Reading Razor View Variables Programmatically - asp.net-mvc-3

I have "widgets" contained within partial views and iterate over these files to build an available widget list. Within these views there are two variables
#{ ViewBag.Name = "Test Widget"; }
#{ ViewBag.Description = "This is a test widget"; }
self explanatory. Is there a way using RazorEngine (or any other way) to "read" these variables out so I can show the value of ViewBag.Description in my widget list?
Thanks.

RazorEngine with a custom base view could be used for this purpose:
public class MyViewModel
{
public string Name { get; set; }
public string Description { get; set; }
}
class Program
{
static void Main()
{
// don't ask me about this line :-)
// it's used to ensure that the Microsoft.CSharp assembly is loaded
bool loaded = typeof(Binder).Assembly != null;
Razor.SetTemplateBase(typeof(FooTemplateBase<>));
string template =
#"#{ ViewBag.Name = ""Test Widget""; }
#{ ViewBag.Description = ""This is a test widget""; }";
var model = new MyViewModel();
var result = Razor.Parse(template, model);
Console.WriteLine(model.Name);
Console.WriteLine(model.Description);
}
}
namespace System.Web.Mvc
{
public abstract class FooTemplateBase<T> : TemplateBase<T>
{
public dynamic ViewBag
{
get
{
return Model;
}
}
}
}

You can use the RazorGenerator to actually compile the views, then do a sample execution of them to be able to read the data.
See this article on unit testing the razor views, a similar thing may work for you:
http://blog.davidebbo.com/2011/06/unit-test-your-mvc-views-using-razor.html
var view = new Index();
// Set up the data that needs to be accessed by the view
view.ViewBag.Message = "Testing";
// Render it in an HtmlAgilityPack HtmlDocument. Note that
// you can pass a 'model' object here if your view needs one.
// Generally, what you do here is similar to how a controller
//action sets up data for its view.
HtmlDocument doc = view.RenderAsHtml();
//recall name and description
var name = view.ViewBag.Name;
var description = view.ViewBag.Description;
Here is some additional info on the Razor Generator from Phil Haack: http://haacked.com/archive/2011/08/01/text-templating-using-razor-the-easy-way.aspx

Related

Binding object to dataset to create a report MvcReportViewer

I'm trying to bind this object to a report RDLC:
public class DataReport
{
public string Name { get; set; }
public string[] DateArray { get; set; }
public DataReport()
{
this.DateArray = new string[5];
}
}
I want to pass this two property to the report using MvcReportViewr (here). I used his example but I couldn't find the way to pass this object. I previously create the datasource and the dataset that accepts the Name and DateArray property.
As explained in the example I passed them as class as in the code below. It did not work.
#using Microsoft.Reporting.WebForms;
#model DataReport
#using MvcReportViewer;
#{
ViewBag.Title = "MvcReportViewer Example";
}
#Html.MvcReportViewerFluent("ReportData.rdlc").ProcessingMode(ProcessingMode.Local).LocalDataSource("DataSet1", Model ).Attributes(new { Height = 900, Width = 900, style = "border: none" })
What is the best way to pass this object to the rdlc report?

The model item passed into the dictionary is of type 'Sitecore.Mvc.Presentation.RenderingModel', but this dictionary requires a model item of type 'X'

