Using MVC Partial View's own model instead of its parent's - asp.net-mvc

I need to populate a list box in a partial view, using ASP.NET MVC4.
Can Partial View have its own #model, as opposed to taking a model from its parent as described here?
I can populate my dropdown box using a separate AJAX call to another MVC controller (i.e. not parent page/url) as discussed here, but the resulting syntax is a bit more clumsy; furthermore, an additional endpoint is exposed to the outside world.

Yes - you can call partial view with any model you like. There is no requirement that data somehow comes from current model.
#Html.Partial("PartialView1", new MyOtherModel(42))

Related

Using #Html.Partial In Sitecore

I would like to use the generic razor helper function Html.Partial to render views that have common html in them.
For instance, I have two views set up in Sitecore Payment Information.cshtml and Agent Payment Information.cshtml. These are rendered using the Sitecore rendering engine. Both of these views have very similar html in them that I would like to put in razor views not set in Sitecore and call them with #Html.Partial as appose to #Html.Sitecore().Rendering() as the latter forces me to set up a view and model in Sitecore which I am not sure is necessary.
My question is, is there anything that Sitecore does behind the scenes that makes it necessary to usethe #Html.Sitecore().Rendering() helper method instead of the #Html.Partial() helper method? Everything seems to work fine and I believe the entire view should get cached since the #Html.Partial call is nested inside either the Payment Information view or the Agent Payment information view set up in Sitecore.
Thanks in advance.
I have Html.Partial working in an MVC solution using Glass for ORM. There are two ways I've used this, one where the assumed model being passed to the partial is the same as the parent rendering and another where we create the model on the fly.
Assumes parent rendering model is passed:
#Html.Partial("~/Views/Components/MyPartialView.cshtml")
Instantiates a new model that is passed in:
#Html.Partial("~/Views/Components/Navigation/SecondaryNavigationRendering.cshtml", new SecondaryNavigation())
The parent view will need to have a mapped model in Sitecore. The secondary view does not have a mapped model in Sitecore but is typed to receive the model being passed (so in my first example that would be my IBasePage model, in my second it would be my SecondaryNavigation model).
Hope this helps.

.Net MVC 4 View Engine WebForm

This is a quite interesting question, in my opinion.
I have a strongly typed view using the WebForm view Engine, I don't know if changing to razor would solve my problem.
PROBLEM:
I have one view with a list of cars, so of type IList <Car>.
And I have a button "Create a new Car" that popups, the popup is a form that is hidded and you call a jQuery UI command $('formName').dialog() to popup it, this form has the attributes of the possible new car, so probably a new view with a strongly typed Car. After fill in the form the database should be populated with the new car, and the list of cars should be refreshed using Ajax.
The main problem is that I can't use HTML Helpers to IList <Car> and for Car at the same time.
Briefly: What is the strongly type for that view ? Is it possible to define two views and the other one call using pop-up? Changing it to Razor would solve my problem?
Best regards,
Tito Morais
Don't mix the views for listing the cars and creating a new car together.
For instance, you can make a popup that dynamically loads a "_CreateCar" partial view, using jQuery dialog or similar component. Then when the partial view is completed, reload the list view using another Ajax call.
Maybe not so much an elegant solution is to create a complex view model like:
class ListAndCreate
{
public IList<Car> AllCars {get;set;}
public Car NewCar {get;set;}
}
IMO this is correct since that one view is responsible for listing all cars and creating a new one. Now, I'm assuming that your NewCar has values coming from your controller or something, where you need to pass a model to your view.
The other approach, that #Jonas mentions is also correct and more unitized. You could create a partial view _CreateCar with type Car, render it with Jquery/Ajax to load it into a dialog/popup and have the form POST to a Create(Car c) method in your controller.

