ASP.NET MVC 3 Preview 1 -- safe to use?

Question

MVC 3 Preview 1 just released a few days ago.

My designer isn't too familiar with C#, so ASPX view pages are sort of overwhelming for him. Razor would really help him focus on the HTML.

Considering MVC3 seems to be an incremental compatible update, it feels like it's good to go.

Usually it's considered harmful to use preview products in production, but lately I'm seeing a fair amount of it, with F# being used in banks before V1 and stuff.

Has anyone tried MVC 3 yet? Is it sturdy enough to start a project on it?

Answer 1

I wouldn't use any Preview release in a Production environment, it doesn't go through the same level of testing as even a beta release does.

Is it safe (in production), not probably not, there are unknown bugs, more than would be present in a final/tested product. Is it safe to start developing a product on that probably won't be out until after MVC 3 final is? Sure go nuts :) But, expect a few API adjustments along the way.

It's the same reason most larger shops wait until SP1 of a product before deploying, more time for bugs to be found/fixed. That being said, it's totally up to you and how much risk/reward you're willing to go for.

Personally I'd wait until at least a beta, but if you're entering log-term development on a product, starting with a Preview may be more acceptable to you (I have to admit, more use of the Razor engine is a pretty good reason for that, again if it were me).

Answer 2

It is a preview, that is, not close to production ready.

If you want to develop on it, hoping it will go into production by the time you launch, go ahead, but remember that things are likely to change, sometimes large changes sometimes subtle ones (the subtle ones are the harder ones to figure out...).

If it was me, I would wait.

Answer 3

Still there is a pretty big difference in asp.net mvc 1 preview 1 and asp.net mvc 3 preview 1 as asp.net mvc 3 preview 1 builds on top of asp.net mvc 2 RTM. Using mvc3 spesific features could be risky of course but you could control your use of those. I am going to switch to MVC3 to use Razor views for my new mobile views.

Answer 4

In addition to the obvious risk involved in using any "Preview" software in production, I can tell you that MVC 3 Preview 1 does indeed have a couple of bugs that would be considered regression bugs (they worked in MVC 2, but now are broken). These bugs include:

• DisplayName attribute is broken -- your model's property name will be displayed instead of any value you provided via DisplayName.

• While I'm not sure if this is a bug or just weirdness with my particular configuration, but my usage of strongly typed models is even broken -- when I use <%: Model.MyProperty %>, I get the following compiler error (and runtime compilation error):

Compiler Error Message: CS1061: 'object' does not contain a definition for 'MyProperty' and no extension method 'MyProperty' accepting a first argument of type 'object' could be found (are you missing a using directive or an assembly reference?)

Answer 5

If you're ok with the possibility of running into a bug that might not be resolved for months (if at all), or the possibility of having to recode certain portions of your application, then yes it's ready.

I have no problem starting projects with ASP.NET MVC 3 PR1, but nothing I'm writing with it is mission critical. And nothing needs immediate deployment.