Learning to create web applications using ASP.NET (MVC) with C# in Visual Studio and with Entity Framework has had a beneficial side effect, which I hadn't realised until this last week -- I can now easily write "native" Windows apps too!

Until now I've been using Visual Web Developer 2010 Express, which only lets you create web applications. But, I have recently downloaded Visual C# Express 2010 Express with which you can create Windows Forms applications.

Windows Forms apps run on top of the .NET Framework. Like Java apps which run on top of the JRE. But Windows Forms apps look just like you'd expect a Windows app to. You know the kind of thing - something simple like this:

What surprised me was how easy it is to create a Windows app using the knowledge I've picked up while making Web apps in ASP.NET. Lots of what you use is the same. There's C# for starters, then there's the Entity Framework concept of data access, app.config and settings files. In short the IDE is just the same. You just have a different target.

When downloading Visual C# Express you get the option to download SQL Server CE (compact edition). This lets you use a lightweight (distributable) database with your apps (a bit like using SQLite with Adobe AIR).

When you package the app you've made you can tell the installer that it needs SQL Server CE and it will download it via the web when your users run your "setup.exe" for the first time (assuming they don't have it already). Same goes for the .NET framework itself. Your install files are generally a few hundred Kb in size.

All in all it's a surprisingly straight-forward and hassle-free process making, packaging and distributing a database-drive Windows application. I've been pleasantly surprised. There's no need to be scared of the prospect of going "native".

Why Am I Writing Windows Apps In This Day and Age?

Writing a Windows app!? Yeah, I know. But there's good reason.

I like to think of myself a "go to" person. Come to me with any IT-related requirement and I'll do whatever it takes to meet those requirements using the best-suited solution.

When a customer comes to me with a requirement which is obviously suited to a custom Windows app I'm not about to walk away and turn down their money because "I'm a web developer" and "I don't do that sort of thing".

Without going in to too much detail I have a requirement from an Event Photographer who can process tens of 1,000s of photos at any given event. They need a streamlined way of importing from memory cards of the various photographers at the event in to one central PC. The process renames and catalogues the files. It also needs to print out contact sheets of the imported images and categorise according to where at the event they were taken. Only a Windows app is going be able to do this.

What Am I Getting At?

My point here is that any time you spend getting to grips with developing ASP.NET web apps inside the Visual Studio environment is time well spent as those skills are transferable and allow you to make Windows apps, should the need arise.