Maria,

We are mixing & matching, both WebForms and WinForms (app is not done yet, but it's getting there). The key is to use the UI *only* for the UI. Have everything else in the middle tier and use WebServices for transferring data between client-side and server-side. Somewhere along the line, there's an issue with Business rules that seem to belong both server-side and client-side, but that's solved by letting them be used in both places. The nice thing about .NET is that it can automatically download newer version .DLLs from the server when they change. Therefore, the WinForms actually do pull down the Business objects that they need client-side, and the WebForms don't need to do that, because everything is server-side for them anyway.

A very simplistic explanation, but my point is that there's no reason not to use both type of forms. As far as the zero-deployment issue with WebForms, that is true. However, with automatic downloading of .DLLs from the server-side, all that needs to be deployed on the client workstations is the .NET Framework and a small .EXE.

~~Bonnie



>Hi All,
>
>In my company we are considering to use .NET for the next version of some apps that we have.
>As they are VB-SQL Server based, and we have lots of VB developers, our choice will be VB.Net.
>
>But now, starting from zero, an interesting debate is going on: WinForms or WebForms?
>
>We have been talking for a while and there are good points in both sides and one strong requirement, we want one GUI. That requirement was born from our experience, some times, when something in the middle tier DLLs programmatic interface changed, our web app guys were not aware of that and the web front was broken or viceversa with our fat client.
>
>So WinForms have the richness of Windows, WebForms the zero deployment client advantage.
>Some of our customers are schools and they will like to give their students Web access to some information.
>I have read about WinForms Web deployment but not too deeply.
>
>What are you thoughts or -even better- experiences on this?
>Thanks in advace for your advice.
>
>Maria