Beginning ASP.NET 4 in VB 2010

Chapter 17. Files and Streams

There's a good reason that this book covered ADO.NET before dealing with simpler data access techniques, such as writing and reading ordinary files. Traditional file access is generally much less useful in a web application than it is in a desktop program. Databases, on the other hand, are designed from the ground up to support a large number of simultaneous users with speed, safety, and efficiency. Most web applications will rely on a database for some features, but many won't have any reason to use direct file access.

Of course, enterprising ASP.NET developers can find a use for almost any technology. If this book didn't cover file access, no doubt many developers would be frustrated when designing web applications ...