WinForms Vs WebForms

Generally speaking (very general). If you require a very powerfull, feature rich, user interface you will spend much less effort developing it in Winforms. Additionally you can get some of the deployment benifits and some offline capability if you implement some Smart Client features.

If you have no control over your client (eg you can't get .Net framework installed due to limitations such as control or OS) then ASP.NET is a good choice.

Once again this is very generic advice for a generic question

Regards,

Josh Carlisle

JoshC at 2007-8-21 >

generally speaking WinForms are Richable but not reachable , on the contrary WebForms are Reachable (but not richable due to performance factors).
so the question is : can we have a form that is both richable and reachable at the same time . the answer is simply , yes "Click-Once deployment ".
there was an old article about hosting a windows form over IIS , and this would lead to the death of browsers we know today . http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnadvnet/html/vbnet10142001.asp
so if we can really work this way by hosting winforms over IIS , why would we need webforms at all ?
i first heard this idea by Chris Sells on his wonderful Guerill.NET in london , he really convinced all the audience that time that browsers are really going to vanish.
so the

but if you need just a comparison that would be on a very huge list of faactors :
for example :
1- Security ( Role based and CAS in win vs only role based in web)
2- graphics (GDI+ in win)
3- Resposiveness ( very quick in win)
4- Framework ( windows forms require .NET fx)
5- programming model ( win32 msg pump in win vs HTTP model in web)

there is another factor which will forever still a difference between win and web , which is state management . windows develoepers dont have to take care of state management they save their state in variable , but web develoeprs need a mechanism for state mgmt of course .

i hope this help

Hussein at 2007-8-21 >