I want to create a class library for an MVC 4 web application. Every search I've tried has returned plenty of references that merely mention creating one, or the importance of doing so, but not specifics of how.
My first assumption was a template would be under Web in the Visual Studio New Project dialog, but no. I was unsure if I was to use the Class Library template under Windows, but did.
I want to include things like some data access (e.g., DbContext), but while Intellisense sees the System.Data.Entity namespace, there are no classes available. I guess I need some additional references, but no idea which ones. Looking at the references in my main MVC project, at lot of them are pointing to the Packages folder. I'm unsure if I should be doing the same.
In short, I'm looking for instructions on how to create a class library for MVC in Visual Studio, including the necessary references for EF, Razor and whatever else.
you used the correct template - a simple class library is all you need.
then in the MVC web project just add a reference to the class library project
Use NuGet to add references to the pieces of functionality, like EF and System.Web.MVC, that you need in your class library or libraries.
A data access project to handle persistence and a class library to hold HTML Helpers that you might want to reuse both make some sense. Razor views if you're using the RazorEngine rendering stack can also be interesting to be able to test.
You are right to use the Class Library template in visual studio for your needs. You can add all of the references you need through NuGet (such as Razor, EF, and so on) and by Right clicking on references in the Solution Explorer and picking and choosing what you need.
Remember when using multiple projects that you add references between projects too! (for example your Web App project needs to know about your Data Repository Project)
Related
I'm currently trying to learn and understand all the new Identity bits and pieces with .Net Core 2.1/MVC. Previously, I have used MVC3 MVC Identity and it was straight forward - it automatically created the Model, View and Controllers and I could easily edit everything and anything.
With .Net Core, it seems to automatically inherit everything from the framework and I just don't easily understand how to override.
I've followed the guides located here, and have managed to scaffold all the pages (e.g. create user, reset password, login), however, this does not create any of the models or controllers.
Because of this, I now have a project with all the pages, but, it fails to build with all the models missing:
CS0246 The type or namespace name 'ChangePasswordModel' could not be found (are you missing a using directive or an assembly reference?
I feel like I am missing something obvious and I can't believe that I am struggling so much on something that ~10 years ago was simple.
How can I create/import the missing Controllers and models?
Identity comes with a default UI composed of Razor Pages and static files housed in a Razor Class Library. It's added by default when you either use AddDefaultIdentity to enable Identity in your project or explicitly call AddDefaultUI on any of the other Identity bootstrapping extensions methods (AddIdentity/AddIdentityCore).
Views and static files in Razor Class Libraries are embedded resources, and as such are treated as if they physically existed directly in the apps that reference them. However, anything that actually does physically exist in your app will be used before any embedded resources. As such, you can override anything coming from an RCL, simply by creating the same file in the same location as it exists in the RCL in your app. The Identity scaffold simply copies over the selected Razor Pages into your project such that they will override in this way.
Since Razor Pages are used for the default UI, there's no controllers or separate model classes. The models used for the views are established in the Razor Page codebehinds, so for each page you scaffold in, you should have both Page.cshtml and Page.cshtml.cs files added.
If your build is failing after doing the scaffold, the build is not seeing the *.cshtml.cs files (codebehinds). Verify that they do exist in your project's file structure. If they don't, there's some fundamental problem with the scaffold in your instance of Visual Studio, which will likely require reinstalling or at least repairing Visual Studio.
Assuming they are there, then there's something stuck in the build process. Occasionally files do get locked and Visual Studio will complain that it's missing references, when in fact it's simply missing the very assemblies those come from. In such cases, you can navigate into your project directly and remove the bin and obj directories completely. Then, come back into Visual Studio and do a rebuild. If you have more than one project, you should rebuild your entire solution, as it could be a project reference that's actually failing to build.
When I want to add System.Web.Mvc by right clicking the project and Add>Reference option, there is only version 3.0.0.0 and 4.0.0.0. However, I created the project as MVC 5. On the other hand, trying to add this reference on Nuget Package, there is no reference with the same name. Instead of this, there is another refernce named So:
1) How can add System.Web.Mvc (version 5 or later) reference to my projects including Class Library?
2) What is the difference between System.Web.Mvc and Microsoft.AspNet.Mvc?
Thanks in advance.
System.Web.Mvc Is one of the core namespaces developed by MS,it contains classes and interfaces that support the ASP.NET Model View Controller (MVC) framework for creating Web applications. This namespace includes classes that represent controllers, controller factories, action results, views, partial view, model binders, and much more. MS Link
Don't get confused with another namespace: Microsoft.Web.Mvcwhich contains classes that support the ASP.NET.MVC framework for creating web applications.
Now back to your first question about Microsoft.AspNet.Mvcthat you can download from Nuget. I think it's the same as System.web.mvc , if you check dll file it creates, you will notice that it has the exact samedll name: System.Web.Mvc.dll. It has the same size, assembly signature, etc.
I experienced this odd issue and had to uninstall/reinstall Microsoft ASP.NET MVC via NuGet Package Manager - for the project in question - before I could add the correct System.Web.Mvc v5.0.
I am working in Visual Studio 2013 RC and am testing Forms Authentication using new Microsoft.AspNet.Identity.* packages.
