Beginning ASP.NET 4: in C# and VB

Chapter 7. Navigation

WHAT YOU WILL LEARN IN THIS CHAPTER:

• How to move around in your site using server controls and plain HTML

• How to address pages and other resources like images

• How to use the ASP.NET Menu, TreeView, and SiteMapPath navigation controls

• How to programmatically send users from one page to another

When your site contains more than a handful of pages, it's important to have a solid and clear navigation structure that enables users to find their way around your site. By implementing a good navigation system, all the disconnected web pages in your project will form a complete and coherent web site.

When you think about important parts of a navigation system, the first thing that you may come up with is a menu. Menus come in all sorts and sizes, ranging from simple and static HTML links to complex, fold-out menus driven by CSS or JavaScript. But there's more to navigation than menus alone. ASP.NET comes with a number of useful navigation controls that enable you to set up a navigation system in no time. These controls include the Menu, TreeView, and SiteMapPath, which you learn about in this chapter.

Besides visual controls like Menu, navigation is also about structure. A well-organized site is easy for your users to navigate. The Web.sitemap file that is used by the navigation controls helps you define the logical structure of your site.

Another important part of navigation takes place at the server. Sending a user from one page to another in Code Behind based on some condition ...