guys, I was applied a big task is about to make the MVC page configurable.
It means:
It just like the webpart in webform.
1.We can config the partial view in the view,make the partial view enable or not,we can drag and drop the partial view anywhere in the container.
2.One partial view is related to a simple mode(entity),and also the fields of the form in the partial view can be configurable:enable or not and the position can be adjusted.
now I have some ideas as following:
1.I create an model base, let other models inherit from model base,model base just hold the metadata related to the fields and the model itself.
2.Render the settings which is in model base to hidden field throght html helper and partial view.And on the client, I just use the jquery to handle the layout according to the setting in the hidden field.
3.The partial view I just let it to render only, and the real logic I will hand it on the page which contain the partial view. I think this would be simple and extendable.right?
So any ideas here? I really think this task is complicate.
In the past, Omar AL Zabir Blog has an portal website, called dropthings, maybe it is closed now. He tried to implemented the things like igoogle did. You can see that project at codeplex.
And you also can find some ideas for that find of application at Lakkakula's Blog
Hope this help.
Related
I have a menu and I used a cookie in order to set the menu as selected by refreshing. The menu is common to all classes, so I put it in the _layout.cshtml, but the same time I want a controller for this layout because there some function to set the menu as highlight. Can I create a controller for this?
Yes, you can call #Html.Action or #Hmtl.RenderAction to invoke a controller from the view. But this borders on mixing of concerns, as now your view is actively calling your controller.
The better approach is often to pass the appropriate data to the view as part of your view model.
Somewhat related answer of mine
RenderAction method documentation
But the same time I want a controller for this layout because there
some function to set the menu as highlight.
If you are doing something basic like highlighting the current page, there may be a simpler solution. You could put the current page ID into the ViewBag and retrieve that value in your main _Layout file and use it to select the appropriate item.
Partial actions may be what you looking for here - this article may be some help. It relates to MVC2 but the principles remain the same.
create an action for menu, and put menu ui in the view, and then call Html.Action("menu action name","controllern name") on layout page.
We are building a large ASP.net MVC 4 Website where one of the modules for Questionaire needs to build the view dynamically.
We are trying to solve 3 problems:
- Generate the view using data from the database (Control Name, Value)
- Have events against the generated controls (Eg: radiobuttion needs to have a change event and needs to enable/disable items accordingly)
- Validate the controls (possibly client side validation)
What is the best approach to do this? We have thought about generating view using Html helpers and Editor templates. The other options floating are using dynamic model and custom model binders.
While we are trying things through POC, any thoughts and solution to solve the above problem will be helpful.
Thanks
Here is a nice webcast from Brad Wilson : Advanced MVC 3.
Also check the source for this presentation. You will be interested in NonClassModels part. It shows how to wire all framework pieces around dictionary type. Validation, editors etc.
Hope this will help.
A friend has asked me to help him with a project that's MVC. This is my first experience with MVC. I'm trying to build the MVC components for a form for him.
A page has a modal popup which uses a JavaScript to POST or GET and receive HTML back—that it displays inside the popup modal.
I need to create an MVC form that has validation to display inside aforementioned popup. This popped-up form will be used elsewhere on the site, so needs to be modular.
Should I create an ActionResult in my Route's Controller that returns an View (.aspx) containing my form? Should I instead create a Partial View (.ascx) that has the form, then use that Partial View in a View for my Route so other parts of the site--other Routes--can do the same?
I'm stuck at that basic understanding. From there, I don't even know what to do about the validation (was told the same validation will be used on a nearly identical form) and how a ViewModel fits into this like is used elsewhere on the site.
I've been reading a lot and looking at a lot of examples but I'm still confused.
You've got two separate questions here really. To deal with whether you should use a partial view or a regular view, just think of it this way. Does the HTML content in question represent a full page, or just a piece of a page that will be reused inside of other pages?
If it's the former, then use a full View. If it's the latter, then put it in a partial view. It sounds to me like you just need a full View. In either case, it's easy to change to the other if it turns out it's not meeting your needs.
As to validation, take a look at xVal if you're using ASP.Net MVC 1. It allows for easy validation using attributes on your models.
When you make your post from the modal popup do the validation then in the actionmethod you created specifically for that popup. If you want client side validation write up the js to do it.
As for the modal markup and what not just create a partial view for that, shouldn't be a big deal.
I have recently started to examine ASP.NET MVC. I have studied quite a few examples and common to these are that they contain quite simple scenarios, where a view will map to either an instance of a type in the model or a list of a paritcular type from the model.
I'm looking for guidelines to compose/composite views. In the long term I would like Ajax to be part of the equation, but for now I'm looking for a simpler non Ajax setup.
The problem
Here is a description of a contrieved problem. A domain model contains the types A and B.
class A
{ String ID, String Name, int Age
List<B> ListOfB
}
class B
{ String ID, String Name, String Url}
I would like to have a that allows the following:
A DropDownList showing type A information
Details about the particular A picked in the dropdown
A list showing type B's related to the selected type A
A form that makes it possible to edit the data of a selected type A
A form that enables the user to add a new B.
