ASP.Net Model without DbContext? - asp.net

I am new to ASP.Net, if my question sounds very basic, please be polite.
I have created a ASP.Net MVC4 project. A page in the application will display names of the files in tabular form.
The names of the files are obtained by finding files in a particular folder on the server. So there is no need for me to have a database for model.
When user opens the page, the server side code will list all the files in the directory and should return a list of Strings.
I am following ASP.Net MVC tutorial here and it appears I have to have a DBContext class and also a database. In my case that's not needed
So that question is can I add my model without having to add code like below and still be able to use the feature of model ? any simple example would be great.
public class MovieDBContext : DbContext
{
public DbSet<Movie> Movies { get; set; }
}

Any class can serve as a model in this case. For example, if you just want to have a Movie model, you can have something as simple as this:
public class Movie
{
public string Title { get; set; }
}
A view can bind to that model, to an enumeration of that model, etc.
For fetching your data from the file system, one approach could be a simple factory method on that model. Maybe something like this:
public class Movie
{
public string Title { get; set; }
public static IEnumerable<Movie> GetMovies()
{
// get the list of movies from the file system, for example as a list of strings
var movies = SomeFileSystemInteraction();
return movies.Select(m => new Movie { Title = m });
}
}
Then in your controller you can get the list of movies to bind to the view:
public ActionResult Index()
{
return View(Movie.GetMovies());
}
There's no need for a database, it's just used in tutorials because it's the most common case. But you can bind your views to any object you'd like.

You do not need that MovieDBContext class if you are not dealing with database. But having a model is a good idea to represent your entity(in this case the Folder). It is just a POCO class.
public class Folder
{
public string Name { set;get;}
public int NumberOfchilds { set;get;}
//Other properties as needed.
}
Now you can use the Model class to pass data between differnt places. For example. You can move the code which reads the data from file system to a Service class method and the method can return a list of this class/A single instance of this class as needed. Your controller action method can call the service method.
public class FolderService
{
public Folder GetRecentlyCreatedFolder()
{
var folder=new Folder();
//Set the properties of this object
// folder.Name="MySecret";
return folder;
}
}
and in your Action method
public ActionResult Items()
{
var srv=new FolderService();
var recentFolder=srv.GetRecentlyCreatedFolder();
return View(recentFolder);
}

Yes, you can use a model which is not stored in a database at all. Your case sounds like an obvious example.
Model, View, Controller makes database access easily abstractable but doesn't necessitate a database.

As much as I like entity framework I've never loved how most tutorials for MVC seem to marry the two - They are essentially unrelated and I think it really muddies the waters for a lot of programmers new to the framework.
All you need for a model is just a plain old class. Instead of using the dbcontext you'd simply use whatever code you need to load your data.

Related

How to preserve input ids when editing lists in ASP.NET MVC?

I'm working with ASP.NET MVC 4, but I on't think that matters for the purpose of this question.
I have a relatively complex model for my edit view. Like this:
public class Recipe_model
{
public string Name { get; set; }
public List<Recipe_Ingredient_model> Ingredients { get; set; }
}
where Ingredients is
public class Recipe_Ingredient_model
{
public int RecipeID { get; set; }
public int? UnitID { get; set; }
public double? Quantity { get; set; }
public Ingredient_model Ingredient { get; set; }
}
which itself contains the Ingredient model.
When I make a form for this, the built-in Html.EditorFor() doesn't work for anything past the properties of the Recipe_model, so I'm using partial views to display the editor for each of the sub-models.
That works fine as far the interface goes, but when I submit the form to the controller and try to bind to the Recipe_model automatically using
[HttpPost]
public ActionResult Edit(Recipe_model model)
{
return View(model);
}
it fails because the ids of the input elements in the partial views do not conform to the correct pattern (I think ParentModel_Property).
Short from hard-coding the ids in the partial view or binding manually from the FormCollection in the controller, is there some way to get the correct ids generated in the partial view so that the model will bind automatically on submit?
This is common problem. Instead of simple partials, use EditorTemplates (special folder for models) and binding will work automatically.
For example look at this question: Updating multiple items within same view
in addition to the answer given by #WebDeveloper
you can also try and create a custom model binder though a little more complex but will add to the ease of posting and binding form value to the objects in long run
have a look here http://patrickdesjardins.com/blog/asp-net-mvc-model-binding
you will have to manually take all the form values and bind them to the model once and then you will be able to use the #HtmlFrom methods on the razor to do anything and you will get all the value inside the objects inside the action methods as you like.

