ASP.NET - Alias dropdownlist names on back end

Question

I'm using .NET 3.5, MVC.

I want to use a set of string aliases to represent database values. i.e. when a user selects an option from a dropdown it actually sets the value as 0, 1, 2, etc. in the table, rather than the text shown in the dropdown itself.

e.g. I'm doing:

IdName[] Thing = new[] {   
new IdName { Id = 0, Name = "No Selection" }, 
new IdName { Id = 1, Name = "Thing A9" }, 
new IdName { Id = 2, Name = "Thing C12" }, 
new IdName { Id = 3, Name = "Thing F4" } 
};

MyDropDownList = new SelectList(Things, "Id", "Name",0);

and in the view:

<%= Html.DropDownList("MyDropDownList")%>

Now, this works just fine. What I can't get to work is displaying the value of the field in a 'details' view and showing "Thing C12" as the text instead of "2".

Also, is this the best way to go about this? I don't want to use the actual string in the database in case I modify the text on an entry (e.g. change the name of "Thing F4" to "Thing F5".) I'm totally open to some other ideas.

Thanks!

Answer 1

So you want your action method (that will store the user choice) to store the value rather than the alias shown on the Dropdown.

I think you have two options here.

1- On the server side by getting the value(the id) from your data source, eg: the Things[] array in your example.

public ActionResult StoreValueFromDropDown(string MyDropDownList) {
        var id = Things.Single(thing => thing.Name == MyDropDownList).Id;
        // here goes the code to sotre the id
}

2- on the client side by adding a hidden field that store the value of the Dropdown. here is an example using jQuery(I didn't test it):

<input type="hidden" id="ThingId" />

,

$('#MyDropDownList').change(function(e){
     $('#ThingId').value($('#MyDropDownList option:selected').attr('value'));
});

then you need to modify your action method to accept the value of that hidden field

public ActionResult StoreValueFromDropDown(int ThingId) {

        // here goes the code to sotre the id
}