What item should I create in ASP.NET MVC if I want to break a view into smaller sub-views?

Question

I have an ASP.NET MVC application I'm building and I'm using a Master page. On this master page, I would like to further break things up by creating a separate file for "Tabs", "Header", and "Footer".

What kind of view should I create to encapsulate these things to help remove clutter from my Master Page? Also, how do I reference these in the correct place in my master view so I can have them rendered properly?

There are several different types of options available for creating views/content views/user controls, etc for MVC and I need to know which is the right one for this task and how to use it.

Answer 1

Have you already considered Usercontrols/Partial views ??

Edit:If its just html you can write html files and render using helper methods.

Answer 2

If you are using WebForms Views then you have 3 options:

Partial Views / User Controls:

Using Html.RenderPartial (I think it is the best method for creating Tabs in ASP.NET MVC 1.0 for today). Your markup will be looking as:

<% Html.RenderPartial(ViewData["TabName"], ViewData["TabData"]); %>

Nested MasterPages:

• Site.master with ContentPlaceHolders for Content, Header, Sidebars, Footer ...
• Tabs.master with ContentPlaceHolder for Tabs in the <asp:Content ContentPlaceHolderID="Content" >
• A lot of Tab1.aspx ... TabN.aspx for tabs .

HtmlHelper extensions:

You can use (I think it is wrong way for creating Tabs) something like this:

<% if(ViewData["TabName"] = "Tab1") { %>
    <%= Html.Tab1() %>
<% } else if(ViewData["TabName"] = "Tab2") { %>
    <%= Html.Tab2() %>
<% } else ...
... 
...
...