Custom Programming

The following is a list of the programming, scripting languages and technologies we use to develop web and desktop applications:

• Microsoft Active Server Pages (ASP)
• .NET
• PHP Hypertext Preprocessor (PHP)
• JavaScript
• HyperText Markup Language (HTML)
• Cascading Style Sheets (CSS)
• Structured Query Language (SQL)
• Extensible Markup Language (XML)
• Asynchronous JavaScript and XML (AJAX)
• Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP)
• Web Services

Microsoft Active Server Pages (ASP) is a server-side scripting environment that you can use to create and run dynamic, interactive Web server applications. With ASP, you can combine HTML pages, script commands, and COM components to create interactive Web pages or powerful Web-based applications.
The Microsoft

.NET Framework is a software technology that is available with several Microsoft Windows operating systems. It includes a large library of pre-coded solutions to common programming problems and a virtual machine that manages the execution of programs written specifically for the framework. The .NET Framework is a key Microsoft offering and is intended to be used by most new applications created for the Windows platform.

PHP is a scripting language originally designed for producing dynamic web pages. It has evolved to include a command line interface capability and can be used in standalone graphical applications

JavaScript is a simple scripting language for Web pages that allows such interactive features as input checking, personalization, current date and time, navigation menus, swapping images on the client side and other special effects on Web pages.

HyperText Markup Language (HTML) is a simple markup system used to create hypertext documents that are portable from one platform to another. HTML documents are SGML documents with generic semantics that are appropriate for representing information from a wide range of applications. HTML markup can represent hypertext news, mail, documentation, and hypermedia; menus of options; database query results; simple structured documents with in-lined graphics; and hypertext views of existing bodies of information.

Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) is designed to control how HTML documents are displayed in the browser. CSS is used with HTML to achieve the an easy and fast way to change and manipulate HTML properties on future updates giving a superior level of control over the look and feel of the web site.

Structured Query Language (SQL) is used to communicate with a database. It is the standard language for relational database management systems. SQL statements are used to perform tasks such as update data or retrieve data. Some of the relational database management systems that we use with SQL are: Microsoft SQL Server, Access, Oracle.

XML (Extensible Markup Language) is a standard data format used for text files and information in computer memory that allows easy data processing and exchange between different web applications.

AJAX (asynchronous JavaScript and XML), or AJAX, is a group of interrelated web development techniques used for creating interactive web applications or rich Internet applications. With Ajax, web applications can retrieve data from the server asynchronously in the background without interfering with the display and behavior of the existing page. Data is retrieved using the XML Http Request object or through the use of Remote Scripting in browsers that do not support it. Despite the name, the use of JavaScript and XML is not required, and they do not have to be used asynchronously.

SOAP is a protocol specification for invoking methods on servers, services, components and objects. SOAP codifies the existing practice of using XML and HTTP as a method invocation mechanism. The SOAP specification mandates a small number of HTTP headers that facilitate firewall/proxy filtering. The SOAP specification also mandates an XML vocabulary that is used for representing method parameters, return values, and exceptions.

Web Services is the umbrella term of group of loosely related Web-based resources and components that may be used by other Web applications over HTTP. Those resources could include anything from phone directory data to weather data to sports results.