ASP.NET MVC FormCollection TextArea - asp.net-mvc

Question

I have a textarea that represents a description field. The descriptions have commas so when trying to split the field's descriptions the data is not parsed correctly. How can I get each row's description correctly.
var DescList = FormValues["Item.Description"].Split(',').Select(item => item).ToList<string>();
//will not work for obvious reasons. Comma delimited FormCollection has commas to identify separate row data.
It seems like Microsoft designed the FormsCollection without the textarea control in mind. A text area with commas will not work when trying to access each value. What is interesting is that the _entriestables property has it in the perfect format but they chose to make it a private property. Very frustrating.
`
Here is the important part of my viewmodel.
public class TenantViewModel
{
public Tenant Tenant { get; set; }
public Site Site { get; set; }
}
My view is populated like this:
if (Model != null && Model.Tenant != null && Model.Tenant.Site != null && Model.Tenant.Site.Count() > 0)
{<div class="detailsbox_view">
<table id="tblTenantSites">
<tr>
<th>#Html.LabelFor(item => item.Site.Title)</th>
<th>#Html.LabelFor(item => item.Site.Description)</th>
</tr>
#foreach (var Item in Model.Tenant.Sites)
{
<tr>
#Html.HiddenFor(modelItem => Item.SiteId)
<td>
#Html.EditorFor(modelItem => Item.Title)
</td>
<td>
#Html.TextAreaFor(modelItem => Item.Description, new {#width="400" })
</td>
</tr> }
</table>
As you see this site table is a child of Tenant object. This child record does not get automatically updated using this method but the Tenant data does automatically get updated. This is the reason I tried the FormColelction instead.
Is there something I am missing to make this work?

Answer 1

try with this useful function
ValueProviderResult Match=FormCollection.GetValue("ValueProvider");

Answer 2

When you have multiple fields with the same name attribute, they'll come back into your FormCollection as an array. So upon posting a view like this:
<form action="/Home/MyAction">
<textarea id="row_one_description" name="description">
First row's description
</textarea>
<textarea id="row_two_description" name="description">
Second row's description
</textarea>
<input type="submit" value="Submit" />
</form>
you could do something like this in your action
[HttpPost]
public ActionResult MyAction(FormCollection collection)
{
var descriptionArray = collection["description"];
string firstRowDescription = descriptionArray[0];
string secondRowDescription = descriptionArray[1];
}
I must note that this is not the recommended way of dealing with posted data. You should instead be building your view using data from a view model and using strongly typed html helpers to render your controls. That way when you post, your action can take the ViewModel as a parameter. Its properties will be automatically bound and you will have a nice object to play with.
[HttpPost]
public ActionResult MyAction(MyViewModel viewModel)
{
foreach (var row in viewModel.Rows)
{
string description = row.Description;
}
}
EDIT
I'm still assuming a lot about your ViewModel but perhaps try this:
<table id="tblTenantSites">
<tr>
<th>#Html.LabelFor(model => model.Site.Title)</th>
<th>#Html.LabelFor(model => model.Site.Description)</th>
</tr>
#for (var i = i < Model.Tenants.Sites.Count(); i++) {
<tr>
#Html.HiddenFor(model => model.Tenants.Sites[i].SiteId)
<td>
#Html.EditorFor(model => model.Tenants.Sites[i].Title)
</td>
<td>
#Html.TextAreaFor(model => model.Tenants.Sites[i].Description, new { #width="400" } )
</td>
</tr>
}
</table>

Answer 3

You could also try ,
string Match=FormCollection.GetValue("ValueProvider").AttemptedValue;