Routing legacy requests with and without querystring - asp.net-mvc-3

(Before starting: I am aware of this and this. I'd like to find a more concise solution -if possible- for a slightly more specific problem)
I'm rewriting an old Webforms app in MVC. As usual, no permalinks should be broken.
I'm using standard {controller}/{action}/{id} routes. Legacy paths are usually SomePage.aspx?ID=xxx, and I have one particular case where Foo.aspx is a list of Bar (new URL: /Bar or /Bar/Index) and
Foo.aspx?ID=xxx is the Bar detail (new URL: /Bar/View/xxx)
One possible workaround is adding the following before the Default MapRoute:
routes.MapRoute("Bar View", "Foo.aspx",
new { controller = "Bar", action = "View" });
And then defining the corresponding action in BarController:
public ActionResult View(int? id)
{
if (id == null)
return RedirectToAction("Index");
return View();
}
There are two problems with this:
Now, if I create an ActionLink, it uses the legacy format
I'd like to handle this in the routes; making the id nullable and redirecting in the controller is just wrong
I'm fine with mapping the legacy URLs by hand (I don't need a generic solution and there are only about 8 pages)
This is a new project, so I'm not tied to anything.

I was able to solve this based on Dangerous' idea plus a constraint based on this answer.
My new route table is:
routes.MapRoute("Bar", "Bar/{action}/{id}",
new
{
controller = "Bar",
action = "Index",
id = UrlParameter.Optional
});
routes.MapRoute("Bar View", "Foo.aspx",
new {controller = "Bar", action = "View"},
new {id = new QueryStringConstraint()});
routes.MapRoute("Bar Index", "Foo.aspx",
new { controller = "Bar", action = "Index" });
routes.MapRoute("Default", /*...*/);
And the QueryStringConstraint couldn't be simpler:
public class QueryStringConstraint : IRouteConstraint
{
public bool Match(HttpContextBase httpContext, Route route,
string parameterName, RouteValueDictionary values,
RouteDirection routeDirection)
{
return httpContext.Request.QueryString.AllKeys
.Contains(parameterName, StringComparer.InvariantCultureIgnoreCase);
}
}

I believe if you specify the following routes:
routes.MapRoute(
null,
"Bar/{action}/{id}",
new { controller = "Bar", action = "View", id = UrlParameter.Optional },
new { action = "Index|Next" } //contrain route from being used by other action (if required)
);
routes.MapRoute(
null,
"Foo.aspx/{id}",
new { controller = "Bar", action = "View", id = UrlParameter.Optional }
);
//specify other routes here for the other legacy routes you have.
Then this should solve your first problem. If the user specifies Foo.aspx in the url then they will be taken to the View action.
If the action link:
#Html.ActionLink("Click me", "Index", "Bar")
is specified then the first route will be used (as the order matters).
However, I could not figure out how to specify if Foo.aspx?id=... then to go to one route else if Foo.aspx is specified then go to the other route. Therefore, I would check whether id is null in the action. However, if you do find this out I would very much like to know.
Hope this helps.

Related

Ajax Sorting and Filtering Is Not Working in MVC

On each index view page which contain list, I'm using ASP.NET MVC AJAX to sort and filter the list. The list is in the partial view. Everything looks so fine until I have a view with a parameter (reference key/FK)
I don't add any routes, just using the default route:
routes.MapRoute(
name: "Default",
url: "{controller}/{action}/{id}",
defaults: new { controller = "Home", action = "Index", id = UrlParameter.Optional }
);
so the url is http://localhost:49458/TimeKeeper/New?billingID=7. If the url in that format, the AJAX sort and filter are not working. I tried to add a new route:
routes.MapRoute(
name: "TimeKeeperNew",
url: "TimeKeeper/New/{billingID}",
defaults: new { controller = "TimeKeeper", action = "New", billingID = "" }
);
so the url become: http://localhost:49458/TimeKeeper/New/7.
Now, the ajax sort and filter are working.
Is there anyone can explain me, what's the problem? Did I use the correct way (by adding a new route) or is there any other way?
I don't even understand why you are saying primary key as MVC has no concept of this.
With only (assuming for the duration of this answer until the break):
routes.MapRoute(
name: "Default",
url: "{controller}/{action}/{id}",
defaults: new { controller = "Home",
action = "Index",
id = UrlParameter.Optional }
);
Any route that does not define id will be appended to the url with the value.
Url.Action("New", "TimeKeeper", new { billingID = 7 })
Always will produce
http://localhost:49458/TimeKeeper/New?billingID=7
Because "billingID" != "id"
So your options are another MapRoute which I would not recommend, or use Id:
Url.Action("New", "TimeKeeper", new { id = 7 })
which always produces:
http://localhost:49458/TimeKeeper/New/7
Optionally:
public class TimerKeeperController
{
public ActionResult New(string id)
{
int billingId;
if (!string.TryParse(id, out billingId)
{
return RedirectToAction("BadBillingId")
}
....
}
}
BREAK
What about if there are 2 parameters, let's say billingID and clientGroupID? I don't quite understand routing in depth, could you help me to explain this in the answer?
Now you need another MapRoute:
routes.MapRoute(
name: "Default2",
url: "{controller}/{action}/{id}/{id2}",
defaults: new { controller = "Home",
action = "Index",
id = UrlParameter.Optional,
{id2} = UrlParameter.Optional }
);
And it is required to be before or after the previous MapRoute because anything that would work for this route will work for the previous route, thus this route will never be called. I can't exactly remember which way it goes at the moment, but if you test it, you'll figure it out quickly.
Then you can have:
http://localhost:49458/TimeKeeper/Copy/7/8
with:
public ActionResult Copy(string id, string id2)
{
....
}
notes
Yes you don't have to use a string and parse the values, you could use constraints on the MapRoute or just use Int and throw errors if someone manually types http://localhost:49458/TimeKeeper/New/Bacon.

