Sharepoint 2010 Page Types

Question

I have been all over the internet trying to search for basic answers to this question in a straight forward manner.

What types of pages does SP 2010 have? From what i understand, there are 2 types: application pages and site pages. Then sites pages are further categorized into publishing and webpart pages. Is that correct?

Can someone point me to a reliable resource on the internet that gives a macro level view of the different types of pages without going into the intricacies of each? Because I have been doing SP 2010 for a long time now and this basic concept still beats me as I do not fully understand the WHY part of these different page types. Can't we just use the bare bones ASPX structure and write our own code for whatever we want to do? For example, create ASPX page intended for publishing on internet as usual like ASP.NET pages are crafted, then add web parts if we want to and etc. etc.

Why the need for these different page types to be made as part of the framework?

Thanks

Answer 1

"Can't we just use the bare bones ASPX structure and write our own code for whatever we want to do? "

There is a page on MSDN that gives information about SharePoint for ASD.NET Developers: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee536974%28v=office.14%29.aspx there is also a section about "pages" : http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff512772%28v=office.14%29.aspx

This should answer your question. It also gives the difference between site pages and application pages and what the differences are and the further split up.

If you click higer on on "glide path" you will find some more information.

You can can still adjust "publishing pages" by opening the aspx page and eg drop a new webpart zone in it and customize it and then save it as a new page layout to use for your endusers who can then drop webparts in it.