Book Image

Ext.NET Web Application Development

By : Anup K Shah
Book Image

Ext.NET Web Application Development

By: Anup K Shah

Overview of this book

To build a rich internet application, you need to integrate a powerful client side JavaScript framework with a server side framework. Ext.NET achieves this by integrating Sencha's Ext JS framework with the power of ASP.NET. The result ñ a sophisticated framework offering a vast array of controls, layout, and powerful AJAX and server bindings, which can be used to build rich, highly usable web applications. "Ext.NET Web Application Development" shows you how to build rich applications using Ext.NET. Examples guide you through Ext.NET's various components using both ASP.NET Web Forms and MVC examples. You will also see how Ext.NET handles data binding and server integration. You will also learn how to create reusable components and put them together in great looking applications. This book guides you through the various Ext.NET components and capabilities to enable you to create highly usable Ext.NET components and web applications. You will learn about various UI components and numerous layout options through examples. You will see how the AJAX architecture enables you to create powerful data-oriented applications easily. This book will also teach you how to create reusable custom components to suit your needs. "Ext.NET Web Application Development" shows you how to create rich and usable applications using Ext.NET through numerous examples.
Table of Contents (17 chapters)
Ext.NET Web Application Development
Credits
About the Author
About the Reviewers
www.PacktPub.com
Preface
8
Trees and Tabs with Ext.NET
Index

DirectMethods


As we have seen, DirectEvents are very powerful; they are attached to an Ext.NET control and called when that event fires and invokes a server method. As powerful as they are, you may want to call a server method at your own choosing, directly from within your own JavaScript function—similar to invoking ASP.NET's own page methods. As we noted earlier, DirectEvents require the control to be recreated on the server as part of the page lifecycle. A DirectMethod, however, doesn't require a control instance on the server (unless it is defined inside a user control). Furthermore, if you use a static DirectMethod, it won't even require the full page lifecycle. Otherwise, most things possible with DirectEvents are possible with DirectMethods. Here are a few examples.

Basic DirectMethod

On the server side, a DirectMethod looks very similar to an ASP.NET page method. Consider the following example:

[DirectMethod]
public void AddToServerTime(int hours)
{
    var date = DateTime.Now.Add...