I am building a solution with Sitecore 7 and ASP.NET-MVC 3 and trying to use a custom model class as described in this blog post by john west.
I have seen several other questions here on SO reporting a similar error with ASP.NET-MVC (without Sitecore), usually related to passing the wrong type of object in controller code, or there being a configuration error with the \Views\web.config file, but neither seem to be the issue here.
this issue is caused when you create a view rendering (possibly others but i haven't tried it) and you have not set up the model in sitecore, so sitecore is passing in its default model.
To fix this you have to go to the layouts section and create a model.
this is the path in sitecore '/sitecore/layout/Models/', in this folder create a 'Model' item and in the model type field you add the reference to your model in the format 'my.model.namespace, my.assembly' without the quotes.
your model needs to inherit 'Sitecore.Mvc.Presentation.IRenderingModel' which forces you to implement the 'Initialize' method, in here you populate data from the sitecore item into the properties of the model. here is an example model...
namespace Custom.Models.ContentBlocks
{
using Sitecore.Data.Fields;
using Sitecore.Mvc.Presentation;
public class BgImageTitleText : IRenderingModel
{
public string Title { get; set; }
public string BgImage { get; set; }
public string BgImageAlt { get; set; }
public string BgColour { get; set; }
public string CtaText { get; set; }
public string CtaLink { get; set; }
public void Initialize(Rendering rendering)
{
var dataSourceItem = rendering.Item;
if (dataSourceItem == null)
{
return;
}
ImageField bgImage = dataSourceItem.Fields[Fields.ContentBlocks.BgImageTitleTextItem.BgImage];
if (bgImage != null && bgImage.MediaItem != null)
{
this.BgImageAlt = bgImage.Alt;
this.BgImage = Sitecore.Resources.Media.MediaManager.GetMediaUrl(bgImage.MediaItem);
}
var title = dataSourceItem.Fields[Fields.ContentBlocks.BgImageTitleTextItem.Title];
if (title != null)
{
this.Title = title.Value;
}
var link = (LinkField)dataSourceItem.Fields[Fields.ContentBlocks.BgImageTitleTextItem.CtaLink];
if (link != null)
{
this.CtaLink = link.GetLinkFieldUrl();
}
var ctaText = dataSourceItem.Fields[Fields.ContentBlocks.BgImageTitleTextItem.CtaText];
if (ctaText != null)
{
this.CtaText = ctaText.Value;
}
var bgColour = dataSourceItem.Fields[Fields.ContentBlocks.BgImageTitleTextItem.BgColour];
if (bgColour != null)
{
this.BgColour = bgColour.Value;
}
}
}
}
Then you have to go to your view rendering (or possibly other types of rendering) and in the 'Model' field you click insert link and click on your newly created model.
This error can be caused when a controller rendering invokes a controller method which returns an ActionResult object instead of a PartialViewResult. In my case I had a rendering model associated with the layout which I believe Sitecore was trying to pass to my controller rendering.
RenderingModel is used when you create a Rendering based on the View Rendering template. This model is created by the sitecore MVC pipelines and is automatically assigned to the view.
To have control over what model to bind to the view, you probably want to use a Controller Rendering, then you can pass in your own model from your controller.

