this.

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