I have been debating whether or not to use ASP.Net WinForms to manage content on a website.
Some of the content on this website is already managed through a web application and has thousands of users worldwide managing their own content.
The addition of WinForms would be for specific content that would be managed by Staff, mostly in a central office location but sometimes out of office.
A click once application would allow the application to be run on windows machines anywhere (I assume.)
What would the pros and cons be with this sort of approach?
Being a web designer it seems ludicrous to me that a content management application for web content could be built as a Windows desktop Application. (And it doesnt help that I wont be able to use it on my Mac unless I install Windows…)
But again, I am no expert, thats why I am asking.
You seem skeptical, so lets ask from the other direction: Why would you want to write such an application in Winforms to begin with? What are you trying to achieve which can’t be done via a web app?
Several possibilities come to mind:
Richer editing canvas /w features such as image manipulation and spell-check. These are typically easier to implement in desktop applications.
performance intensive algorithms which aren’t feasible in JS
Integration /w existing desktop applications such as MS Office or Powerpoint.
Integration /w hardware devices (tablets, touch devices, etc)
Offline support (doable via browser but involves much more pain)
So, assuming you need one or more of the above, the next question would be – why Winforms? .Net provides newer, better alternatives such as WPF and Silverlight, both of which are much closer to the web design paradigm and will likely be easier for a web developer to pick up. Not to mention that Silverlight can also be hosted in a browser for a hybrid experience.
This is just the tip of the iceberg, if you can provide additional info we can continue the discussion in more depth…