How to create dynamic, multiple partial views using repository pattern in MVC

I am trying to have a general home page that depending on the parameter passed to the control, different content (modules) will be displayed.
For example, a user may select Kentucky from the menu and the id for Kentucky is 1. The home controller gets the id (1) and determines the possible modules for that
state (a simple db call.) Perhaps there is an announcements module and a contacts module for the state. An announcements module could have several items but it's only one module. There would be a partial view for each type of module.
Here is the basic setup I have.
public interface IModuleRepository
{
IList<MenuItemModule> GetMenuItemModules(int menuItem);
IList<Announcements> GetAnnouncements(int modID);
IList<News> GetNews(int modID);
IList<Contacts> GetContacts(int modID);
}
//business object
public class MenuItemModule
{
private int _MenuItemID;
private int _ModuleID;
private int _ModuleDefID;
private string _Src;
private int _ModuleOrder;
//get, set properties for these...
}
//announcements entity
public class Announcements
{
private int _ID = -1;
private int _MenuItemID = -1;
private int _ModuleID = -1;
private string _Description = string.Empty;
//get set props ...
}
In my home controller...
public class HomeController : Controller
{
private IModuleRepository modRepository;
public HomeController(IModuleRepository modRepository)
{
this.modRepository = modRepository;
}
public ViewResult Item(string ItemID)
{
//returns a list of menuitemmodules for the page. This gives me the Src or name of each
//module on the page, i.e. Announcements, news, contacts, etc.
var modules = modRepository.GetMenuItemModules(Convert.ToInt32(ItemID));
return View(modules);
}
}
I have tried several different models to return but I always run up against some contstraint. If I pass the menuitemmodules to my Item.aspx, then I can do something like this:
foreach (var mod in Model)
{
Html.RenderPartial(mod.Src, a); //needs an announcement object though
}
That makes it somewhat dynamic because I have the Src which would basically be something like "Announcements" and I can just create an announcements.ascx partial to process the module. But I have found it difficult to pass my menuitemmodule and an announcements entity as well.
I have also messed around with passing a more complex object and then testing every Src that comes through with an If statement. This would make scaling difficult in the future as I increase the number of possible modules in the app.
How can I solve my problem? I hope I have provided enough info. I like the basic idea here - http://www.mikesdotnetting.com/Article/105/ASP.NET-MVC-Partial-Views-and-Strongly-Typed-Custom-ViewModels but that seems to only work for static modules on a page.
I did try a composite view model called ModuleViewModel. Here is that attempt:
public class ModuleViewModel
{
public IList<Announcements> announcements { get; set; }
public IList<MenuItemModule> mods { get; set; }
}
If I pass that model to the Item.aspx I can do something like this (but I must be doing something wrong because something doesn't look right.)
foreach (var mod in Model)
{
if (mod.announcements.Count > 0)
{
Html.RenderPartial("Announcements", mod.announcements);
}
}
Once again, scalability is going to haunt me. I would like to have something like this on item page:
foreach (var mod in Model)
{
Html.RenderPartial(mod.Src, mod);
}
That would the correct partial view and pass it the correct model.
Create Module classes that derive from a common Module base class:
public class AnnouncementsModule : Module
{
}
public class ContactsModule : Module
{
}
In controller:
Create your various modules and put them into your overall view module (here it has a property called Modules that is an array of Module:
var viewModel = new ComplexViewModel
{
Modules = new []
{
new ContactsModule(),
new AnnouncementsModule()
}
};
return View(viewModule);
In view:
#Html.DisplayFor(x => x.Modules);
Create the partial views for each Type of Module in the appropriate 'Shared` folder. (Run it without creating them and it will show you an exception with the locations where it's looking for them).
After messing around with this for over a week, I finally managed to figure out how MVC can do what I want dynamically. I decided to post my solution for others that are new to MVC. Hopefully, the following will clear up the misunderstandings I had (although, at this point in my understanding of MVC, I cannot say this is the best approach.)
I will include the previous code snips and modifications for clarity:
public interface IModuleRepository
{
IList<MenuItemModule> GetMenuItemModules(int menuItem);
IList<Announcements> GetAnnouncements(int modID);
IList<News> GetNews(int modID);
IList<Contacts> GetContacts(int modID);
}
//business object
public class MenuItemModule
{
private int _MenuItemID;
private int _ModuleID;
private int _ModuleDefID;
private string _Src;
private int _ModuleOrder;
//get, set properties for these...
}
//announcements entity
public class Announcements : MenuItemModule
{
private int _ID = -1;
private string _Description = string.Empty;
//get set props ...
}
I also added another class:
public class AnnouncementModule : MenuItemModule
{
private IList<Announcements> _Announcements;
//get set prop
}
...and I created a model for the view
public class HomeItemViewModel
{
public MenuItemModule[] MenuItemModules { get; set; } //collection of menuitemmodules
}
In my home controller...
var menuItemModules = modRepository.GetMenuItemModules(ItemID);
if (menuItemModules.Count > 0)
{
AnnouncementModule aMod;
MenuItemModule[] mods = new MenuItemModule[menuItemModules.Count()];
int i = 0;
//loop through each MenuItemModule assign to the appropriate model
foreach (MenuItemModule mod in menuItemModules)
{
if (mod.Src == "Announcements")
{
aMod = new AnnouncementModule();
aMod.Announcements = modRepository.GetAnnouncements(mod.ModuleID);
//now add this to the menuitemmodule collection
mods[i] = aMod;
}
if (mod.Src == "Contacts")
{
//...
}
i++;
}
}
var viewModel = new HomeItemViewModel
{
MenuItemModules = mods
};
return View(viewModel);
Then I used the suggestion to use DisplayFor in the view. The view is strongly typed to HomeItemViewModel.
<%: Html.DisplayFor(m => m.MenuItemModules) %>
This iterates through the collection and based on the type, it will call that template. In this example, it calls AnnouncementModule.ascx which is strongly typed to AnnouncementModule.
foreach (var a in Model.Announcements)
{
//a.Description will give us the description of the announcement
}
I realize there are slicker ways to code the controller, and I plan on refactoring, but this skeleton should provide the basics to solve the question I posted.

How can I utilise my custom DisplayTemplate with non-text fields so that it doesn't override existing values?