Calling controller actions using custom routes always directing to same action

I am accessing different actions which takes different number of parameters but even on applying custom routing the call to the same action is always take place .
Controller data-----
[System.Web.Mvc.ActionName("Details1")]
public string Detail1(string Name)
{
return null;
}
[System.Web.Mvc.ActionName("Details2")]
public string Detail2(string Name, string secondName)
{
return null;
}
custom routes
context.MapRoute(
"M_default",
"controllername/{action}/{id}",
new { action = "Index", id = UrlParameter.Optional }
);
context.MapRoute(
"name1",
"controllername/{Name}",
new { controller = "controllername", action = "Details1" }
);
context.MapRoute(
"name2",
"controllername/{Name}/{secondName}",
new { controller = "controllername", action = "Details2" }
);
the forst route is default ,second route is for details1 ,third route is for details2 .
And I calling these from view $.post whose URLS are as
URL for Details1 calling
"/api/controllername/?Name="+somename+"",
URL for Details2 calling
"/api/controllername/?Name="+somename+"&secondName="+othername,
I had taken reference from here
What could be possible solution . Any suggestion , help will be appreciated .
Try putting your default route last. I think it's catching everything.
If I understand correctly, your problem lies in how the rules are parsed by the framework.
You must keep in mind that the framework start from the top of your rules list and go down till one condition is matched. Inverting the sequences of your urls should fix your problem
You can also use this route debugger to check if all your routes are working correctly
Update:
I mean creating the route like this. And I just saw that you are missing the "api" part. Use the route debugger to check that everything is correct.
context.MapRoute(
"name2",
"api/controllername/{Name}/{secondName}",
new { controller = "controllername", action = "Details2" }
);
context.MapRoute(
"name1",
"api/controllername/{Name}",
new { controller = "controllername", action = "Details1" }
);
context.MapRoute(
"M_default",
"controllername/{action}/{id}",
new { action = "Index", id = UrlParameter.Optional }
);
That should handle correctly
/api/controllername/somename/someothername
and
/api/controllername/somename

I can't get the #ActionLink to render the correct url to work with my MVC3 default routing

I'm trying to take advantage of the default routing so I get a URL without a query string parameter.
So, I've currently got this url:
http://www.mysite.Items/Edit?ItemID=19719
And I'm trying to get a URL like this:
http://www.mysite.Items/Edit/19719
The routing works, but I can't get the #Html.ActionLink method to produce the 2nd url.
Here is my razor code:
#Html.ActionLink("Edit", "Edit", new {item.ItemID}, new { id = "edit-" + item.ItemID })
The first argument is my link's text. The 2nd argument is the Action. 3rd is the ID Value and finally the last argument is and HTML attribute I use for some javascript I'm using.
Originally I had my 3rd Argument as
new {itemID = itemID}
This was when my Edit action expected an integer value named itemID as the parameter. I changed it to 'id' so the routing would work.
Ideally I would like a route that would pass the 19719 value to an action with the argument named itemID, but this is beyond the scope of this question.
Thanks in advance.
SOLVED
Thanks Darin Dimitrov for this solution.
I ended up leaving my html code and action arguments the way I had them originally. All that was really required was an update to my routes. I should note that I had to add my new route map before the default. Anyway, here is my route registration now that made this all work.
public static void RegisterRoutes(RouteCollection routes) {
routes.IgnoreRoute("{resource}.axd/{*pathInfo}");
routes.MapRoute("", "Items/{action}/{itemID}", new { controller = "Items", action = "Details", itemID = #"\d+" });
routes.MapRoute("Default", "{controller}/{action}/{id}", new { controller = "Home", action = "Index", id = UrlParameter.Optional } );
}
The default routes uses id as route token name, so you want:
#Html.ActionLink(
"Edit",
"Edit",
new { id = item.ItemID },
new { id = "edit-" + item.ItemID }
)
Notice new { id = item.ItemID } and not new {itemID = itemID} and not new {item.ItemID}.

