Uploading large files with ASP.NET: what are the best practices?

Question

What are, nowadays, the best practices for uploading a large file (which may cause a timeout) with ASP.NET Web Forms and/or MVC?

• Increase Server.ScriptTimeout (only for the specific POST request);
• Use some flash client-side uploader like swfupload ( http://swfupload.org ) or plupload ( http://www.plupload.com/ ), but Flash uploads have some issues with proxies;
• Use some gmail-like javascript ( like http://code.google.com/p/gwtupload/ )

Answer 1

The very best way that I have found for uploading large files is Darren Johnstone's File Upload Control.

It includes a progress bar, doesn't require flash, and gracefully handles the memory problems that can occur when uploading files through IIS.

It even contains a module for uploading files directly to SQL Server.

Answer 2

Every mayor component suite probably has an upload control. So if you already use such a component suite you can use one of those.

Make sure that whatever you use as an upload tool that it streams to IIS, and doesn't first upload it all to memory before writing it.