I've been following this guide on creating custom display attributes (specifically extra html attributes) to apply to the properties in my ViewModel. I have overridden both String and Boolean in the EditorTemplates folder. The editor template checks to see if a value has been set/the display attribute has been used - and adds the additional html attributes.
I'm getting stuck on the Boolean override when performing an edit action though. Regardless of whether or not I apply the attribute to a string, the ViewModel always maps with the correct existing data. This isn't true with any other form input type, due to the way the templates have been written by changing the type attribute inside a TextBoxFor.
I've been writing this primarily because I have been digging into knockout, and wanted an easy way to apply the data-bind attribute to strongly-typed views - if there's a better way please let me know!
Attribute Code:
public class Knockout : Attribute
{
public string DataBind { get; set; }
public string InputType { get; set; }
/*
Example:
Knockout("checked: showUploader", "checkbox")
Adds the HTML attributes data-bind="checked: showUploader" type="checkbox"
*/
public Knockout(string dataBind, string inputType)
{
this.DataBind = dataBind;
this.InputType = inputType;
}
public Dictionary<string, object> OptionalAttributes()
{
var options = new Dictionary<string, object>();
if(!string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(DataBind))
{
options.Add("data-bind", DataBind);
}
if (!string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(InputType))
{
options.Add("type", InputType);
}
return options;
}
}
Template Code
#using CumbriaMD.Infrastructure.ViewModels.DisplayAttributes
#{
var key = "Knockout";
}
#if (ViewData.ModelMetadata.AdditionalValues.ContainsKey(key))
{
var knockout = ViewData.ModelMetadata.AdditionalValues[key] as Knockout;
#Html.TextBoxFor(model => model, knockout.OptionalAttributes())
}
else
{
/*
When the attribute is not present, the default action is the following - which seems to
be overriding the data mapped from the database:
*/
#Html.TextBoxFor(model => model, new { type="checkbox" })
}
Found the answer nested in this beauty of a question!
My working template for boolean values now looks like:
#using CumbriaMD.Infrastructure.ViewModels.DisplayAttributes
#{
var key = "Knockout";
bool? value = null;
if(ViewData.Model != null)
{
value = Convert.ToBoolean(ViewData.Model, System.Globalization.CultureInfo.InvariantCulture);
}
}
#if (ViewData.ModelMetadata.AdditionalValues.ContainsKey(key))
{
var knockout = ViewData.ModelMetadata.AdditionalValues[key] as Knockout;
#Html.CheckBox("", value ?? false, knockout.OptionalAttributes())
}
else
{
#Html.CheckBox("", value ?? false, new { #class = "check-box" })
}

MVC3 shared-search model confusion

(couldn't think of a better title, sorry)
So I've got my layout page, on this page there is a searchbar + options. Choosing whatever, should take you through to the search page, with the results etc. Fairly standard. What I've done to get this working is to create a MasterModel class, with a SearchDataModel class member on it. This SearchDataModel contains the various parameters for the search (search term, what fields to search on etc).
I've then strongly typed my layout page to the MasterModel class, and using a Html.BeginForm... I've constructed the search form for it. However all the checkboxes relating to the fields aren't checked by default, even though the default value for all the fields is true (via a private getter/setter setup).
Yet when I submit the form to the SearchController, all the checkboxes are set to true. So I'm a bit confused as to why it knows they should be true, yet not set the checkboxes to be checked?
Putting breakpoints in key places seems to show that the model isn't insantiated on the get requests, only the post to the Search controller?
I may be going about this all wrong, so if so, pointers as to the right way always appreciated.
public class MasterModel {
public SearchDataModel SearchModel { get; set; }
}
public class SearchDataModel{
private bool _OnTags = true;
private bool _OnManufacturers = true;
private bool _OnCountries = true;
[Display(Name= "Tags")]
public bool OnTags {
get { return _OnTags; }
set { _OnTags = value; }
}
[Display(Name= "Manufacturers")]
public bool OnManufacturers {
get { return _OnManufacturers; }
set { _OnManufacturers = value; }
}
[Display(Name= "Countries")]
public bool OnCountries {
get { return _OnCountries; }
set { _OnCountries = value; }
}
[Required]
[Display(Name="Search Term:")]
public string SearchTerm { get; set; }
}
Then in the _layout page:
#Html.CheckBoxFor(m => m.SearchModel.OnTags, new { #class="ddlCheckbox", #id="inpCheckboxTag" })
#Html.LabelFor(m =>m.SearchModel.OnTags)
Make sure you return a MasterModel with initialized SearchModel from your views:
public ActionResult Index()
{
var model = new MasterModel
{
SearchModel = new SearchDataModel()
};
return View(model);
}
Another possibility to implement this functionality than strongly typing your master layout to a view model is yo use Html.Action as shown by Phil Haack in his blog post.

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