Alternative asp.net MVC viewing engines

Question

I was wondering if there was a general consensus on the “best” alternative viewing mechanism for asp.net MVC. So far I know about Spark, Braille, NHaml, but what about the others?

Answer 1

I would suggest that you take each of the above View Engines, write a presentation, and see what works best for you. You may find that the choice of View Engine changes for different applications or even for different types of views.

If you are returning HTML to your client, perhaps an engine like Spark. However, if the end you are returning is XML or other markup (like JSON), then Spark will not be very useful. NHaml is also focused on XHTML generation.

See how you want to test your views, the set of skills of your engineers (both developers and testers), the level of support that you hope to get from your author Engine Engine (if you find errors, as you want, bug fixes) and whether your customer any preferences.

Basically - try a few, see what you like, use a mixture of them if you find that it makes sense.

Oh, and here is a good post listing 4 alternative engines ...

http://codebetter.com/blogs/jeffrey.palermo/archive/2008/01/27/mvccontrib-now-offers-four-4-alternative-view-engines-for-asp-net-mvc.aspx

... he mentions the XSLT engine, which might be suitable if you want to create XML.

Answer 2

There is no “better” alternative in software. It always depends on your background, the company you work for, your preferences, your tastes, etc.

Just choose what works best for you for the current project. If you are not sure, choose a safe path, MS way :)

Answer 3

StringTemplate is a decent alternative.

Here's a ViewEngine (with source) and some tutorials .

Answer 4

When making a decision, also make sure that you consider the level of skills and experience in the team.

If you have developers new to mvc, then they are going to find a lot more books, examples, and solutions if they use the default mechanism. This does not mean that it is “the best” or the most productive, but it can provide the fastest time for new developers.