title: Architecture for new ASP.NET web application
body: <p>I'm maintaining an application which currently is just a web service (built with WCF) and a database backend. The web service is built in layers with a linq-to-sql data access part with core functionality in an own assembly and on top of that the web service assembly which contains the WCF code. The core assembly also handles all business logic rules (very few actually).</p>
  
  <p>The customer now wants a Web interface for the application instead of just accessing it through other applications which are consuming the web service. I'm quite lost on modern web application design, so I would like some advice on what architecture and frameworks to use for the web application. The web application will be using the same core assembly with business rules and the linq-to-sql data access layer as the web service. </p>
  
  <p>Some concepts I've thought about are:</p>
  
  <ul>
  <li>ASP.NET MVC (or MVC-2)</li>
  <li>Webforms</li>
  <li>AJAX controls - possibly leting the AJAX controls access the existing web service through JSON.</li>
  </ul>
  
  <p><strong>Are there any more concepts I should look into? Which one is the best for a fresh project?</strong></p>
  
  <p>The development tools are Visual Studio 2008 Team Edition for Developers targeting .NET 3.5. An upgrade to Visual Studio 2010 Premium (or maybe even Ultimate) is possible if it gives any benefits.</p>