Some of the most advance to new features in Expression Web II have to do with asp.net support and the new PHP support which I will get to in a moment. xpression Web now lets you use custom asp.net controls. You just place them in the bin folder, in your main website folder and you are ready to go. By the way, you will find the asp.net controls in a couple of places in Expression Web. Under the Insert menu when you choose asp.net controls and in the toolbox if you scroll down to the bottom, you will see again asp.net controls.

You can create custom asp.net controls by using a visual design tool like Microsoft Visual Studio and you can download a growing list of custom controls created by other developers from the control gallery on the Microsoft asp.net website. Expression Web II also adds asp.net Ajax server controls which enable you to quickly create web pages with responsive interface elements. You will also find this at the very bottom of the toolbox task pane.

Just click on the little plus sign next to asp.net controls and you will see many other options including the Ajax extensions. Just beware that to work with this controls in Expression Web II, you have to first install asp.net Ajax or the dot net framework 3.5. You can find these in the Microsoft download center when you search for Microsoft.net framework 3.5 or asp.net Ajax 1.0. And finally, one of the most dramatic new features in Expression Web is the ability to work with PHP.

Microsoft Expression Web now enables you to create PHP pages and insert PHP codes snippets as well as asp.net. You will find many of these features under the Insert menu when you choose PHP. And on top of all of that, you will also find better CSS support in Expression Web which now renders the CSS overflow property in design view and checks both internal and external CSS files for compatibility and schema when you were on the CSS reports.

Another new option in the Expression Web II, you can now change the default extension for HTML files. You will find that under tools, page editor options, authoring, and here you will see if you prefer .HTML or .HTM, you can easily switch this so that the default setting always creates pages with the extension that you prefer. And finally, when you are ready to publish your new site with Expression Web II, you will find enhancements to the built in FTP feature as well.

When you choose File, publish site, you will find the remote website properties dialog. Here you will find the few additions like use paths of FTP and now you can save your FTP user name and password so you do not have to enter it everytime you upload your site. And that is a quick look at what is new in Expression Web II.