Problems using UpdateProgress

Question

I have a button on my ASP.NET page, which fetches some data from my database and displays it on a gridview.

This process takes a while, so I thought I'll add an updateprogress AJAX control. Now when I click the button, the updateprogress image shows up and data is being fetched from my database successfully (I checked this from some logs that I have in my DB). But there are 2 issues:

(1) The updateprogress image shows only for about 2 minutes. But my buttonclick event takes about 5 minutes to complete. Basically the updateprogress stops showing up even before my task is complete, which defeats its purpose.

(2) GridView doesn't show up. It shows up correctly if I don't use scriptmanager/AJAX.

Any ideas?

Some relevant code snippets:

<div style="position: absolute; top: 300px; left: 19px; width: 568px; height: 48px;">
    <table>
        <tr>
        <td>
    <asp:Button ID="btnGenerateReport" runat="server" Height="37px" Text="Generate Report" 
        Width="132px" onclick="btnGenerateReport_Click" />
        </td>
        <td class="style5">
    <asp:ScriptManager ID="ScriptManager1" runat="server" />
    <asp:UpdatePanel runat="server" id="Panel">
    <ContentTemplate>
            <asp:UpdateProgress ID="PageUpdateProgress" runat="server">
                <ProgressTemplate>
                    <img runat="server" src="updateprogress.gif" 
                        style="position: static; width: 32px;"> </img></ProgressTemplate>
            </asp:UpdateProgress>
            <div style="position: absolute; top: 423px; left: 9px; width: 795px; height: 984px;">
        <asp:GridView ID="Report" runat="server" 
            AllowSorting="True" AutoGenerateColumns="False" 
            Height="622px" BorderStyle="Solid" 
            Width="779px" PageSize="100" HorizontalAlign="Center">
            <Columns>
                <asp:BoundField HeaderText="AccountId" DataField="AccountId">
                <ControlStyle BorderStyle="Solid" Width="20px" />
                </asp:BoundField>
                <asp:BoundField HeaderText="User Name" ReadOnly="True" DataField="UserName">
                <ControlStyle Width="50px" />
                </asp:BoundField>
                <asp:BoundField HeaderText="C2" ReadOnly="True" 
                    DataField="C2">
                <ControlStyle BorderStyle="Solid" Width="20px" />
                </asp:BoundField>
                <asp:BoundField HeaderText="C1" ReadOnly="True" 
                    DataField="C1">
                <ControlStyle BorderStyle="Solid" Width="20px" />
                </asp:BoundField>
            </Columns>
        </asp:GridView>
    </div>
    </ContentTemplate>
    <Triggers>
            <asp:AsyncPostBackTrigger ControlID="btnGenerateReport" EventName="click" />
    </Triggers>
    </asp:UpdatePanel>
        </td>
        <td>
        <asp:Button ID="btnExportToExcel" runat="server" Text="Export To Excel" 
                Height="37px" Width="132px" onclick="btnExportToExcel_Click" />
        </td>
        </tr>
    </table>
    </div>

Codefile part:

protected void btnGenerateReport_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)
        {

            FetchAccounts();
            long startId = FetchAuditData();
            AggregateAuditData(startId);
            dsAnalysisReport = GenerateDataSet();
            if (dsAnalysisReport == null || dsAnalysisReport.Tables.Count == 0)
                lblErrorText.Text = "No Data Found for the input information";
            else
                BindData(dsAnalysisReport);
        }

        public void FetchAccounts()
        {
            using (var sqlConnection = new SqlConnection(ConnectionString))
            {
                sqlConnection.Open();
                cmdstring = @"[spo_FetchAccounts]";
                cmd = new SqlCommand(cmdstring, sqlConnection) { CommandType = CommandType.StoredProcedure };
                cmd.CommandTimeout = 100000;
                cmd.Parameters.Add("@MaxActivationDate", SqlDbType.DateTime);
                cmd.Parameters["@MaxActivationDate"].Value =
                    DateTime.Parse(txtStartDate.Text) - new TimeSpan(1, 0, 0, 0);
                cmd.ExecuteNonQuery();
                sqlConnection.Close();
            }
        }

