MVC Areas - View not found

Question

Hi,

I have a project that is using MVC areas. The area has the entire project in it while the main "Views/Controllers/Models" folders outside the Areas are empty barring a dispatch controller I have setup that routes default incoming requests to the Home Controller in my area.

This controller has one method as follows:-

public ActionResult Index(string id)
    {
        return RedirectToAction("Index", "Home", new {area = "xyz"});
    }   

I also have a default route setup to use this controller as follows:-

routes.MapRoute(
            "Default",                                              // Default route
            "{controller}/{action}/{id}",
            new { controller = "Dispatch", action = "Index", id = UrlParameter.Optional }
        );   

Any default requests to my site are appropriately routed to the relevant area. The Area's "RegisterArea" method has a single route:-

context.MapRoute(
            "xyz_default",
            "xyz/{controller}/{action}/{id}",
            new { action = "Index", id = UrlParameter.Optional }

My area has multiple controllers with a lot of views. Any call to a specific view in these controller methods like "return View("blah"); renders the correct view. However whenever I try and return a view along with a model object passed in as a parameter I get the following error:-

Server Error in '/DeveloperPortal' Application.
The view 'blah' or its master was not found. The following locations were searched:
~/Views/Profile/blah.aspx
~/Views/Profile/blah.ascx
~/Views/Shared/blah.aspx
~/Views/Shared/blah.ascx 

It looks like whenever a model object is passed in as a param. to the "View()" method [e.g. return View("blah",obj) ] it searches for the view in the root of the project instead of in the area specific view folder.

What am I missing here ?

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

If this is a routing problem, you can fix it by registering your area routes first. This causes the routing engine to try matching one of the area routes, before matching a root route:

AreaRegistration.RegisterAllAreas();
RegisterRoutes(RouteTable.Routes);

If I force an error by renaming one of my views folders in my areas application, I get a different error than yours:

The view 'Index' or its master was not found. The following locations 
  were searched:

~/Areas/xyz/Views/Document/Index.aspx
~/Areas/xyz/Views/Document/Index.ascx
~/Areas/xyz/Views/Shared/Index.aspx
~/Areas/xyz/Views/Shared/Index.ascx

...and then the usual root view folders.. 

..which is the pattern of subdirectories it would search if it thought it was in an area.

Answer 2

Solved ! A couple of my "RedirectToAction" calls were not specifying the area name explicitly in the routeobject collection parameter of that method. Weird though, that that is required even though the controllers Redirecting are all in the same area. Also, the HtmlActionLinks work fine when I don't specify the new {area="blah"} in its routeobject collection, so I wonder why the controller action calls to RedirectToAction() need that even though both the calling and the called controller actions are all within the same area.

Answer 3

Check the generated code at *MyArea*AreaRegistration.cs and make sure that the controller parameter is set to your default controller, otherwise the controller will be called bot for some reason ASP.NET MVC won't search for the views at the area folder

public override void RegisterArea(AreaRegistrationContext context)
    {
        context.MapRoute(
            "SomeArea_default",
            "SomeArea/{controller}/{action}/{id}",
            new { controller = "SomeController", action = "Index", id = UrlParameter.Optional }
        );
    }

Answer 4

I have the problem you say. When I debug the controler in the other area is called but from there it is unable to find the view. i get the errors saying

Server Error in '/' Application.

The view 'Index' or its master was not found. The following locations were searched: ~/Areas/BpmModel/Views/BpmModel/Index.aspx ~/Areas/BpmModel/Views/BpmModel/Index.ascx ~/Areas/BpmModel/Views/Shared/Index.aspx ~/Areas/BpmModel/Views/Shared/Index.ascx ~/Views/BpmModel/Index.aspx ~/Views/BpmModel/Index.ascx ~/Views/Shared/Index.aspx ~/Views/Shared/Index.ascx

I can't see anything wrong in the RegisterArea method public class Routes : AreaRegistration { public override string AreaName { get { return "BpmModel"; } }

    public override void RegisterArea(AreaRegistrationContext context)
    {
        context.MapRoute(
            "BpmModel_Default",
            "BpmModel/{controller}/{action}/{id}",
            new { controller = "BpmModel", action = "Index", id = "" }
        );
    }
}

and the controller looks like

public class BpmModelController : Controller { // // GET: /BpmModel/

    public ActionResult Index()
    {
        return View();
    }

    public ActionResult InitModel(string projectId)
    {
        return View();
    }


}

and i created a view by doing a right mouse button and Add view on the Index() mehod.