The final version of ASP.NET AJAX was released today. We are very pleased to simultaneously announce the immediate availability of the full production version of ComponentArt Web.UI for ASP.NET AJAX. Taking those "beta" signs off our ASP.NET AJAX product line felt really good!
Developing for various technology preview and beta builds of "Atlas" / ASP.NET AJAX has been quite an experience. It all started at the PDC 2005 conference where Microsoft showed off the first prototypes of their new framework. I remember that Phil, Jovan, Milos, and myself were there, but we were not allowed to enter Nikhil's presentation on Atlas because we were exhibitors and had only one attendee pass. We sat on the floor just outside of the conference room, where we were sort of able to follow the presentation on one of the screens.
In the coming months we were thinking hard about our role as a component vendor, and the best way to add value to the platform. We were very impressed by the early CTP builds of Atlas, so we made a somewhat risky move to put most of our development resources on building a suite of UI controls for a framework that hadn't even reached the beta stage. Our assessment was that the release of Atlas would be a game-changing event of magnitude comparable to the release of ASP.NET itself.
That decision meant developing against a (rapidly) moving target. Microsoft promised that they would change designs and implementation details on the go, and they sure kept that promise. One of the most drastic shifts was the famous Beta 1 release. I blogged about our experience upgrading to Beta 1 here.
Developing against such early builds of a framework is not a simple task, not only because things tend to change a lot, but also because resources are so incredibly scarce. You can't buy a book and learn all about it. Forget about handy reference manuals. In the early days, our only resources were blogs of various dedicated Atlas team members, as well as the source code of the product itself.
Somewhere in the middle of 2006 ComponentArt became a part of the "ASP.NET AJAX Develop Program", designed to engage early adopters of this technology. We were able to attend various technical sessions in Redmond, as well as get preview builds of the framework well before they were available to general public. Yes - we finally got our revenge. Take that, Mr. PDC05 security officer!
The flip side of all the challenges was a highly rewarding sense of accomplishment as we saw things come together in the last quarter of 2006. We were determined to bring something new and significant to this changing market, and to try to ship at the same time as the framework itself is released. The result of our work is the industry's first commercial suite of UI controls built on top of the ASP.NET AJAX component model. The client-side capabilities and the level of client-side programmatic control offered by ComponentArt Web.UI for ASP.NET AJAX far exceed that of any UI library (for any framework) that we are aware of:
- Watch the Web.UI for ASP.NET AJAX Video
We are very excited about ComponentArt's unique position in the AJAX space. Instead of creating yet another proprietary AJAX framework that duplicates functionality found in ASP.NET AJAX, we have embraced Microsoft's new technology and created something that every AJAX framework needs: true client-side UI controls.
Starting today, our customers have a best-of-breed AJAX development framework in ASP.NET AJAX, and best-of-breed UI controls in ComponentArt Web.UI for ASP.NET AJAX. This is a truly exciting moment!
