History of DNN

Provided by Microsoft as an ASP.NET 1.0 reference application with full source code.
Written by Microsoft (Scott Guthrie) & Vertigo.

On Christmas Eve 2002, Shaun Walker released IBuySpy Workshop, which eventually became DNN.

With the enthusiastic support of a global development community, the open source project quickly launched a renamed application called “DotNetNuke.” Released in February 2003, the application was named after the .NET Framework and the word “nuke” that was commonly used in open source web content management.

Developer discussion forums created & maintained by Microsoft created a dedicated a DotNetNuke forum

Launched at VS Live conference in San Francisco. Marketing opportunities were provided by Microsoft.

New skin created for main website highlighting flexibility and strength of skinning solution

DotNetNuke 3.0 released with multi-lingual features and an overhauled API.

First DNN release that requires ASP.NET 2.0

DotNetNuke Corporation founded by Shaun Walker, Scott Willhite, Joe Brinkman, Nik Kalyani.

The first DotNetNuke conference in the US.

DotNetNuke 5 launches with a unified installer for all extension types, a new default skin and Workflow in HTML module

This gathering in Switzerland marked the beginning of organized European DNN community events. DNN Europe brought together developers, designers, and site builders from across the continent for a number of years, before DNN-Connect took over in 2014 and has been organizing the European DNN conferences ever since.

The first community-led DNN event was held in Tampa, Florida, marking the beginning of organized DNN community gatherings in the United States.
This grassroots initiative eventually grew and evolved into what is today the official DNN Summit — now held annually.

Open Source CMS Market Share Report concluded that DotNetNuke was the leading .NET-based open source web content management system.

Major release with improved development patterns, modernized UI/UX support for vendors, and continued improvement

Major release added services framework, WebAPI support, improved authentication methods, and support for Visual Studio 2012

Major release adding support for MVC & SPA-based module development for the first time, offering more options for implementers and incremental updates to improve future growth.

Major release improving security & overall system stability

DNN Software (aka DNN Corp) contributed the source code, and trademark usage of DNN/DotNetNuke to the .NET foundation.

DNN wasn't always as open as it is today. Originally controlled by a corporation, the platform has since been handed over to a global community of developers. This shift means no licensing fees, no vendor lock-in, and full freedom to use, modify, and distribute the code. Development is now driven by real users, making DNN more transparent, flexible, and community-focused than ever before.

This release introduced the now current PersonalBar editor experience, ushering in a new user experience and modern touches for website administration. Noteworthy new features: Prompt, Pages Management UI, Connectors, and the Azure Storage Connector.

This release was the first "true open source" release of DNN Platform after control & management of the project was turned over to the development community, signaling a major, positive shift in community contributions, acceptance, and process.

This release became milestone in future upgrades, a long-standing stopping point (all the way to v9.13.9 in Apr 2025)..

This release was a key community milestone: the removal of the third-party Telerik library. Telerik had served DNN well in its time, but relying on a closed-source dependency created long-term security and maintainability risks the project could not accept. The work was complex, but the result is a more secure, more independent, and more sustainable DNN Platform.

Lots of stability enhancements, bug fixes, major improvements to both the developer experience and DNN Docs. The platform also introduced Mail Providers making the MailKit library available, paving the way for sending SMTP using an OAuth connection. The very useful and time-saving Quick Add a Module UI was added to the EditBar.

The all new Resource Manager premieres featuring the modern DNN-Elements web components project. Both Newtonsoft JSON and PetaPOCO were updated modern versions resulting in notable performance improvements. Significant and ongoing progress has been made in the developer experience and documentation and 9.11 has hit some significant milestones.

From added caching, to improved logging, to ongoing maintenance and project cleanups that have resulted in a smaller running memory footprint for DNN, the project is getting a lot of small tweaks in the PersonaBar and Resource Manager.

This release was the culmination of 5 years of community contributions focused on continued platform improvements in performance, security, development patterns, and overall system functionality.

The new Upgrade Process and the new Client Dependency Framework (CDF) make their debut. The new Upgrade Process allows DNN better management of the upgrades avoiding some classic DLL issues. The new CDF fluent interface is both an initial piece of the upcoming MVC Pipeline effort and helps move DNN forward after the deprecation of ClientDependencyCore project. After much learning and many fixes, DNN v10.02.05 becomes the new Recommended Upgrade Path Milestone for upgrading from 9.13.09 or higher.

The future of DNN looks bright!
Explore these resources to learn more: