What is the difference between <% %> and <%=%>?

Question

What is the difference between <% %> and <%= %> in ASP.NET MVC? And when to use which?

Answer 1

Say you have a method on your page, called "SayHello":

protected string SayHello()
{
    return "Hello!";
}

And on your page, you have these statements:

first: <%= SayHello() %>
second: <% SayHello() %>

Your output will be:

first: Hello!
second: 

when you use <%= %>, what you put in there is inserted into the html at that position. If you use <% %>, you're just inserting some code into your page.