ASP.NET Master Page & Containers

Question

I have been using ASP.NET MVC for the past few months, after successfully ignoring ASP.NET for years. I have a (simple) MVC site where I have used a Master Page for the overall look, then, in the content pages, called RenderPartial on subpages with their own Master Pages to give the subcontent a consistent Container style.

I need to shift this site to ASP.NET (not MVC), but can't work out how to mimic this behavior. If I use the subcontent as User Controls, they don't work through Master Pages, but I can't use them as Pages (they must inherit from UserControl).

Sorry if this is a bit vague, but if anyone thinks they know what I'm after and can help, I'd be grateful. Thanks.

Answer 1

If your condition is with groups of pages with similiar child content layout you should look into Nested Master Pages. So you can have secondary Master Pages built on top of the original.

If you are using one additional Master Page for each page then you should probably consider refactoring your code to use a Content Page for each child page where they all use the same Master. Then you are only replacing the content placeholder with your specific content for each page, where a user control could be placed into the ContentPlaceholder.

Sorry my answer goes in 2 directions but the question was a little vague. Hope this provides some help.