Testing ASP (and other technologies) without a web server?

dboundy · 19 Dec 2006 at 04:12

How do I do this?

I really want to get stuck in with ASP and other web technologies, but there's one slight problem. I can't test them online as I don't have server space and can't afford it.

Is there anyway to test websites/applications offline on the computer I create them on without using Microsoft's IIS (I always have problems with it installing).

Thanks.

Defiled · 19 Dec 2006 at 09:17

Well Microsoft's free Visual Web Developer comes with an ASP.NET development web server. Unfortunately, it's only good enough for testing and development, but that sounds just what you're after.

Edit: Just remember that ASP.NET is very different to ASP - but imo a much better language to go for if you're learning from scratch.

Mel_P · 23 Dec 2006 at 12:09

Doesn't the ASP.net server use IIS ?

toString · 23 Dec 2006 at 12:33

Defiled · 23 Dec 2006 at 12:54

Mel_P said:
Doesn't the ASP.net server use IIS ?

The ASP.net development server does *not* use IIS. It's it's own webserver.

However, it's true that the ASP.net production environment requires IIS.

dboundy · 26 Dec 2006 at 00:55

Any other ways to do this other than using IIS?

Mel_P · 26 Dec 2006 at 11:55

Does Dreamweaver has a "server" - but not sure if it runs ASP.NET - I am pretty sure it needs IIS as they are both microsoft items.

sist_si · 27 Dec 2006 at 16:08

For ASP (classic):
If you have Windows 2000 or XP Pro then you should be able to install IIS and run all your websites on your local machine.
Any extra components you use in the sites such as file uploader's etc, you'll need to install them on your local machine to use them. ASPUpload gives you a 30 day trial I think so others will prob do a similar vibe.

ASP.NET 2:
From my fairly limited experience to date, it would seem that Visual Studio compiles and debugs your website wherever it is saved on your computer which is a nice little feature. It is far more self reliant...very impressive from what I've used.
I'm not sure if you still need IIS installed for that but it's not too bad as it's standard with 2000 and XP Pro.

Alternativley, you can probably find a host that'll let you have some free webspace and test your sites online. I've not had to do this for years myself but one of the old examples of this was Brinkster.com

Hope that helps anyway!

nolimit · 27 Dec 2006 at 20:45

You don't need IIS installed to view and test your ASP.NET2 with Visual Web Developer.

Zaphan58 · 28 Dec 2006 at 13:26

If you want to play with PHP/SQL you can use easy php or xampp Ive used them both in the past and both worked fine and are easy to use.