ASP.Net MVC reusable form as RenderAction or RenderPartial

I'm looking for a best practice for embedding a form on multiple pages as a partial view.
I have a contact form I'm looking to embed on multiple pages on a site. Usually, the form would be on a contact page and the contact model could be the model for the view and use data annotations for validation. However, the view is already strongly typed.
How can I create a reusable form in a partial view and embed it on the page? I'm using N2 on the site, so the pages have to already have a strongly-typed model, but I would be open to extending those objects.
Personally, I recommend using for Html.RenderAction() for cross-cutting concerns such as these.
The handler for your contact form is going to need to exist independently of the page your are currently viewing so you are left with 3 options:
Manually add it to the response of
the current action
Manually add it to the response of
the current controller by way of a
base controller that modifies the
ViewState or ViewModel
Call the RenderAction()
HtmlHelper inside of the current view
Of these 3 options, while the third is technically more costly than 1 and 2 (because it initiates a brand new request), it is also the most maintanaible solution. By calling RenderAction() you have the advantage of being able to completely isolate your contact form from the rest of the view and thus you won't have to worry about hacking it into the current controller responses.
Use RenderPartial if data model for partial view is already in main view's model, in other case use RenderAction (then the action of the partial view will create its view model itself).

Populating the model for a shared view, embedding a shared view within another view

I'm trying to embed a small view snippet that steps through a model fragment that works fine when I embed it in a single controller and pass it to a view like so;
Controller:
return View(_entities.formTemplate.ToList());
View:
http://www.pastie.org/666366
The thing is that I want to be able to embed this particular select box in more than just this single action / view, from the googling I've been doing this appears that it should go into a shared view, but I'm not clear then on how I could populate the model within that view from the controller? (or maybe I'm completely missing the purpose for shared views?)
In the other MVC framework I'm accustomed to working with there is the concept of a filter where you can call code before or after any action and mod the model as it passes the controller and goes to the view, is such a thing possible in .net mvc?
Any assistance appreciated.
You'll want to use the HtmlHelper method DropDownList() in order to create a input:
<%= Html.DropDownList("id", new SelectList(formBuilder, "ID", "Name")) %>
You probably want to use a ViewUserControl here.
You have a couple of options if you go that route. If it's model data that is easily available, recreate it at the call site of your RenderPartial like so:
<%=Html.RenderPartial("ViewName", new ModelData())%>
If it's data that is dependent on the current model data, then you'll need to pass that data somehow to your partial view.
ASP.Net MVC also has the concept of before/after controller actions. You decorate your controller method with an Attribute that derives from ActionFilterAttribute. In there, you have access to OnActionExecuting and OnActionExecuted.

RenderPartial and Dynamic Selection of Partial Views

My MVC application contains a parent model, which will contain 1 or more child models.
I have set up the main view to display properties from the parent model, and then loop through a collection of my child models (of various types, but all inheriting from the same base type). Each of the child models have a corresponding partial view.
My "parent" view iterates over the child models like this:
foreach (ChildBase child in ViewData.Model.Children)
{
Html.RenderPartial("Partials/"+child.ChildType.ToString()+"Child",
section);
}
My application has the appropriate /Partials/ChildType1.ascx, ChildType2.ascx, etc. Everything works great.
Is this an appropriate way to use Partial Views? It feels slightly off-kilter due to the dynamic names, but I don't know another way to perform dynamic selection of the proper view without resorting to a big switch statement.
Is it advisable to use the same view for multiple "modes" of the same model? I would like to use the same .ascx for displaying the "read only" view of the model, as well as an edit form, based on which Controller Action is used to return the view.
Iconic,
It's difficult to answer the questions without knowing exactly what you're trying to achieve.
I'll have a go though:
If you're familiar with web forms, think of your partial view as a webforms usercontrol for the moment and think of the part of your model that is relevant to your partial views as a 'fragment of information' that want to pass across to the partial view.
Natural choices for using a partial view would be for elements used in many views across your site.
So ... in answer:
1.Although what you are doing is valid, it doesn't seem quite correct. An example of a partial view I have used might be a row in a grid of data where you'd call the partial view passing in the row object as its model:
foreach (MyObject o in Model.objects)
{
Html.RenderPartial("Shared/gridRowForObject.ascx", o, ViewData);
}
You can strongly type your views also to expect a specific type to be passed through as the Model object.
Again another use might be a login box or a 'contact me form' etc.
2._Ultimately this is a personal design decision but I'd go for the option that requires the least application/presentation logic and the cleanest code in your view. I'd tend to avoid writing to many conditional calls in your view for example and by inferring a base type to pass across to all of your partial views as in your example, may well tie you down.
When learning the MVC framework I found the Oxite code to be useful.
I hope that helps.

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