Front and Center: Developing ASP.NET with Web Matrix

So you want to try your hand at developing some ASP.NET pages, but you don't have a lot of money to invest in Visual Studio .NET? Microsoft has made it easy for you to get started without spending a dime. ASP.NET Web Matrix is a free ASP.NET development tool that makes developing ASP.NET pages much easier than writing them all by hand. It's not nearly as robust as Visual Studio .NET, but it is a great way to get started with ASP.NET.

You can get Web Matrix free from http://webmatrix.frontpagelink.com. Once installed, the Help menu provides quick links to documentation on Web Matrix and Microsoft's .NET Framework.

Web Matrix doesn't have many of the features that make Visual Studio .NET or FrontPage easier to use. For example, Web Matrix doesn't provide any IntelliSense support for ASP.NET code. It also doesn't provide a user interface for easy configuration of many of the properties of ASP.NET controls. However, it is quite a bit easier to develop with Web Matrix than it is with Notepad or another text editor.