Hello. My organization currently has a site that was developed in ASP.NET & C#. There are several problems with our present situation, though. One problem is with our hosting, in that the site is on a shared server which doesn't give us fast enough performance, hence we would like to port the site to a dedicated server. But our other problem is with the software engineering company that developed the site- they've been pretty flaky lately, so we're also interested in switching to a new company for maintaining the site's code (and and this company would potentially also be doing the porting of the site over to a new server.) So, here's where DotNetNuke enters into the picture: since we were considering making all these changes, we were also contemplating adapting DotNetNuke as well, along with doing these other things while we were at it. So what I'm trying to do now is to ascertain what exactly would be the benefits of going with DotNetNuke. Specifically what I was wondering was- - Would our .cs and .aspx files all be transferable "as is", without making any modifications to the code? (There are A LOT of files, so it would be rather impractical to have to modify so many files in order to make the code compatible with DotNetNuke.) - Are there advantages in terms of cost, with regards to hosting? For example, our present hosting company is Brinkster, who charges $23 per month for their "premium" shared hosting (what we're getting now), and $69 per month for their "base" dedicated server hosting. But if it's the case that a server doesn't need to have any Microsoft proprietary stuff installed on it for DotNetNuke, then perhaps that can open up the possibilities for us with the hosting options. - Are there good engineering companies out there, that can work in DotNetNuke (and if so, please let me know your recommendations.) Our site is a rather beefy one (with a content management system, and lots of databases), so we require a company that would be up to the task. Any assistance with the above matters would be greatly appreciated- thanks!

I'll pick off a couple of answers from the group, perhaps others can take the remainders:

>Are there advantages in terms of cost, with regards to hosting?

Unlikely : DotNetNuke requires the same platform as your existing asp.net application.  The only saving might be consolidation of databases, if you're paying per-database.  It's unlikely you can get better hosting for cheaper than that.  Quality hosting costs money, regardless of technology.

> Would our .cs and .aspx files all be transferable "as is", without making any modifications to the code?

No : if you want to integrate your code properly into the DNN framework, then you'd need to create any custom modules.  Chances are, however, that there is a lot of overlap between your proprietary system and DotNetNuke.  You may find it's as simple as copy/pasting a lot of html from your existing site into the DNN installation.  Without specific details, it's impossible to say.  I would be looking at what sort of content you need to display, then chewcking out the core and third party modules to see which is best suited to displaying it.

> Are there good engineering companies out there, that can work in DotNetNuke

Yes, but it's unlikely you'll get anyone recommending a company unless it's their own.  The best thing to do is to check out different people and ask them for quotes.  It's not hard to find DNN system integrators / developers.

I think in summary it's best to look at the end goal and work backwards from there: a DNN site with all your content, how best to achieve that? Rather than trying to work from your existing stie forwards.  Your objective should be to eliminate as much custom code as possible, because custom code is like custom furniture : very nice, but very costly.

Bruce, I just wanted to thank you for the information you provided (and like Chris, I think you especially deserve thanks considering how challenging my post was to read- although like I said in my reply to Chris, my post was only that way by accident!)  Thanks again for your very helpful input.