Html.RouteLink href null despite route (seeming) to work

I have a route (which works):
routes.MapRoute(
"Details", // Route name
"{controller}/{id}", // URL with parameters
new { controller = "Advisors", action = "Details", id = UrlParameter.Optional }, // Parameter defaults
new { id = new GuidConstraint() } // Constraint
);
And a link:
#Html.RouteLink(#item.FullName, "Details", new { controller = "Advisors", id = item.Id })
However the link is rendering as:
David Wick
Basically my goal here is to have routes that are {controller}/{id} and the links rendered are also in that format. When using Html.ActionLink() links render as {controller}/{action}/{id} and Html.RenderRoute() doesn't seem to work at all, despite the route working.
What's going on here?
I was able to correct this issue just now by changing "item.Id" to "item.Id.ToString()". Probably not the ideal solution, but good enough for me for now.
I had a similar issue (I think) and it was actually the route constraint that was failing because the IRouteConstraint was checking for
routeDirection == RouteDirection.IncomingRequest
whereas the RouteLink HTML helper will actually produce
routeDirection == RouteDirection.UrlGeneration

ASP.net MVC RenderAction and Route

I have a web project using ASP.net MVC3. There's an child action in my project. I use
<% Html.RenderAction("Navigator", "Application");%>
to call a shared action. But I find that if my current url is "localhost/application", it throws an exception "No route in the route table matches the supplied values". But when current url is "localhost/application/index", it works fine. Index is a default action in my route config, which is shown below:
public static void RegisterRoutesTo(RouteCollection routes)
{
routes.IgnoreRoute("{resource}.axd/{*pathInfo}");
routes.IgnoreRoute("{*favicon}", new { favicon = #"(.*/)?favicon.ico(/.*)?" });
//routes.IgnoreRoute("{*chartName}", new { chartName = #"(.*)?Chart.aspx" }); //ignore request for charting request
routes.Ignore("{*pathInfo}", new { pathInfo = #"^.*(ChartImg.axd)$" });
routes.MapRoute(
"Default", // Route name
"{controller}/{id}/{action}", // URL with parameters
new { controller = "Home", action = "Index", id = UrlParameter.Optional }, // Parameter defaults
new { httpMethod = new HttpMethodConstraint("GET", "POST") } // Allowed http methods
);
}
Note that I switch default id and action position. I see mvc can remove the default controller and action name in url when using "Html.ActionLink(...)". And I don't like to use explicit url string in my views. How can make it work?
My Action code is simple:
[ChildActionOnly]
public ActionResult Navigator()
{
return PartialView(appFacility.GetAll());
}
Thanks alot.
Wrong route URL definition and defaults combination
The problem is that you can't have non optional parameters after an optional parameter.
Why does localhost/application/index work? This are route values:
controller = "application" (supplied from URL)
id = "index" (supplied from URL)
action = "Index" (supplied as route default)
Basically these values equal to localhost/application/index/index request URL.
If you'd like your RenderAction to work, you'd have to call it this way:
<% Html.RenderAction("Navigator", "Application", new { id = 0 }); %>
which would equal to localhost/application/0/navigator request URL.
But you'll soon find out that your route doesn't work and you'll have to change it (because I suppose you don't like having that additional 0 in your URL). If you provide information how you'd like your route work (or why you've decided to switch action and id) we can provide an answer that will help you meet your requirements.
Optinal parameters work correctly only on the end of route. Try something like this:
routes.MapRoute("DefaultWithID", "{controller}/{id}/{action}",
new { action = "Index" },
new { id = "^[0-9]+$" }
);
routes.MapRoute("Default", "{controller}/{action}",
new { controller = "Home", action = "Index" }
);
edit: hopefully fixed :) this version counts on fact that ID will be numeric - without constraint we can't tell whether it would mean action or id, so there couldn't be default action on routes when ID is specified

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