A web application framework is described. A web application framework class that inherits from an ASP.NET framework class is defined and used to maintain global code that may be accessed by one or more web-based applications. A global class associated with each web-based application is modified to inherit from the web application framework class rather than from the ASP.NET framework class. Code in the ASP.NET framework class can be overridden or customized by code in either the web application framework class or an application-specific global class. Code in the web application framework class can be overridden or customized by code in the application-specific global class.