Visual Studio 2013
Introduction
Visual Studio 2013 allows web development using 3 different
approached, Web Pages, Web Forms
and MVC.
There is a free version of the software suitable for each approach, or
you can purchase the complete Visual Studio 2013 which contains MVC
and Web Forms in one package. To help you choose please view the
video,
Choosing the Right Programming Model
from the asp.net web site.
Web Pages (Web Matrix)
Web Pages (or Web Matrix as the application is called uses the same
syntax to provide dynamic database driven web sites as MVC, however
it uses a much simpler and easy to use user interface. Watch a
3 Minute Introduction to ASP.NET Web Pages
on the asp.net web site.
To install Web Matrix use the Microsoft Web Platform Installer 4.5, this
is illustrated in the video
Install and Use the Microsoft WebMatrix Tool
MVC
MVC offers the most advanced approach to web development but is
better suited to those who already understand how to program in
an Object-Oriented way. It does however provide good integration
with HTML5, CSS3, Javascript and jQuery. Watch the video a
5 Minute Introduction to ASP.NET MVC
.
To see how to install Visual Studio Express (for VB or C#) look at the first
MVC Pluralsight Video
(Introduction) to be shown the installation process
Web Forms
This approach is based on a rich set of web controls which can be visualy dragged into a web page, and hooked up to a database. Event handlers can then be written in C#, of VB to handle all the user interface requests.
It is easier to use than MVC, and offers a very quick way of developing sophistocated user interfaces, however it does not integrate as well with HTML, CSS and Javascript.
See the video
Intro to ASP.NET Web Forms.
To see how to install
Visual Studio Web Developer
goto the
Web Forms front page,
and then look at the first Pluralsight Video, Introduction to ASP.NET.