Custom Filter Attribute or call in Action Method - Earlier in Request Pipeline but Performance? - asp.net-mvc-3

Question

I have a HomeController with about 8 or 9 Action Methods.
About 7 of these methods require a check to see if the User has a special setting or not to see if they are allowed to access these Methods and related Views.
If they are not they are redirected back to a Common Action Method and View.
public class HomeController : Controller
{
public ActionResult Index() {
UserManager um = new UserManager();
um.Punter p = um.GetPunter(User.Identity.Name);
return View(p);
}
public ActionResult PunterList() {
UserManager um = new UserManager();
um.Punter p = um.GetPunter(User.Identity.Name);
if (p.isPunter) {
return RedirectToAction("Index", "Home");
} else {
return View(p);
}
}
}
The check in 'PunterList' is done in other Action Methods, I was thinking about creating a FilterAttribute to do this check. As per the following:
public class NoPunterAttribute : FilterAttribute, IActionFilter {
public void OnActionExecuting(ActionExecutingContext filterContext) {
UserManager um = new UserManager();
um.Punter p = um.GetPunter(User.Identity.Name);
if (p.isPunter) {
filterContext.Result = new RedirectToRouteResult(new RouteValueDictionary { { "controller", "Home" }, { "action", "Index" } });
}
}
public void OnActionExecuted(ActionExecutedContext filterContext) { }
}
then put this attribute on the Action method this type of user cannot access.
[NoPunter]
public ActionResult PunterList() {
UserManager um = new UserManager();
um.Punter p = um.GetPunter(User.Identity.Name);
return View(p);
}
this puts this code in 1 place, However the UserManager.GetPunter is called twice if the User.isPunter=false. Perhaps this is not such a good idea for Performance or Memory conservation of the MVC web application.
The benefit is does the check earlier in the Request pipeline, but perhaps a method called inside of the action method would mean .GetPunter would be called only once, but further along the Request pipeline. Not sure about this, kind of split on earlier vs Performance/Memory issues.
Any suggestions or ideas would be interesting to hear. Presumably it would depend on what is done inside UserManager.GetPunter. There is some caching inside this call but it does requery the cache.

Answer 1

You could write a custom authorization attribute which will inject the Punter as a parameter of your action:
public class HomeController : Controller
{
public ActionResult Index()
{
UserManager um = new UserManager();
um.Punter p = um.GetPunter(User.Identity.Name);
return View(p);
}
[NoPunterAuthorize]
public ActionResult PunterList(Punter punter)
{
return View(punter);
}
}
and the custom authorization attribute:
public class NoPunterAuthorize: AuthorizeAttribute
{
protected override bool AuthorizeCore(HttpContextBase httpContext)
{
var authorized = base.AuthorizeCore(httpContext);
if (!authorized)
{
return false;
}
var um = new UserManager();
var p = um.GetPunter(httpContext.User.Identity.Name);
var routeData = httpContext.Request.RequestContext.RouteData;
routeData.Values["punter"] = p;
return !p.IsPunter;
}
protected override void HandleUnauthorizedRequest(AuthorizationContext filterContext)
{
filterContext.Result = new RedirectToRouteResult(
new RouteValueDictionary
{
{ "controller", "Home" },
{ "action", "Index" }
}
);
}
}