Chapter 4. Data Access

Data access is one of the most common tasks that you're likely to perform when you write web applications. This is made evident by the number of new data controls that ship with Visual Studio 2005. Most visible in ASP.NET 2.0 is the new GridView control, which is a much improved version of the venerable DataGrid control (the older DataGrid control is still supported in ASP.NET 2.0, though). In addition, ASP.NET 2.0 ships with several new data source controls that make it easier to consume a variety of data sources.