We are planning to use DotNetNuke as the framework for our upcoming custom ASP.NET application (Visual Studio 2008, .NET Framework 3.5, SQL Server 2005).  We will have approximately 30-40 custom pages with complex code behinds using our other tiers (data, business).  We would like these pages to follow the same skin as the DNN application with the same look and feel.  I understand we could create modules instead of pages and just drop those modules into the content frames inside DNN, but this seems like a lot of extra work and headache as opposed to creating pages.  The pages will be single-use and not multi-use and modules are intended to be.  We do need to maintain a DNN front-end to our site for the content management functionality.

My questions are:

1. Is there a way to create a base page or master page that we can use to follow the DNN skins and not impede any future DNN upgrades?  Any examples or instructions?
2. Would we be better to just create our own master page to look like DNN and just host these custom pages in a separate web and refer to them from our front-end DNN site?
3. Is there a better approach within DNN?

Thanks so much for any and all help!

Tom

Tom,

Converting special pages or creating special functionality in a DotNetNuke environment isn't as difficult as it might seem at first glance.

If you are building pages that interact minimally with the DotNetNuke framework, but included functions and access to other database, then turning them into DotNetNuke modules isn't a big issue at all.  Add to that the fact that you can take advantage of the DotNetNuke-provided services like authentication, skinning, etc. and you're on your way.  If you aren't going to take advantage of DotNetNuke's offerings, it's almost as easy as editing a few lines in the page and codebehind file to inherit from the DotNetNuke module classes.

Take a look at stockcentral.com.  Virtually all of the "tools" and "data" pages are adaptations of other functionality into DotNetNuke.  We do need to go back and make a couple of them more "compliant" with the DotNetNuke architecture, but you probably can't tell.

Spend a little time with Michael Washinton's tutorials, and you're well on your way!