Web Development·11,944 discussions

Which standalone development framework to build a single page application?

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Tags: Web development, Windows

Using a Windows-based standalone framework, I’d like to create a single web page that performs several calculations and displays the results on the same page.

No server side programming. The page just needs to work in a browser.

As I don’t know HTML, I’d like to create the page via a forms designer — and use an easy language (JavaScript?) for the calculations.

I already have Visual Studio (Community 2022) and have used it recently to make a Windows C++ GUI application using Visual Studio’s form designer. It worked well; the hardest part was learning all the Visual Studio project options and packages needed to get started!

Since I have Visual Studio, and suspect it can create the above single page application, I have a slight preference for using it. But if another free Windows standalone framework is more appropriate, that would be fine also.

Any suggestions will be appreciated.

Thank you.

Topic

So many out there.

In reply to Which standalone development framework to build a single page application?

This sounds like you want a no or low code web app builder. The web won’t be required but since you want it to work in a browser we can’t avoid the use of the word “web.”

Here’s a few to research: https://www.google.com/search?&q=no+code+web+app+builder

I will not recommend one over the others because I don’t use these builders.

Reply To: Which standalone development framework to build a single page application?

In reply to So many out there.

Thank you, rproffitt.

Yes, I’d like a drop-and-drag web page designer in which my programming contribution is limited to inserting code (JavaScript?) into already created functions (e.g., to respond to a button click).

I’ve already looked a few builders that work that way (e.g., Calconic). But, so far, the ones I’ve found charge a per-use fee, which I’d like to avoid.

Even so, I appreciate your search suggestion, as it returned others that I didn’t know about, and will look into.

A related question:

In looking at Visual Studio, it appears that some project choices involve using C# and Visual Basic to create web pages. I can understand such use on the server side (which I won’t be using). But on the client side, my understanding is that browsers can handle JavaScript but not other high level languages.

Do these C# compilers produce JavaScript, or are such efforts used only for server side activities?

(I have a lot to learn!)

Thank you.

As to the question about C# and VB.net.

In reply to Reply To: Which standalone development framework to build a single page application?

1. About C# and VB.net:
Such code is almost always server side and is a app running on the server responding to a client’s web browser.

While I know about this (a bit too much actually) it requires a good understanding of HTML and maybe a lot more since we have the client load a web page, said web page queries the server and the C#/VB.net app responds.

You may hear the term FULL STACK DEVELOPER used in such systems as said programmer has skills in HTML, CSS, Javascript, maybe some database, web server setup and of course C# and VB.net. Said programmer usually has years of work put in to arrive at being called a Full Stack Developer.

2. C# and VB.net emits byte code that is then run by the .NET system. Maybe long ago Microsoft’s own Internet Explorer might have had other than Javascript capability but Microsoft’s lack of security doomed those ideas.

3. About the only other language I see that regularly ties in with a browser besides Javascript is Java but setup is required and not something I feel is worth doing 99% of the time.

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