How do I request views from a layout using AJAX? - ajax

Question

In my MVC application I don't want the layout page to reload everytime a view is selected. It would be great if the views could be loaded using ajax to keep things nice and fast and allow me to persist certain interface states that are wiped out when you move around.
My initial approach was to add some ajax to the _Layout.cshtml and then whent he view was requested pass that request to the controller method which will grab that page. All I ended up doing however was returning the WHOLE view again.
Here is the code I have so far, am I on the right tracks here or is this totally wrong?
Layout Ajax Script
<script>
$(function () {
var content = document.getElementById('content');
//When a user selects a link, pass the data attribute and
//use it to construct the url
$('#sidebar a').on("click", function () {
var page = $(this).data('page');
console.log("Data Attrib : " + page);
$.ajax({
type: 'GET',
url: '#Url.Content("~/Home/")' + page,
success: function (data) {
$('#content').html(data);
console.log("Success");
},
error: function (xhr, ajaxOptions, thrownError) {
console.log("Error: " + thrownError);
}
})
})
});
</script>
As I say, this sort of works, but it's not perfect as it returns the whole page into the content area including layout, ideally I just want the core view data.

Answer 1

you can create a Single Page Application that have 1 layout and in home controller and index action method create menu or user setting or another things
and now you can load other action with Ajax call with data-content html that does not have layout file and append that in container
when user click another menu clean older content and add new or you can create tab strip or window

Answer 2

Layout.cshtml
<script>
$(function () {
//When a user selects a link, pass the data attribute and
//use it to construct the url
$('#sidebar a').on("click", function () {
var page = $(this).data('page');
$.ajax({
type: 'POST',
url: '/Home/Pages',
data: { pageValue: page },
success: function (data) {
$('#content').html(data);
console.log("Success");
},
error: function (xhr, ajaxOptions, thrownError) {
console.log("Error: " + thrownError);
}
})
})
});
Controller
public class HomeController : Controller
{
[HttpPost]
public string Pages(string pageValue)
{
string result = //Whatever
return result;
}
}

Answer 3

Controller
public ActionResult SomeAction(String someparams)
{
//Make the model
SomeModel someModel = new SomeModel();
someModel.someparams = someparams;
return PartialView("SomePartialView", someModel);
}
In View
$.ajax({
url: "/Home/SomeAction",
type: "POST",
dataType : "html",
data: json,
contentType: 'application/json; charset=utf-8',
success: function(data){
$('#SomeDivID').html(data);
}
});