| A1: | A static web page has static content, whereas a dynamic web page's content is generated each time the page is requested. The dynamic content is typically generated from user input, database data, or some combination of the two. For example, the official website for the National Basketball Association (www.NBA.com) lists the teams' schedules, the ongoing games' scores, players' statistics, and so on. The web pages simply display the content from some database that is updated after each game. A search engine site like Google displays dynamic content based on both its database of websites and the visitor's search term. |
| A2: | The ASP.NET Development Web Server is designed specifically for testing ASP.NET version 2.0 web pages locally. If you move your website to a web-hosting company, it uses different web server software. Most likely, it uses Microsoft's Internet Information Server (IIS), which is a professional-grade web server designed to work with Microsoft's dynamic web technologiesASP and ASP.NET. If you are running Windows 2000, Windows XP Professional, or Windows 2003, IIS may already be installed on your computer. If not, you can install it by going to Start, Settings, Control Panel, Add or Remove Programs, and clicking on the Add/Remove Windows Components option. I encourage you not to install IIS and to instead use the ASP.NET Development Web Server unless you are familiar with IIS and know how to administer and secure it. The ASP.NET Development Web Server is more secure because it allows only incoming web requests from the local computer; IIS, on the other hand, is a full-blown web server and, unless properly patched and administered, can be an attack vector for malicious hackers. |
