Asp.Net State Management

Asp.Net State Management can be done using various ways and in this post I'll discuss a comparative analysis of all the state management techniques. ASP.NET offers a number of places to store state, both on the client and server. However, sometimes it's difficult to decide where you should put things and how to make that decision.

A new instance of the Web page class is created each time the page is posted to the server. In traditional Web programming, this would typically mean that all information associated with the page and the controls on the page would be lost with each round trip. For example, if a user enters information into a text box, that information would be lost in the round trip from the browser or client device to the server.

HTTP is a stateless protocol. Once the server serves any request from the user, it cleans up all the resources used to serve that request. These resources include the objects created during that request, the memory allocated during that request, etc. If anyone whom comming from a background of Windows application development, this could come as a big surprise because there is no way he could rely on objects and member variables alone to keep track of the current state of the application.

You choices for state management include:

• Application      - Stored on the server and shared for all users. Does not expire(Deprecated by Cache)
• Cache              - Stored on the server and shared for all users. Can expire.
• Session            - Stored on the server.  Unique for each user.  Can expire.
• ViewState        - Stored in a hidden page input (by default).  Does not expire.
• Cookies           - Stored at the client. Can expire.
• QueryString    - Passed in the URL.  Must be maintained with each request.
• Context.Items - Only lasts for one request's lifetime.  More.
• Profile             - Stores the data in the database. Can be used to retain user data over multiple request and session.

If we have to track the users' information between page visits and even on multiple visits of the same page, then we need to use the State management techniques provided by ASP.NET. State management is the process by which ASP.NET let the developers maintain state and page information over multiple request for the same or different pages.

There are mainly two types of state management that ASP.NET provides:

1.Client side state management
2.Server side state management

Client side state management techniques :

• View State
• Control State
• Hidden fields
• Cookies
• Query Strings

Server side state management techniques :

• Application State
• Session State
• Profile Properties

The following sections describe options for state management that involve storing information either in the page or on the client computer. For these options, no information is maintained on the server between round trips.

View State :

The ViewState property provides a dictionary object for retaining values between multiple requests for the same page. This is the default method that the page uses to preserve page and control property values between round trips.

Control State :

The ControlState property allows you to persist property information that is specific to a control and cannot be turned off like the ViewState property.

Hidden Fields :

ASP.NET allows you to store information in a HiddenField control, which renders as a standard HTML hidden field. A hidden field does not render visibly in the browser, but you can set its properties just as you can with a standard control. When a page is submitted to the server, the content of a hidden field is sent in the HTTP form collection along with the values of other controls. A hidden field acts as a repository for any page-specific information that you want to store directly in the page.

Cookies :

A cookie is a small amount of data that is stored either in a text file on the client file system or in-memory in the client browser session. It contains site-specific information that the server sends to the client along with page output. Cookies can be temporary or persistent.

Query Strings :

Query strings provide a simple but limited way to maintain state information. For example, they are an easy way to pass information from one page to another, such as passing a product number from one page to another page where it will be processed. However, some browsers and client devices impose a 2083-character limit on the length of the URL.

ASP.NET offers you a variety of ways to maintain state information on the server, rather than persisting information on the client. With server-based state management, you can decrease the amount of information sent to the client in order to preserve state, however it can use costly resources on the server.

Application State :

ASP.NET allows you to save values using application state — which is an instance of the HttpApplicationState class — for each active Web application. Application state is a global storage mechanism that is accessible from all pages in the Web application. Thus, application state is useful for storing information that needs to be maintained between server round trips and between requests for pages.

Session State :

Session state is similar to application state, except that it is scoped to the current browser session. If different users are using your application, each user session will have a different session state. In addition, if a user leaves your application and then returns later, the second user session will have a different session state from the first.

Profile Properties :

ASP.NET provides a feature called profile properties, which allows you to store user-specific data. This feature is similar to session state, except that the profile data is not lost when a user's session expires. The profile-properties feature uses an ASP.NET profile, which is stored in a persistent format and associated with an individual user.

The ASP.NET profile allows you to easily manage user information without requiring you to create and maintain your own database. In addition, the profile makes the user information available using a strongly typed API that you can access from anywhere in your application. You can store objects of any type in the profile. The ASP.NET profile feature provides a generic storage system that allows you to define and maintain almost any kind of data while still making the data available in a type-safe manner.