View State and Control State

The standard ASP.NET controls retain the values of their properties across postbacks. For example, if you change the text displayed by a Label control, the Label control continues to display the new text even if you repeatedly post the page containing the Label control back to the server.

The ASP.NET Framework takes advantage of a hidden form field named __VIEWSTATE to preserve the state of control properties across postbacks. If you want your controls to preserve the values of their properties, you need to add the values of your control properties to this hidden form field using the appropriate APIs—never access this hidden form field directly.

The ASP.NET Framework supports two methods of preserving values across ...

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