get selectlist text - asp.net

Question

when i bind my select list to a dropdownlist in a view i see where i can get the selected value (but in my case, it's a number). is there a way i can get the description/text from the select list?

Answer 1

Here is one way:
$(function() {
$('select').change(function() {
alert($('select option:selected').text());
});
});
<select>
<option value="0">Zero</option>
<option value="1">One</option>
<option value="2">Two</option>
<option value="3">Three</option>
</select>
Working jsfiddle: http://jsfiddle.net/wherC/
If you have multiple select elements on a page you will need to change the selector accordingly.

Answer 2

The the value of the selected option is what will be transferred as the form key of a select list.
Example
<select name="list1">
<option selected value="1">one</option>
</select>
will produce a key list1=1
If you need the description, bind the description to the value of the select list.
<select name="list1">
<option selected value="one">one</option>
</select>
will produce a key list1=one
If you are using SelectListItem this option would be:
new SelectListItem {
Text = "one",
Value = "one"
}

Answer 3

Not sure if I understand your question but :
Assuming our collection we want to use for populating our dropdown list is made from :
public class Animal
{
public int ID { get; set; }
public string Name { get; set; }
}
Then you can populating your list would be
#Html.DropDownListFor(model => model.AnimalId, new SelectList(AnimalList, "ID", "Name"))
For the sample above ID is the "Value" and Name would be displayed as option to choose. If you want it the other way around - just replace names of the class properties/fields
If you want both ID and Name to be displayed on the dropdown list to produce
<option value="1">1 - Horse</option>
I would go with
#Html.EditorFor(model => model.id, "PickAnimalTemplate", new { animals = ViewBag.Animals})
which is defining custom EditorTemplate for this property, where you can pretty much do whatever you want with the layout for example :
#foreach (var item in animals)
{
<option value="#item.ID">#item.ID - #item.Name</option>
}