Handing forms in ViewUserControls

Question

I am rendering out a ViewUserControl (.ascx file) in a view:

<% Html.RenderPartial("Comments", Model.Comments); %>

This ViewUserControl shows associated comments on an entry. I would like this control to render out a form as well, so users of my application can contribute.

How would you add a form to a ViewUserControl and handle it's postback?

Answer 1

Just add the form in there the same as you would on any page. In MVC, the form does not postback as such - it simply submits itself and its content (input controls) via HTTP Post to a URL.

Simply create an action in your controller (and hence a URL) which the form will post and do whatever activity is required there...

Answer 2

There is no postaback, like in standard asp.net, there can be only form tag that posts data to some url (controller/action).
Inside your partial user control, write:

<form action="controller/actionname" method="post">
<input type="text" name="inputText" />
<input type="submit" value="Post data to server" />
</form>

In MVC, only input type="submit" triggers form submit. In standard ASP.NET webforms, you can have many Linkbuttons, Buttons, ... but under cover, they all triggers this simple click on input type="submit" through javascript event. One form can post data to only one URL (controller/action), but that can be changed with javascript (as we can see in html source of 'old' asp.net webforms).

then, in controller you can handle post data:

[AcceptVerb(HttpVerb.Post)] // optionally 
public ActionResult ActionName(string inputText) ...

Answer 3

Like others have answered already, you simply render a form and handle it's submit with an ActionResult.

For example, if your form (which could be rendered anywhere in your site) was submitting to http://www.yoururl.com/home/save, you would create an ActionResult method named save on the home controller to handle the submit (likely post/get method).