Custom MVC routing based on URL stored in database - asp.net-mvc-3

Question

I'm trying to add some custom routing logic based on url's stored in a database for mvc. (CMS Like), I think its fairly basic, but I feel like i'm not really getting anywhere.
Basically a user may type url's such as:
www.somesite.com/categorya/categoryb/categoryf/someitem
www.somesite.com/about/someinfo
In the database these items are stored, along with the type they are, i.e. a normal page, or a product page.
Depending on this I then want to actually hit a different 'action' method, i.e. I would like the above to hit the methods:
PageController/Product
PageController/Normal
These actions then load the content for this page and display the same view (product view, or a normal view).
Using the normal way of routing won't work, since I could potentially have things like;
cata/producta
cata/catb/catc/catd/cate/catf/producta
Now i've been looking here : ASP.NET MVC custom routing for search
And trying to use this as a basis, but how do I actually 'change' my action method I want to hit within the InvokeActionMethod call?
Using MVC 3.0 btw.
Thanks for any help/suggestions
Final Solution:
Global.asax
routes.MapRoute(
"Default",
"{*path}",
new { controller = "Page", action = "NotFound", path= "Home" }
).RouteHandler = new ApplicationRouteHandler();
Route Handlers
public class ApplicationRouteHandler : IRouteHandler
{
public IHttpHandler GetHttpHandler(RequestContext requestContext)
{
return new ApplicationHandler(requestContext);
}
}
public class ApplicationHandler : MvcHandler, IRequiresSessionState
{
public ApplicationHandler(RequestContext requestContext)
: base(requestContext)
{
}
protected override IAsyncResult BeginProcessRequest(HttpContextBase httpContext, AsyncCallback callback, object state)
{
var url = RequestContext.RouteData.Values["path"].ToString();
var page = SomePageService.GetPageByUrl(url);
if (page == null)
{
RequestContext.RouteData.Values["Action"] = "NotFound";
}
else
{
RequestContext.RouteData.Values["Action"] = page.Action;
RequestContext.RouteData.Values["page"] = page;
}
return base.BeginProcessRequest(httpContext, callback, state);
}
}

Answer 1

Maybe not an exact solution for your situation, but I've recently had to handle something similar so this might point you in the right direction.
What I did was setup a simple route in Global.asax with a catch-all parameter which calls a custom RouteHandler class.
// Custom MVC route
routes.MapRoute(
"Custom",
"{lang}/{*path}",
new { controller = "Default", action = "Index" },
new { lang = #"fr|en" }
).RouteHandler = new ApplicationRouteHandler();
ApplicationRouteHandler.cs :
public class ApplicationRouteHandler : IRouteHandler
{
/// <summary>
/// Provides the object that processes the request.
/// </summary>
/// <param name="requestContext">An object that encapsulates information about the request.</param>
/// <returns>
/// An object that processes the request.
/// </returns>
public IHttpHandler GetHttpHandler(RequestContext requestContext)
{
string path = requestContext.RouteData.Values["path"] as string;
// attempt to retrieve controller and action for current path
Page page = GetPageData(path);
// Method that returns a 404 error
if (page == null)
return SetupErrorHandler(requestContext, "ApplicationRouteHandler");
// Assign route values to current requestContext
requestContext.RouteData.Values["controller"] = page.Controller;
requestContext.RouteData.Values["action"] = page.Action;
return new MvcHandler(requestContext);
}
}
Obviously the way you retrieve the action and controller names from your database will probably be much different than mine, but this should give you an idea.