Overriding validation attribute from a base Model

i have a MVC controller called MyController with an action called MyAction. For other hand i have a Model called MyModel, and all this classes are in a project called Portal.Website (Asp.net MVC3 Application) that i use as a generic website and that store common functionalities for custom websites that i will add in the future.
For other hand i have another website project with a reference to Portal.Website project called Portal.Website.MyCustomWebsite.
This is the viewmodel MyModel.cs in the generic website part:
namespace Portal.Website
{
public class MyModel
{
[Required(ErrorMessage="The field Name is required.")]
[Display("MyPropertyOriginal")]
public virtual string Name{get;set;}
}
}
This is the controller and action in the generic website part:
namespace Portal.Website
{
public class MyController: Controller
{
[HttpPost]
public ActionResult MyAction(MyModel model)
{
if(Model.IsValid)
....
//My issue: Im getting the error message in english, not the overridden one.
}
}
}
This is the viewmodel that i created in the custom part:
namespace Portal.Website.MyCustomWebsite
{
public class MyModel: MyModel
{
[Required(ErrorMessage="My error message in other language.")]
[Display("MyPropertyOverriden")]
public override string Name{get;set;}
}
}
My problem:
I would like to override the ErrorMessage of the Required attribute. For this reason i created a new Model in my custom project. For other hand i would like to use the Controller/Action (MyController/MyAction) that is already defined in my common part.
Do you know if this is possible? Im only getting the issue with the Required attribute, but with the Display one its working perfect.
Thanks in advance.
Greets.
Jose.
You may want to check out this article that suggests two possible solutions :
http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/130586/Simplified-localization-for-DataAnnotations
I've found it was making more sense to re-create some DataAnnotation classes with my custom logic.
MVC3 comes with better support for I18N (internationalisation) than it's predecessors - you can pass the RequiredAttribute the type of your resource class and the resource key and the error message will be displayed in whichever language is most appropriate:
[Required(ErrorMessageResourceType = typeof(MyResources), ErrorMessageResourceName = "ResourceKey")]
public override string Name { get; set; }

ASP.net MVC create model with value with multiple options

I am wanting to create a Model that has a property of Service which then has multiple options that can either be true or false. So my Contact Class:
public class Contact
{
//My Properties
}
I want the Contact class to have a property of Services. I have a list of services available. How can I reference my services from my Contact class. I would like be able to access it in my view like: model.services.MyCustomService if it's even possible. I come from a javascript background so this is what I mean but written in javascript if it helps.
Javascript Example
var Contact = {
property: "",
services: {
MyCustomService: "",
MyCustomService2: "",
}
}
Here's how I'd do it:
In your Model:
public class Contact
{
//My Properties
public List<Service> Services
{
get;
set;
}
}
In your Controller:
public ActionResult Index()
{
var model = new Contact(); // Create model
// Create some sample services
var service = new Service();
var service2 = new Service();
// Add the services
model.Services.Add(service);
model.Services.Add(service2);
// Pass the model to the view
return View(model);
}
Then, in your view:
#model MySite.Models.Contact
#foreach (var service in Model.Services)
{
<text>Here's my service: #service.MyCoolProperty.ToString()</text>
}
In that simple example, I first declared the Services property of your Contact class as a List<Service>. That allows you to combine many Services into one property - perfect for passing along to a view.
Next, in the Controller, I added some Services to the List by using the Add() method. Therefore, in the View, you're now able to access those Services through Model.Services.
To me, that looks like one of the simplest ways to approach this common problem. Hope that helped!
In C#, every object has a type so Services property has to have an actual type if you want to reference MyCustomService and MyCustomService2 through dot notation:
class Contact {
public ServiceContainer Services { get; set; }
}
class ServiceContainer {
public Service1 Service1 { get; set; }
public Service2 Service2 { get; set; }
}
However, if container serves for no other purpose but to store a service (assuming it's some object), you should probably store them in a list or array (access by index) or in a dictionary (access by string).
To give you more information, I'll need to know what exactly these services are, whether you expect their set to change, do they have different types, etc.
To bind to a collection all you need is this:
<%# Page Inherits="ViewPage<IList<Book>>" %>
A complete explanation can be found here:
http://haacked.com/archive/2008/10/23/model-binding-to-a-list.aspx

how to edit json data runtime?

i want to add the data to existing generated json data in my asp.net mvc application , what i have to do ?
means , suppose i have class Company that having list of Departments as property. but json serialization is not able to support such kind of circular reference. so i thought how if, i get serialize the Company object first without list of Departments, then get departments for each company and then serialize this list and append data to company serialized data. i know this may be wrong way . but i have to do because of time ultimatum. please guide.
You could define a view model where you won't have any circular references:
public class DepartmentViewModel
{
public string DepartmentName { get; set; }
}
public class CompanyViewModel
{
public IEnumerable<DepartmentViewModel> Departments { get; set; }
}
and then you would map between your model and view model (you could use AutoMapper for this) and finally return the view model to the view.
For example:
public ActionResult Index()
{
var companies = _repository.GetCompanies();
var companiesVM = Mapper.Map<IEnumerable<Company>, IEnumerable<CompanyViewModel>>(companies);
return Json(companiesVM, JsonRequestBehavior.AllowGet);
}
Now you no longer would have circular references and you will be able to successfully serialize the view model to JSON and you would only pass the information that is required to the view.

Configuration and Views

I've been developing an application using asp.net MVC, and I have some configurations that influences in process of render a view. For example, a user can choose (in an configuration of system) if a field should appear for a management of records in an area of the system. So, I have an class called AppConfiguration has some properties to represent this configurations.
I guess I need to cache an object of AppConfiguration, and make a ViewModel base class and inherits from my viewmodel, for example:
public class BaseViewModel {
public AppConfiguration Config { get; set; }
}
public class DocumentViewModel : BaseViewModel {
public Document Document { get; set; }
}
and make typed views using "DocumentViewModel" to check the properties if this kind of document is able to render or not ? is it works ? Or is there any other better way to do something like this ?
Thanks all and sorry for my english!
Cheers
I'd suggest that you write an associated metadata provider for your view model and then use default templated views in MVC 2.

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