Question
I want to make a web based application so that we can make booking of a car in the gantt chart and that chart should be database driven.When we want to change the booking we should be able to work from the chart itself,so that we can drag and change the colour bars.Will it be possible?How much will it cost?
Answer
Interactivity on the web is hard. You have three major paths to chose from:
1. Integrate the windows forms control into IE. This is the similair to how ClickOnce applications work.
2. use a basic html compliant solution with Gantt_ASP
3. Use a lot of client side java script functionality in the browser and get info from the server asynchrounsly. aka Ajax.
Pros and cons:
1. pros: full interaction, you can use .NET and high level languages to develop your stuff
1. cons: it works in IE (96% of all browsers), it does not work on Mac/Linux
2. pros: works everywhere even on java enabled browser phones and wireless devices
2. cons: html basically sucks big time on interactivity. You need to work with server postbacks and bring up dialogs to change and update the information
3. pros: You may get what you are looking for in parts of better interactivity, and you can get it to work on all major browsers
3. cons: your solution code is partly in the browser and partly on the server. Your environment has gone from crisp clear to very complex.
Solution 1, and 2 you can start with today with GTP.NET, it will cost you one developer seat license per developer that will work with this part of the system -> good price.
We are very intrested with solution number 3 as well and we are looking into the microsoft approach Atlas to handle Ajax implementations. This is not done, and we have no real good ETA.