ASP.NET <%# versus <%

Question

I'm working on various asp.net pages .

For inline functions I do see 2 different formats are used:

Example 1:

<p><%Response.Write(now())%></p>

I also see another one with #:

Example 2:

<Asp:TextBox id="Textbox5" width="40" Text='<%# DataBinder.Eval(Container.DataItem, "Name") %>' runat="server" />

I want to know what is the exact different , <%# vs <%

How did you guys found the duplicates??? I wonder when I was asking this question , those duplicates did Not show under "Questions that may already have your answer" I also did a search but no similar results. — , Jul 17 '13 at 16:06
Give it a try Search for <%# vs <% no related results. Search for <%# no results!!! — , Jul 17 '13 at 16:10
No big deal about not seeing existing answers to your question. I had the post I linked bookmarked. I think I stumbled onto it from google not that long ago. It's good to see answers on stackoverflow show up at the top of your search results on google. — Ross, Jul 17 '13 at 16:21
I found it by searching google for "ASP.net code blocks". searching for symbols is very difficult. — Jason P, Jul 17 '13 at 16:37

score 4 · Accepted Answer · edited May 23 '17 at 12:21

4

Here is a good explanation here on stack -

Summary from those answers:

There are a several different 'bee-stings':

<%@ - Page/Control/Import/Register directive
<%$ - Resource access and Expression building
<%= - Explicit output to page, equivalent to <% Response.Write( ) %>
<%# - Data Binding. It can only used where databinding is supported, or at the page level if you call
Page.DataBind() in your code-behind.
<%-- - Server-side comment block
<%: - Equivalent to <%=, but it also html-encodes the output.

edited May 23 '17 at 12:21

Community

answered Jul 17 '13 at 16:00

Ross

Very nice reference. I wonder when I was asking this question , those duplicates did Not show under "Questions that may already have your answer" – Jul 17 '13 at 16:04

score 3 · Answer 2 · answered Jul 17 '13 at 16:00

3

The former is simply denotes some .NET code in the markup that outputs to the page.

The later uses Data Binding Expression Syntax to bind to a specific object.

answered Jul 17 '13 at 16:00

Justin Niessner

2 Answers2