The view should not show all of this at once, instead it has to show different combinations of information and functionality according to user input. Combinations of detail and functionality could forexample be:
Initially only show the dropdownlist containing A's
If an A has been selected in the dropdown:
Show the particular A as selected in the dropdown
Show detail info about the selected A
Show list of detail info of related type B's
The user wants to edit a particular A
Show the particular A as selected in the dropdown
Show form that allows user to edit particular A
Show list of detail info of related type B's
The user wants to add a new B
Show the particular A as selected in the dropdown
Show detail info about the selected A
Show list of detail info of related type B's
That could look something like this (used the web version of balsamiq mockups - what a fantastic invention!):
Combination 2:
Combination 4:
Creating the view and controller
Since the solution has to allow for different combinations of data and functionality, I think it would be smart to have a parent view (not to be confused with a masterpage) that contained placeholders for parital views. Then, the parent views controller could make up the right combinations of model data and partial views and feed these to the parent view.
Finally; the questions:
Is my way of thinking in accordance with the asp.net mvc methodology?
Can you explain/show (not necessarily all of it) how the controller can compile the right combination of partial views and feed these to the parent view?
Can you point me towards an Ajax based solution?
Can you suggest books/links that contain examples of complex views?
asp.net mvc fully supports all of your requirements but there are few things you should get up to speed on:
You should look at implementing view models to help seperate your domain model from your specific views. Here is a good link on how to start this.
You need to get up to speed with a client side javascript framework for the ajax work with partial html rendering. jquery will do this or ms ajax. Here is an example
To your detailed questions:
Is my way of thinking in accordance with the asp.net mvc methodology?
Asp.net mvc is not going to constrain you at all so essentially this is fully supported
Can you explain/show (not necessarily all of it) how the controller can compile the right combination of partial views and feed these to the parent view?
You can use partial views if you want to seperate bits of code out and can easily refresh them by loading them independently using ms ajax or jquery. You would have a controller that mapped onto your parent view and can delegate and refresh partial views in ajax calls.
Can you point me towards an Ajax based solution?
jquery will do this or ms ajax. Here is an example
Can you suggest books/links that contain examples of complex views?
This link talks a lot about this.
I am working on an ASP.NET MVC application that contains a header and menu on each page. The menu and header are dynamic. In other words, the menu items and header information are determined at runtime.
My initial thought is to build a base Controller from which all other controllers derive. In the base controller, I will obtain the menu and header data and insert the required information into the ViewData. Finally, I will use a ViewUserControl to display the header and menu through a master page template.
So, I'm trying to determine the best practice for building such functionality. Also, if this is the recommended approach, which method should I override (I'm guessing Execute) when obtaining the data for insertion into the ViewData.
I'm sure this is a common scenario, so any advice/best-practices would be appreciated! Thanks in advance!
EDIT:
I did find the following resources after posting this (of course), but any additional anecdotes would be awesome!
http://www.singingeels.com/Blogs/Nullable/2008/08/14/How_to_Handle_Side_Content_in_ASPNET_MVC.aspx
How do you use usercontrols in asp.net mvc that display an "island" of data?
Depends on where your information is coming from. We have standard view data that we use to generate some of the information we have on screen that we create in just this fashion. It works well and is easily maintained. We override the View method to implement strongly typed view names and use this information to retrieve some of the data that the master page requires as well.
You could write a helper extension to render the header/menu
That way you could have it show in different places in the view should you need to, but only one place for maintenance.
public static HtmlString MainMenu(this HtmlHelper helper)
Use a base controller class to implement generell filter methods. The controller class implements some filter interfaces IActionFilter, IAuthorizationFilter, IExceptionFilter and IResultFilter which are usefull to implement some common behavior for all controllers.
If the menu data is the same on all pages but different for each unique user.
Generate the menudata in an OnAuthorization or Initialize method of your controller base class. First will be called on authorization. Initialize will be called before every action method. You have access to ViewData Context. Generate the menudata there.
Put the view content for menu and header into the master page and access generated ViewData there.
I tackled a similar design challenge a couple months ago - implementing a breadcrumb feature that changes as user navigates from page to page.
I overrided the OnActionExecuting method to gather the breadcrumbs and store them in ViewData (I use the name of the action as the breadCrumb of the view). Then I updated the Master page to include a user control that takes the ViewData and renders the breadcrumbs.
One thing to be aware is that if you were using the default ASP.NET MVC error handling attribute [HandleError] and your error page is using the same Master page that attempts to read the ViewData, you will soon find out that you can't access ViewData from your error page and it will raise an exception. Depending on whether you need the ViewData for failure scenarios, the viable solution is to use a separate Master page or do this: How do I pass ViewData to a HandleError View?
I'll answer your question with another question. Will the base controller have to determine what type it really is in order to generate the proper menu data? If so, then you're defeating the purpose of polymorphism and the code to generate the data should go in each controller, perhaps in OnActionExecuting if the menu is the same for all actions. Pushing it back down into a parent class seems likely to end up with some switch statement in the parent class doing what each derived controller really ought to take care of.