MVC 3: Why is jquery form.serialize not picking up all the controls in my form? - model-view-controller

Question

I am trying to create a situation where if a user clicks on an "edit" button in a list of text items, she can edit that item. I am trying to make the "edit" button post back using ajax.
Here's my ajax code:
$(function () {
// post back edit request
$('input[name^="editItem"]').live("click", (function () {
var id = $(this).attr('id');
var sections = id.split('_');
if (sections.length == 2) {
var itemID = sections[1];
var divID = "message_" + itemID;
var form = $("#newsForm");
$.post(
form.attr("action"),
form.serialize(),
function (data) {
$("#" + divID).html(data);
}
);
}
return false;
}));
});
But the form.serialize() command is not picking up all the form controls in the form. It's ONLY picking up a hidden form field that appears for each item in the list.
Here's the code in the view, inside a loop that displays all the items:
**** this is the only control being picked up: ******
#Html.Hidden(indexItemID, j.ToString())
****
<div class="datetext" style="float: right; margin-bottom: 5px;">
#Model.newsItems[j].datePosted.Value.ToLongDateString()
</div>
#if (Model.newsItems[j].showEdit)
{
// *********** show the editor ************
<div id="#divID">
#Html.EditorFor(model => model.newsItems[j])
</div>
}
else
{
// *********** show the normal display, plus the following edit/delete buttons ***********
if (Model.newsItems[j].canEdit)
{
string editID = "editItem_" + Model.newsItems[j].itemID.ToString();
string deleteID = "deleteItem_" + Model.newsItems[j].itemID.ToString();
<div class="buttonblock">
<div style="float: right">
<input id="#editID" name="#editID" type="submit" class="smallsubmittext cancel" title="edit this item" value="Edit" />
</div>
<div style="float: right">
<input id="#deleteID" name="#deleteID" type="submit" class="smallsubmittext cancel" title="delete this item" value="Delete" />
</div>
</div>
<div class="clear"></div>
}
It's not picking up anything but the series of hidden form fields (indexItemID). Why would it not be picking up the button controls?
(The ID's of the edit button controls, by the way, are in the form "editItem_x" where x is the ID of the item. Thus the button controls are central to the whole process -- that's how I figure out which item the user wants to edit.)
UPDATE
The answer seems to be in the jquery API itself, http://api.jquery.com/serialize/:
"No submit button value is serialized since the form was not submitted using a button."
I don't know how my action is supposed to know which button was clicked, so I am manually adding the button to the serialized string, and it does seem to work, as inelegant as it seems.
UPDATE 2
I spoke too soon -- the ajax is not working to update my partial view. It's giving me an exception because one of the sections in my layout page is undefined. I give up -- I can't waste any more time on this. No Ajax for this project.

Answer 1

You could try:
var form = $('#newsForm *'); // note the '*'
Update
Did you change the argument to $.post() as well? I think I may have been a little too simple in my answer. Just change the second argument within $.post() while continuing to use form.attr('action')
New post should look like this:
$.post(
form.attr("action"),
$('#newsForm *').serialize(), // this line changed
function (data) {
$("#" + divID).html(data);
}
);