        public long FetchAuditData()
        {
            using (var sqlConnection = new SqlConnection(ConnectionString))
            {
                sqlConnection.Open(); 
                cmdstring = @"[spo_GetComparisonData]";
                cmd = new SqlCommand(cmdstring, sqlConnection) { CommandType = CommandType.StoredProcedure };
                cmd.CommandTimeout = 100000;
                cmd.Parameters.Add("@StartDate", SqlDbType.DateTime);
                cmd.Parameters["@StartDate"].Value = txtStartDate.Text;
                cmd.Parameters.Add("@EndDate", SqlDbType.DateTime);
                cmd.Parameters["@EndDate"].Value = txtEndDate.Text;
                SqlParameter returnValue = new SqlParameter("@Return_Value", SqlDbType.BigInt);
                returnValue.Direction = ParameterDirection.ReturnValue;
                cmd.Parameters.Add(returnValue);
                cmd.ExecuteNonQuery();
                long startId = long.Parse(cmd.Parameters["@Return_Value"].Value.ToString());
                sqlConnection.Close();
                return startId;
            }
        }

        private void AggregateAuditData(long startId)
        {
            using (var sqlConnection = new SqlConnection(ConnectionString))
            {
                sqlConnection.Open();
                cmdstring = @"[spo_ComparisonTable]";
                cmd = new SqlCommand(cmdstring, sqlConnection) { CommandType = CommandType.StoredProcedure };
                cmd.CommandTimeout = 100000;
                cmd.Parameters.Add("@StartId", SqlDbType.Int);
                cmd.Parameters["@StartId"].Value = startId;
                cmd.ExecuteNonQuery();
                sqlConnection.Close();
            }
        }


        public DataSet GenerateDataSet()
        {

            using (var sqlConnection = new SqlConnection(ConnectionString))
            {
                sqlConnection.Open();
                cmdstring = @"SELECT * FROM XAccounts";
                cmd = new SqlCommand(cmdstring, sqlConnection);
                DataSet ds = new DataSet();
                SqlDataAdapter da = new SqlDataAdapter(cmd);
                da.Fill(ds);
                sqlConnection.Close();
                if (ds.Tables.Count > 0 && ds.Tables[0].Rows.Count > 0)
                    return ds;
                return null;
            }    
        }

        private void BindData(DataSet ds)
        {
            BindReportGrid(Report, ds.Tables[0]);
        }

        private void BindReportGrid(GridView gridToBind, DataTable dataTableToBind)
        {
            gridToBind.DataSource = dataTableToBind;
            gridToBind.DataBind();
        }

Answer 1

Seems like your grid is outside the Update panel, if you are using a update panel and you button is inside the update panel and grid is outside the update panel in that case everything will happen at server side but you will not find any changes in the UI.

Try to place your grid inside the update panel.

Answer 2

Maybe you want this: http://www.codeproject.com/kb/Ajax/ModalUpdateProgress.aspx

It works well for me, even with lengthy operations.

Answer 3

I have had very same problems with ASP.NET UpdateProgress. I fixed it by handling script manager events directly:

<script language="javascript" type="text/javascript">

//adding event handlers for ajax initialize request and end request
Sys.WebForms.PageRequestManager.getInstance().add_initializeRequest(ShowHandler);
Sys.WebForms.PageRequestManager.getInstance().add_endRequest(HideHandler);

function ShowHandler(sender, args) {
    //show div with animation
    pcProcessing_ClientInstance.Show();
}
function HideHandler(sender, args) {
    //hide div with animation
    pcProcessing_ClientInstance.Hide();
}

</script>

Answer 4

Move the UpdateProgress outside of the UpdatePanel.

Answer 5

As per issue (1) most likely it is ajax timing out. Default timeout is 90 seconds. To increase that use ScriptManager's AsyncPostBackTimeout property:

<asp:ScriptManager ID="ScriptManager1" runat="server" AsyncPostBackTimeout="400">
</asp:ScriptManager>

If ajax call is timing out, controls on the page might not work correctly so increasing timeout might solve problem (2) as well.