Chapter 9. .NET and Mobile Devices

The increased use by employees of devices other than traditional PCs and laptops, such as personal digital assistants (PDAs) and web-enabled phones, has increased pressure on corporate IT departments to open corporate databases and intranets to a range of non-standard devices. The explosion in use of these devices, and the proliferation of embedded systems and specialized network protocols, has made it important for developers to design their applications in ways that keep it independent of the clients that will access it.

.NET embraces mobile device users and offers developers tools to meet their needs in two ways:

ASP.NET Mobile Controls

Mobile Controls are web server controls that dynamically generate code that renders web content appropriately on devices such as web-enabled phones and PDAs as well as traditional web browsers.

.NET Compact Framework

The .NET Compact Framework is a version of the .NET Platform that runs on Windows CE or Pocket PC mobile devices and can be used to develop clients and applications that run on the devices themselves.

Both ASP.NET Mobile Controls and the .NET Compact Framework are supported by Visual Studio .NET 2003.^[1]

^[1] In Version 1.0 of the .NET Framework, you have to download separate packages to write ASP.NET mobile applications or applications for smart devices.