ASP.NET MVC 2 - ViewData empty after POST

Question

I don't really know where to look for an error... the situation: I have an ASPX view which contains a form and a few input's, and when I click the submit button everything is POST'ed to one of my ASP.NET MVC actions.

When I set a breakpoint there, it is hit correctly. When I use FireBug to see what is sent to the action, I correctly see data1=abc&data2=something&data3=1234.

However, nothing is arriving in my action method. ViewData is empty, there is no ViewData["data1"] or anything else that would show that data arrived.

How can this be? Where can I start looking for the error?

Answer 1

ViewData is relevant when going from the controller to the view. It won't post back.

you'll need your action method to look something like

public ActionResult DoSomething(string data1, string data2, int data3) { ...

Then the (model? parameter?) binding should take care of things for you

Answer 2

Try modifying your Action to accept FormCollection:

public ActionResult DoSomething(FormCollection fc)
{
     System.Diagnostics.Debug.Writeline(fc["data1"]);
}

Answer 3

If you want to see what is posted to your View, accept FormCollection as a parameter, or bind your form elements directly to a model. Like so:

[AcceptVerbs(HttpVerbs.Post)]
public ActionResult PostToThisView(FormCollection formItems)
{
    var data1 = formItems["data1"];
    return View();
}

Also, see this question.

Answer 4

try this:

Request["data1"]

or

Request.Form["data1"]

or

[HttpPost]
public ActionResult YourPostAction(object data1)

or

[HttpPost]
public ActionResult YourPostAction(ACLassThatHasData1Prop viewmodel)
//your view doesn't has to be strongly typed to the type of the parameter in this case