Active Server Pages (ASP) is Microsoft's first server-side script engine for dynamically-generated web pages. It was initially marketed as an add-on to Internet Information Services (IIS) via the Windows NT 4.0 Option Pack, but has been included as a free component of Windows Server since the initial release of Windows 2000 Server. Programming ASP websites is made easier by various built-in objects. Each object corresponds to a group of frequently-used functions useful for creating dynamic web pages. In ASP 2.0 there are six such built-in objects: Application, ASPError, Request, Response, Server, and Session. Session, for example, is a cookie-based session object that maintains variables from page to page. Web pages with the ".asp" or file extension use ASP, although some Web sites disguise their choice of scripting language for security purposes. The ".aspx" extension is not an ASP page, but an ASP.NET page, another server-side scripting language from Microsoft, based on a mixture of traditional ASP, and microsoft's .NET technology. Microsoft Corporation, (NASDAQ: MSFT, HKSE: 4338) is a multinational computer technology corporation with global annual revenue of US$44. ... Server-side scripting is a web server technology in which a users request is fulfilled by running a script directly on the web server to generate dynamic HTML pages. ... Active Scripting (formerly known as ActiveX Scripting) is the technology used in Windows to implement component-based scripting support. ... Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS, formerly called Internet Information Server) is a set of Internet-based services for servers using Microsoft Windows. ... A website (alternatively, web site or Web site) is a collection of Web pages, images, videos or other digital assets that is hosted on one or more web servers, usually accessible via the Internet. ... In strictly mathematical branches of computer science the term object is used in a purely mathematical sense to refer to any thing. While this interpretation is useful in the discussion of abstract theory, it is not concrete enough to serve as a primitive datatype in the discussion of more concrete... In classical hypertext navigation occurs among static documents, and, for web users, this experience is reproduced using static web pages. ... This article is about the HTTP state mechanism. ... In computer science, in particular networking, a session is either a lasting connection using the session layer of a network protocol or a lasting connection between a user (or user agent) and a peer, typically a server, usually involving the exchange of many packets between the users computer and... In computer science and mathematics, a variable (pronounced ) (sometimes called an object or identifier in computer science) is a symbolic representation used to denote a quantity or expression. ... A filename extension or filename suffix is an extra set of (usually) alphanumeric characters that is appended to the end of a filename to allow computer users (as well as various pieces of software on the computer system) to quickly determine the type of data stored in the file. ... ASP.NET logo ASP.NET is a web application framework marketed by Microsoft that programmers can use to build dynamic web sites, web applications and XML web services. ... Microsoft . ...

Most ASP pages are written in VBScript, but any other Active Scripting engine can be selected instead by using the @Language directive or the <script language="language" runat="server"> syntax. JScript (Microsoft's implementation of ECMAScript) is the other language that is usually available. PerlScript (a derivative of Perl) and others are available as third-party installable Active Scripting engines. VBScript (short for Visual Basic Scripting Edition) is an Active Scripting language developed by Microsoft. ... Active Scripting (formerly known as ActiveX Scripting) is the technology used in Windows to implement component-based scripting support. ... JScript is the Microsoft implementation of the ECMAScript scripting programming language specification. ... ECMAScript is a scripting programming language, standardized by Ecma International in the ECMA-262 specification. ... PerlScript is an ActiveX Scripting Engine produced by the company ActiveState. ... For other uses, see Perl (disambiguation). ...

History

ASP was one of the first web application development environments that integrated web application execution directly into the web server. This was done in order to achieve high performance compared to calling external executable programs or CGI scripts which was the most popular method for writing web applications at the time it was introduced. Today there are additional platforms for web application development that are more common on other operating systems. Both JavaServer Pages and PHP are more commonly found on webservers running non-Microsoft operating systems, with PHP currently being the more common of the two. Also of note is ColdFusion, a popular Java technology running on several platforms including Microsoft servers as well as other platforms. CGI may mean: Computer-generated imagery, a film-making technology Common Gateway Interface, a technology used in web servers CGI.pm, a Perl module used for dealing with it CGI Group, a Canadian headquartered information management company (formerly ) Computer graphics interface, a low-level interface between the Graphical Kernel System... // JavaServer Pages (JSP) is a Java technology that allows software developers to dynamically generate HTML, XML or other types of documents in response to a Web client request. ... For other uses, see PHP (disambiguation). ... For other uses, see PHP (disambiguation). ... This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources. ...

Prior to Microsoft's release of ASP for IIS 3, programmers relied on IDC and HTX files combined with ODBC drivers to display and manipulate dynamic data and pages running on IIS. The basics of these file formats and structures were used, at least in part, in the implementation of the early versions of ASP.

InstantASP and ChilisoftASP are technologies that run ASP on platforms other than the Microsoft Windows Operating System. ChilisoftASP was purchased by Sun Microsystems and later renamed "Sun ONE Active Server Pages", then later renamed to "Sun Java System Active Server Pages". It appears that InstantASP is no longer available. There are large open source communities on the internet, such as ASPNuke, which produce ASP scripts, components and applications to be used free under certain license terms.

Versions

ASP has gone through three major releases:

• ASP version 1.0 (distributed with IIS 3.0) in December 1996
• ASP version 2.0 (distributed with IIS 4.0) in September 1997
• ASP version 3.0 (distributed with IIS 5.0) in November 2000

ASP 3.0 is currently available in IIS 6.0 on Windows Server 2003 and IIS 7.0 on Windows Server 2008.

ASP.NET is often confused as the newest release of ASP, but the technologies are very different. ASP.Net relies on the .Net Framework and is a compiled language, whereas ASP is strictly an interpreted scripting language. ASP.NET logo ASP.NET is a web application framework marketed by Microsoft that programmers can use to build dynamic web sites, web applications and XML web services. ... Microsoft . ...

The move from ASP 2.0 to ASP 3.0 was a relatively modest one. One of the most important additions was the Server.Execute methods, as well as the ASPError object.^[1] Microsoft's What's New in IIS 5.0 lists some additional changes.

There are solutions to run "Classic ASP" sites as standalone applications, such as ASPexplore, a software package that runs Microsoft Active Server Pages offline.

Sample usage

Several scripting languages may be used in ASP. However, the default scripting language (in classic ASP) is VBScript: VBScript (short for Visual Basic Scripting Edition) is an Active Scripting language developed by Microsoft. ...

Or in a simpler format

The examples above print "Hello World!" into the body of an HTML document.

Here's how to connect to an Access Database

^[2]

See also

• ASP.NET
• JSP
• PHP
• Adobe ColdFusion

ASP.NET logo ASP.NET is a web application framework marketed by Microsoft that programmers can use to build dynamic web sites, web applications and XML web services. ... // JavaServer Pages (JSP) is a Java technology that allows software developers to dynamically generate HTML, XML or other types of documents in response to a Web client request. ... For other uses, see PHP (disambiguation). ... ColdFusion is an application server and software development framework used for the development of computer software in general, and dynamic web sites in particular. ...

References

External links

Wikibooks has a book on the topic of

Active Server Pages

• Ajaxed ASP Ajax Library
• W3 Schools - ASP Tutorials on ASP and ASP.net programming.
• ASP101- ASP Code & Tutorial Website
• PowerASP - ASP Code & Tutorial Website
• Beginning Active Server Pages 3.0 - Online Wiki Book
• Apache::ASP, provides an Active Server Pages port to the Apache Web Server with Perl scripting only, and enables developing of dynamic web applications with session management and embedded Perl code. There are also extensions, including XML taglibs, XSLT rendering, and new events not originally part of the ASP API.