I would to integrate these concepts (Users, Roles, etc, etc) but want to use my own domain models (POCOs) which are in different assembly. I also don't want to create a dependency on Microsoft.AspNet.Identity.* dlls.
Is that even possible?
I found this article which says it is not, but the article is written based on Preview not RC versions of identity packages.
I have updated my sample project which you can find here: Identity RC1 sample
It now implements an entity framework model, it still require a reference to the Microsoft.AspNet.Identity.EntityFramework as I didn't want to reimplement all the Store classes also. But the sample shows how you can use your own POCO classes for the model.
If you want to completely remove the dependency on Microsoft.AspNet.Identity.EntityFramework from your model assembly you need to implement an class implementing the IIdentityStore interface which has properties of the following interfaces:
IUserLoginStore
IRoleStore
IUserSecretStore
ITokenStore
IUserClaimStore
IUserManagementStore
IUserStore
The IIdentityStore class should be in an assembly separate from your model assembly, with a reference to your model assembly. The IIdentityStore assembly would be dependent on ASP.Net Identity core.
Your custom implementation of IIdentityStore would need to somwhow be able to convert to and from your POCO classes to ASP.Net Identity interfaces such as IUser, IUserSecret etc.
Seems to me to be a lot of work for little gain, if you are using EF for your stores anyway.
Taking a dependency on the AspNet.Identity.Core assembly and have some of your POCO classes implementing one tiny interface each, seems a lot simpler to me.
Yes this is a fully supported scenario, basically you will want to use exclude using the Microsoft.AspNet.Identity.EntityFramework dll which has the default EF implementation, but you should be able to reuse the Manager classes and just implement your own custom Stores using your own POCOs which the manager will use just fine via the interface. For RTM its been streamlined and simplified a bit more, I believe the RC version was not quite as streamlined yet.
Updated You can get early access to the RTM bits here: MyGet
Just in case. Maybe I can help someone.
exorcising entity framework from asp.net.Identity
I'd created separate project(class library), then add ref to asp.identity.core,
then I'd implemented my UserStore class there, and feed it my Identity config in Web project.
It works fine in project with complex n-tier architecture.
I'm currently learning ASP.Net MVC; I'm using Visual Studio Express 2012 with MVC4 (which is the last version) and I'm totally new to this stuff. My goal is to rewrite a huge web application to MVC, so I was told to separate my main solution into 3 projects using the code-first method:
The core (models and controllers I guess)
The UI (views, scripts, and Content)
And the Database (Entity Framework 5.0 will be used)
I'm quite familiar with MVC, but not separating stuff into different projects. Now I'm a bit lost, I don't have a clue on how to do that, which should reference who, where, how, etc.
Your solution could be structured this way:
UI - ASP.NET MVC application project containing the controllers, views, view models, mapping logic between your domain models and view models, scripts, styles, ...
DAL (EF 5.0, EF autogenerated domain models, Data Contexts, ...) everything that is specific to the data retrieval
The UI layer will then reference the DAL layer.
Some people might also opt to externalize the controllers, view models and mapping logic into a third layer which in turn will reference the DAL layer. The UI layer in this case will reference both other layers.
There are tutorials available on here: http://www.asp.net/mvc
It really helped me out to get the basics of MVC, but be aware - sometimes there are parts missing in the video's, but you can find the code which isn't provided easily elsewhere.
Good luck :)
The tutorials are used to show code first.
create an empty solution using the Visual Studio Blank Solution template
add a solution folder (folder name will be your project name)
then right click that folder and select add project then select "class library" (for The c# classes domain logic)
same again right click the folder and select add project then select asp.net mvc3 template
then same way you create the test template as a new project.
For more information you can follow this book http://www.apress.com/9781430234043
I've searched (google and SO) about this topic and couldn't find a thorough answer to my question(s).
I'm building an ASP.NET MVC 2 application that will be distributed to other people (with source code). These people will need to create modules/plugins that use the application's base.
The base is a simple ASP.NET MVC Application with Linq-To-Sql file, repositories, authorization/membership.
Is it possible to create a plugin that would work by simply adding a .DLL file in a folder?
Right now, you can create a "plugin" by opening the source project of the base application, creating a few controllers/views that do somethings, using the base application's authorization/membership and repositories. You would also be required to edit the Linq-to-Sql file and add in any tables that you need.
However, to "install" this plugin, I would need to copy the controllers/views for this plugin into my base application and edit the Linq-to-Sql class to include the tables necessary for this plugin, then build the solution. Is there a simpler method?
I read of .DLL plugins, but how would someone build a plugin like this starting from the base application.
If the 'plugin' creates tables with foreign keys of the "User" table in the main application, how does one separate those tables/relationships in a separate file and have the base application recognize those relationships?
As you can tell, I'm asking multiple questions that are kind of all over the place. This is a new topic/issue for me and I have no idea where to start. Theme mere concept of having my application interact with a separate .DLL file is foreign to me.
Any help/links would be greatly apprecaited.
Does this answer the same question: Plug-in architecture for ASP.NET MVC?
I think this could be applied to mvc too: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms972962.aspx