The .NET platform
.NET is a developer platform made up of tools, programming languages, and libraries for building many different types of applications.
The base platform provides components that apply to all different types of apps. Additional frameworks, such as ASP.NET, extend .NET with components for building specific types of apps.
Here are some things included in the .NET platform:
- The C#, F#, and Visual Basic programming languages
- Base libraries for working with strings, dates, files/IO, and more
- Editors and tools for Windows, Linux, macOS, and Docker
ASP.NET extends .NET
ASP.NET extends the .NET platform with tools and libraries specifically for building web apps.
These are some things that ASP.NET adds to the .NET platform:
- Base framework for processing web requests in C# or F#
- Web-page templating syntax, known as Razor, for building dynamic web pages using C#
- Libraries for common web patterns, such as Model View Controller (MVC)
- Authentication system that includes libraries, a database, and template pages for handling logins, including multi-factor authentication and external authentication with Google, Twitter, and more.
- Editor extensions to provide syntax highlighting, code completion, and other functionality specifically for developing web pages
Below are a few links for additional information about ASP.NET:
What languages can I use with .NET?
We are very excited about a newer Microsoft development framework known as “Blazor”. This technology attempts to pull together the older Web Forms and the newer MVC Core environment into an almost “javascript-less” development environment. Check out the video below for a full explanation of Blazor.