JsonResult returns HTML response - asp.net-mvc

Question

I have this method in a controller to reset the password of a user by mail.
public JsonResult RecoverPasswordByEmail(string mail)
{
MembershipUser member = Membership.GetUser(Membership.GetUserNameByEmail(mail));
string newPassword = System.Web.Security.Membership.GeneratePassword(14, 0);
member.UnlockUser();
if (!member.ChangePassword(member.ResetPassword(), newPassword))
{
return Json(new { Resultado = false, Excepcion = "Couldn't change password" }, JsonRequestBehavior.AllowGet);
}
System.Net.Mail.MailAddress from = new System.Net.Mail.MailAddress("foo#bar.com");
System.Net.Mail.MailAddress to = new System.Net.Mail.MailAddress(mail);
System.Net.Mail.MailMessage message = new System.Net.Mail.MailMessage(from, to);
message.Subject = "Forgot pass";
if (member.IsLockedOut)
{
message.Body = "You're locked";
}
else
{
message.Body = "New password: " + newPassword;
}
var client = new System.Net.Mail.SmtpClient("my.smtpserver.com", 587)
{
Credentials = new System.Net.NetworkCredential("foo#bar.com", "12345"),
EnableSsl = true
};
try
{
client.Send(message);
}
catch (System.Net.Mail.SmtpException ex)
{
return Json(new { Resultado = false, Excepcion = ex.Message }, JsonRequestBehavior.AllowGet);
}
return Json(new { Resultado = true }, JsonRequestBehavior.AllowGet);
}
I do an ajax request using jQuery from a button in a dialog from the login View.
The weird thing is that I use another controller method RecoverPassword that does the same thing but by the username and that works. Using firebug I see that RecoverPassword does the job and returns a JSON with the result, but RecoverPasswordByEmail responds with a big html document.
The important part of the HTML:
<div id="dialog">
<h2>Retrieve Password</h2>
#Html.Label("Mail:")<br/>
#Html.TextBox("txtMail")
<div id="loading">
<br/><img class="displayed" src="#Url.Content("~/Content/Images/Ajax/ajax-loader3.gif")" alt="loading" /><br/>
#Html.Label("Error")
</div>
<br/><br/><input class="button" id="btnSendMail" type="submit" value="Get new password" />
<div>
Recuperar contraseña
</div>
</div>
And the js:
$(document).ready(function () {
var requestMail;
$('#btnSendMail').button();
$('#loading').hide();
$("label[for=Error]").text("");
$('#btnSendMail').click(function (event) {
event.preventDefault();
var mail = $("#txtMail").val();
if (mail.length > 0) {
if (requestMail && requestMail .readystate != 4) {
requestMail .abort();
}
$('#loading').show();
$('input[id="btnSendMail"]').attr('disabled', 'disabled');
requestCorreo = $.ajax({
url: '/Users/RecoverPasswordByEmail',
type: 'POST',
dataType: 'json',
contentType: "application/json; charset=utf-8",
timeout: 8000,
data: { Email: mail },
success: function (response) {
if (response.Result) {
$("label[for=Error]").text('New password has been sent to: ' + mail);
}
else {
alert(response.Result + ' ' + response.Exception);
}
},
error: function (xhr, textStatus, thrownError) {
if (textStatus === "timeout") {
alert("got timeout");
}
else {
alert(xhr.status + ' ' + textStatus + ' ' + thrownError);
}
},
complete: function () {
$('#loading').hide();
$('input[id="btnSendMail"]').removeAttr('disabled');
}
});
}
else {
$("label[for=Error]").text("Insert a valid email");
}
requestCorreo.done(function (msg) {
alert(msg);
});
requestCorreo.fail(function (jqXHR, textStatus) {
alert("Request failed: " + textStatus + " " + jqXHR.responseText);
});
});
});

Answer 1

What is in the HTML that is returned? I'm going to bet that your method is throwing an exception, which is caught by ASP.NET, and an error page is returned rather than the JsonResult from your method.
Or it not, the content of the HTML would help shed more light on the issue.
As a side note, you don't seem to be checking null anywhere in your method - and you're assuming the MembershipUser will be found no matter what email address is passed (which may indeed be the source of your exception).