Scott on Writing

Musings on technical writing...

Does the VS.NET Designer Hate Me?

This is more of a rant than anything else, but does anyone know why if I type in a Repeater in the HTML view in VS.NET 2003 like so:

<asp:Repeater Runat="server" ID="...">    
   <HeaderTemplate>
      <p><hr /></p>
   </HeaderTemplate>
   <ItemTemplate>
      ...
   </ItemTemplate>
   <SeparatorTemplate>
      <p><hr /></p>
 </SeparatorTemplate>
</asp:Repeater>

When I go to the Design view it gives me that “Error in Server Tag” message.  But, if I remove the HeaderTemplate and SeparatorTemplte's contents, then it works fine.  Why can't the Designer handle that simple bit of HTML?  What gives!?!

Ok, I feel better now.

posted on Friday, July 23, 2004 11:29 AM

Feedback

# re: Does the VS.NET Designer Hate Me? 7/23/2004 12:18 PM stephenpatten

It hates all of us!! Try using the frigging tab control and see how much it really loves you..back you code up w/ ultra edit

# RE: Does the VS.NET Designer Hate Me? 7/23/2004 12:50 PM Ryan Farley

Scott, it must hate me too. I've always wondered what that is about (so make sure you post the answer if you ever find it out)

# re: Does the VS.NET Designer Hate Me? 7/23/2004 12:58 PM Scott Mitchell

Ryan, I don't know *WHY* it behaves like a snotty brat, but I do know how I fixed it. I just used some data-binding expressions:

<asp:Repeater ...>
<HeaderTemplate>
<%# "<p><hr /></p>" %>
</HeaderTemplate>
...
</asp:Repeater>

Same output, and the VS.NET Designer plays nice.

# RE: Does the VS.NET Designer Hate Me? 7/23/2004 1:27 PM Steve

Is "Avoid Design Mode Like the Plague" a viable answer?

man, you'd think after Front Page's mucking of code and Interdev's pathetic "Design Mode", and on and on and on, that something actually usable would come out.... buuuut.....

At a MS conference that they showed off Whidbey (this was back in like January) and promised improvements to Design mode "so coders and designers can work alike".. i think there was a collective "yeah right" coming from the audience of hundreds

# re: Does the VS.NET Designer Hate Me? 7/23/2004 1:43 PM Scott Mitchell

Steve, I agree that the Designer is a royal pain. I usually do most of my page markup in the HTML view. I switch to the Design view primarily to get the protected Web control references injected into the code-behind class.

# re: Does the VS.NET Designer Hate Me? 7/23/2004 1:44 PM Ryan Farley

Doh! That makes sense, I should have tried that.

Anywa, thanks Scott.

# re: Does the VS.NET Designer Hate Me? 7/26/2004 3:06 PM chris

It also loves turning your CSS and HTML tags into uppercase, but randomnly. and Also you tag properties will suddenly erupt into camel case. Probably the most annoying bug (I'd say it was a bug) in vs.net 2002/2003.


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# re: Does the VS.NET Designer Hate Me? 8/23/2004 4:02 AM Rob

Or you just totally give up and do everything in code behind.

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