Asp.net-mvc – Render scripts for use in Partial View

asp.net-mvcscriptingviews

I've seen numerous sources stating that it's incorrect / bad practice to put scripts in Partial Views, but this raises a huge question…

How are you supposed to run scripts that interact with Partial Views? I've tried using @section scripts { } or something like that, but it doesn't work. At all. The section contains the scripts just fine, but they don't get rendered when the Partial is loaded into the full View.

In addition, I can't render the scripts my Partial View needs on my full View because the scripts pull values from the Model, which is only rendered on the Partial View, since it's the piece of the puzzle that actually works with data.

I hope that doesn't sound too complicated… How can I effectively, efficiently, and correctly render scripts for use with my Partial View's elements and Model?

Best Answer

@keyCrumbs I will not give you a direct answer, but something for you to analyze.
One of the most biggest problems in you call scripts for you partial view is replication of code.

Think you'll use ajax to get the partial view and you will continue doing this for a while. In every call you'll download the script code, and you put it in html. Every time you reset the script block in html, the functions are reset, the variables are reset. It's can be a big problem depending on your js code.

Other point is the size of the response, you can say, but js has a small size, and I'll say multiply this size for every call of a user and next multiply for ever user connected.

So finally, a solution for you, in this case is: create function in the page and call the function in partial view like this:

Your page: Page.cshtml

<script type="text/javascript">
    function myPartialView_Load() {
        $("birth").datepicker();
        $("phone").mask("000-0000");
    }
</script>

<!-- Some other code here -->

<div>
    <!-- Or you can call from a ajax or other way... -->
    @Html.Action("MyActionPartialView")
</div>

Your partial view: MyPartialView.cshtml

<script type="text/javascript">
    $(function () { myPartialView_Load(); });
</script>

<form>
    <input type="text" name="birth" id="birth" />
    <input type="text" name="phone" id="phone" />
</form>

So as you see the problem lies not in putting js in partial view, but the way as you do it. All rules of good practice has a "why" behind, if you understand the "why" you can determine how far the rule is a help and not a burden. And decide break it or not.

Like a said, I'm not given you a ultimate answer but something you thing about. You can use other ways to contour the problem.

Related Solutions

Linux – How to prompt for Yes/No/Cancel input in a Linux shell script

The simplest and most widely available method to get user input at a shell prompt is the read command. The best way to illustrate its use is a simple demonstration:

while true; do
    read -p "Do you wish to install this program?" yn
    case $yn in
        [Yy]* ) make install; break;;
        [Nn]* ) exit;;
        * ) echo "Please answer yes or no.";;
    esac
done

Another method, pointed out by Steven Huwig, is Bash's select command. Here is the same example using select:

echo "Do you wish to install this program?"
select yn in "Yes" "No"; do
    case $yn in
        Yes ) make install; break;;
        No ) exit;;
    esac
done

With select you don't need to sanitize the input – it displays the available choices, and you type a number corresponding to your choice. It also loops automatically, so there's no need for a while true loop to retry if they give invalid input.

Also, Léa Gris demonstrated a way to make the request language agnostic in her answer. Adapting my first example to better serve multiple languages might look like this:

set -- $(locale LC_MESSAGES)
yesptrn="$1"; noptrn="$2"; yesword="$3"; noword="$4"

while true; do
    read -p "Install (${yesword} / ${noword})? " yn
    if [[ "$yn" =~ $yesexpr ]]; then make install; exit; fi
    if [[ "$yn" =~ $noexpr ]]; then exit; fi
    echo "Answer ${yesword} / ${noword}."
done

Obviously other communication strings remain untranslated here (Install, Answer) which would need to be addressed in a more fully completed translation, but even a partial translation would be helpful in many cases.

Finally, please check out the excellent answer by F. Hauri.

Asp.net-mvc – How to render an ASP.NET MVC view as a string

Here's what I came up with, and it's working for me. I added the following method(s) to my controller base class. (You can always make these static methods somewhere else that accept a controller as a parameter I suppose)

MVC2 .ascx style

protected string RenderViewToString<T>(string viewPath, T model) {
  ViewData.Model = model;
  using (var writer = new StringWriter()) {
    var view = new WebFormView(ControllerContext, viewPath);
    var vdd = new ViewDataDictionary<T>(model);
    var viewCxt = new ViewContext(ControllerContext, view, vdd,
                                new TempDataDictionary(), writer);
    viewCxt.View.Render(viewCxt, writer);
    return writer.ToString();
  }
}

Razor .cshtml style

public string RenderRazorViewToString(string viewName, object model)
{
  ViewData.Model = model;
  using (var sw = new StringWriter())
  {
    var viewResult = ViewEngines.Engines.FindPartialView(ControllerContext,
                                                             viewName);
    var viewContext = new ViewContext(ControllerContext, viewResult.View,
                                 ViewData, TempData, sw);
    viewResult.View.Render(viewContext, sw);
    viewResult.ViewEngine.ReleaseView(ControllerContext, viewResult.View);
    return sw.GetStringBuilder().ToString();
  }
}

Edit: added Razor code.

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Linux – How to prompt for Yes/No/Cancel input in a Linux shell script

Asp.net-mvc – How to render an ASP.NET MVC view as a string

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