Updated June 12, 2023
Difference Between ASP.NET vs C#
ASP.NET is an open-source framework for web application development to generate dynamic content over web pages. This was primarily written in .NET languages. This framework is also used to develop web services. ASP.NET based web applications can be developed by using several existing tools such as Microsoft Visual Studio, Microsoft Expression Web, Macromedia HomeSite that can be used based on the requirement. C# is an object-oriented, functional, imperative, generic and component-based programming language. The C# programming language was primarily developed based on C++, Java Pascal, and few other object-oriented programming languages.
C#
C# is pronounced as ‘C – Sharp’, which is an object-oriented, functional, imperative, declarative, strict type, generic. C# was developed by Microsoft and was designed by Microsoft Corporation. It was developed in the year 2000 and NET’s initiative and was later standardized using ECMA-334 (Common body for maintaining programming or scripting language standards) standard. It was licensed under GPL (General Public License) License.
ASP.NET
Microsoft developed the ASP.NET framework. This framework supports different operating systems such as Windows, Mac OS, and Linux. This was licensed under the Apache License 2.0 version. ASP.NET was first released in 2002, named the .NET framework, and was later called ASP.NET, which was called Active Server Pages (ASP). ASP.NET Core was a successor to the ASP.NET framework. Even third-party frameworks like Spring.NET also exist in Spring Framework for Java.
Head To Head Comparison Between ASP.NET and C# (Infographics)
Below is the top 6 difference between ASP.NET vs C#
Key Difference Between ASP.NET and C#
Both are popular choices in the market; let us discuss some of the major difference:
- ASP.NET was marketed and developed by Microsoft, which is used to develop robust web applications in Microsoft Windows environment, which is cross-platform, whereas C# is mostly based on C and C++ programming languages, which are generalized by ISO (International Standards Organization) and ECMA (European Computer Manufacturers Association) standards.
- ASP.NET works on top of the HTTP layer, which is a part of the Microsoft .NET platform. whereas C# is a structured programming language used to produce some effective programs that support various platforms with important features.
- ASP.NET has different features like web forms model using HTTP protocols such as Page State, Session State, etc. whereas C# has different features like Automatic Garbage Collection, Boolean Conditions, Assembly Versioning Properties and Events, Delegates and Events Management, Standard Library, Automatic Garbage Collection (GC), Indexers, Generics, Multithreading, and Lambda Expressions.
- ASP.NET is the medium for these types of programming languages such as C# to provide APIs (Application Programming Interfaces) or libraries to ease the development process with readymade functionalities, whereas C# is used to write different types of applications such as Web applications, Web services and Windows applications (Standalone apps).
- ASP.NET stores the page state and session across all the web pages throughout the session to store any session-related data and can be session timed out based on the requirement of data to be made available for the application state or page state, whereas C# can be used to write the implementation of handling the storage of session or state in the application.
- ASP.NET has a component model which forms the basic building block which forms the control over server-side components and server-side pages rendering to the user interface by rendering the content when the user requests through IIS (Internet Information Services), which is an extensible web server created by Microsoft to delegate the user requests whereas C# is used to manage the components of the .NET framework.
- ASP.NET has different types of components available out of which the most important are Windows Communication Foundation (WCF), Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF), Windows Workflow Foundation (WF), Metadata and Assemblies, Windows Forms, ASP.Net and ASP.Net AJAX, ADO.Net, Common Type System, Common Language Specification (CLS), etc., where C# will be used as client language to utilize these components.
- ASP.NET has an application lifecycle which is divided into different groups such as the Application Life Cycle and Page Life Cycle; in turn, these life cycles will have sub-processes or groups that follow some sort of standard to implement the application, whereas C# will be used as a medium to implement these processes to run the application as per requirement.
- ASP.NET has different security features such as Authorization, Authentication, Confidentiality, Integrity which will be implemented using forms-based authentication in a .NET framework, whereas C# has object-oriented features to encapsulate the required classes or methods or code block using the access modifiers to hide the implementation
ASP.NET vs C# Comparison Table
Below is the topmost comparison:
| Basis Of Comparison |
ASP.NET |
C# |
| Design | It was designed as a framework to be developed using C# | It was designed as a programming language |
| Application | This can be used to develop web applications using any CLS compliant language such as C#, VB.NET, etc., | It is a programming language used to develop web applications along with ASP.NET |
| Use | It is a library of code that can be used with C# | C# is a CLS (Common Language Specification) compliant language |
| Standard | It is developed by Microsoft | It is developed and designed by Microsoft but later standardized by ECMA. |
| License | It is licensed under Apache 2.0 | It is licensed under GPL (General Public License) |
| Operating System | It supports Microsoft Windows, Linux, MacOS | It supports mostly all types of major operating systems |
Conclusion
ASP.NET is a web application development framework used to develop web applications using different back-end programming languages like C# where C# is used as an object-oriented programming language to develop web applications along with ASP.NET. ASP is an Active Server Pages technology that is used above the .NET framework to develop web apps. Before developing ASP.NET, ASP.NET core was there, which was the initial version and was later upgraded with new functionalities.
To develop a web application, a programming language and a framework are required to ease the development by importing required libraries from the framework. The features and functionalities will be made inbuilt in the framework like the ASP.NET framework. Here both ASP.NET vs C# equally important and required for developing a web application in the modern world.
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