To Mark-up or not to Mark-up . . . That Is The Question

I can't stand it when people use Label controls to populate their ASP.NET pages with markup, like this:

Anytime you see someone using StringBuilders to generate lines upon lines of HTML, you just know that it's procedural, not object-oriented code and (b) it's going to be unmaintainable spaghetti code after they're done.  They are PHP/ASP programmers in ASP.NET programmers' clothing.

Use the intrinsic HtmlControls and WebControls to generate your markup:

or

A suitable but more advanced alternative would be to learn how to write your own server-side controls.  Here is a crude example, but the gist of the suggestion here is that you want to make reusable code that has a semantically useful presence in your ASP.NET markup and (b) provides some sort of Visual Studio/Expression Studio design-time experience.

using System;
using System.ComponentModel;
using System.Web;
using System.Web.UI;

namespace MyControlLib
{
    [DefaultProperty("Text")]
    public class MyAnchor : System.Web.UI.Control
    {
        public MyAnchor()
            : base()
        {
            Href = "javascript:void(0)";
            Text = "Link";
        }

        [DefaultValue("javascript:void(0)")]
        public string Href
        {
            get { return (string)ViewState["href"] ?? string.Empty; }
            set { ViewState["href"] = value; }
        }

        [DefaultValue("Link")]
        public string Text
        {
            get { return (string)ViewState["Text"] ?? string.Empty; }
            set { ViewState["Text"] = value; }
        }

        protected override void Render(HtmlTextWriter writer)
        {
            base.Render(writer);

            bool inDebugMode = HttpContext.Current == null;

            writer.WriteBeginTag("A");
            writer.WriteAttribute("href", Href, true);
            writer.Write(HtmlTextWriter.TagRightChar);
            writer.Write(string.IsNullOrEmpty(Text) && inDebugMode) ? string.Format("[{0}]", ID) : Text);
            writer.WriteEndTag("A");
        }
    }
}

In the markup, it would look like this:

<%@ Register Assembly="MyControlLib" Namespace="MyControlLib" TagPrefix="cc" %>
<cc:MyAnchor ID="MyAnchor1" runat="server" />

Using StringBuilders is the semantic equivalent of using document.writeln()-style JavaScript to build Web pages. It's an unreadable, unmaintainable mess where your ideas are expressed with crude, long-winded, ill-suited metaphors rather than clear, concise language.

UserControls are another great way to develop your own custom server-side controls without having to "live in the code-behind."

cheong wrote:

Those classes can be easily extended by using <Control>.Attributes.Add() for any new properties. There's little need to write your own UserControl to replace them as Validation/Customization for <a> tags are rarely needed.

JohnnyAwesome wrote:

Oh and JChung, I don't think .NEt newbies would even use StringBuilder. It would much more like string s = "";