MvcContrib grid paging and searching in Asp.NET MVC3

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Introduction

This article shows you how to implement MvcContrib grid paging,filtering and preserving search url in Asp.NET MVC3.

MvcContrib grid provides nice paging interface with column ordering. In real world, we need to aggregate complex ViewModels to present grid view. We also should provide multiple searching filters and keywords to the grid view. So, I implemented clean PagedViewModel<T> class to make MvcContrib Grid paging and filtering simple in ASP.NET MVC3 based on this nice article.
 

Implementation Summary

I added some codes and classes to the original source to simplify implementation as follows:

• PagedViewModel<T> containing ViewModel collection, sorting and paging information.
• Preserving the query url between list page and view page.

This is result view page using MvcContrib Grid and MVC3.

Business Layer

Let's use the music store database of http://chinookdatabase.codeplex.com/ for our AlbumServie. (*I attached the mdf with basic connection string in web.config in our MVC project.)
Let's add MVCMusicStoreDB EF4 model including Album,Genre and Artist tables. We can see the basic entity diagram.

 
The AlbumViewModel class is the composite ViewModel class of Album,Genre and Artist entities. The MvcContrib Grid uses those Display* and ScaffoldColumn Attributes in the AutoGenerateColumns() function.

using System.ComponentModel;
using System.ComponentModel.DataAnnotations;

namespace MvcMusicStore.Models
{
    public class AlbumViewModel
    {
        [DisplayName("ID")]
        public int AlbumId { get; set; }

        [ScaffoldColumn(false)]
        public int? GenreId { get; set; }

        [DisplayName("Genre")]
        public string Genre { get; set; }

        [ScaffoldColumn(false)]
        public int? ArtistId { get; set; }

        [DisplayName("Artist")]
        public string Artist { get; set; }

        [ScaffoldColumn(false)]
        public string AlbumTitle { get; set; }

        [DisplayName("Price")]
        [DisplayFormat(DataFormatString = "{0:c}")] 
        public decimal AlbumPrice { get; set; }
    }
}

 

Let's build our main business service methods. First step is adding some basic reading methods in AlbumService. We don't implement CUD methods and any UoW or Repository layer for simple & quick implementation.

namespace MvcMusicStore.Models
{
    public class AlbumService
    {
        private MvcMusicStoreEntities _context;

        public AlbumService()
        {
            _context = new MvcMusicStoreEntities();
        }

        public IQueryable<AlbumViewModel> GetAlbumsView()
        {
            var query = from a in GetAlbums()
                        select new AlbumViewModel
                        {
                            AlbumId = a.AlbumId,
                            GenreId = a.GenreId,
                            Genre = a.Genre.Name,
                            ArtistId = a.ArtistId,
                            Artist = a.Artist.Name,
                            AlbumTitle = a.Title,
                            AlbumPrice = a.Price
                        };
            return query;
        }

        public AlbumViewModel FindAlbumView(int albumId)
        {
            return GetAlbumsView().Where(a => a.AlbumId == albumId).Single();
        }

        public IQueryable<Album> GetAlbums()
        {
            return _context.Albums;
        }

        public IQueryable<Genre> GetGenres()
        {
            return _context.Genres;
        }

        public IQueryable<Artist> GetArtists()
        {
            return _context.Artists;
        }

        public void Save()
        {
            _context.SaveChanges();
        }
    }
}        

 

 

PagedViewModel<T>

PagedViewModel<T> is generic container holding all data for grid presentation including search filters.

To support fluent filter setting function to the PagedViewModel<T>, We should implement AddFilter and Setup methods.

namespace MvcMusicStore.Models
{
    public class PagedViewModel<T>
    {
         ...

        public PagedViewModel<T> AddFilter(Expression<Func<T, bool>> predicate)
        {
            Query = Query.Where(predicate);
            return this;
        }

        public PagedViewModel<T> AddFilter<TValue>(string key, TValue value, Expression<Func<T, bool>> predicate)
        {
            ProcessQuery(value, predicate);
            ViewData[key] = value;
            return this;
        }

        public PagedViewModel<T> AddFilter<TValue>(string keyField, object value, Expression<Func<T, bool>> predicate,
            IQueryable<TValue> query, string textField)
        {
            ProcessQuery(value, predicate);
            var selectList = query.ToSelectList(keyField, textField, value);
            ViewData[keyField] = selectList;
            return this;
        }

        public PagedViewModel<T> Setup()
        {
            if (string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(GridSortOptions.Column))
            {
                GridSortOptions.Column = DefaultSortColumn;
            }
            PagedList = Query.OrderBy(GridSortOptions.Column, GridSortOptions.Direction)
                .AsPagination(Page ?? 1, PageSize ?? 10);
            return this;
        }

        private void ProcessQuery<TValue>(TValue value, Expression<Func<T, bool>> predicate)
        {
            if (value == null) return;
            if (typeof(TValue) == typeof(string))
            {
                if (string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(value as string)) return;
            }
            Query = Query.Where(predicate);
        }
    }
}

 

Listing action method in controller

Let's make a listing method of AlbumController with searching filters,ordering and paging in our AlbumController. We can add fluently query filters to the filter pipeline of PagedViewModel.

namespace MvcMusicStore.Controllers
{
    public class AlbumController : Controller
    {
        private AlbumService _service;
        public AlbumController()
        {
            _service = new AlbumService();
        }
        public ActionResult Index(string albumTitle, int? genreId, int? artistId, GridSortOptions gridSortOptions, int? page)
        {
            var pagedViewModel = new PagedViewModel<AlbumViewModel>
            {
                ViewData = ViewData,
                Query = _service.GetAlbumsView(),
                GridSortOptions = gridSortOptions,
                DefaultSortColumn = "AlbumId",
                Page = page,
            }
            .AddFilter("albumTitle", albumTitle, a => a.AlbumTitle.Contains(albumTitle))
            .AddFilter("genreId", genreId, a => a.GenreId == genreId, _service.GetGenres(), "Name")
            .AddFilter("artistId", artistId, a => a.ArtistId == artistId, _service.GetArtists(), "Name")
            .Setup();
            return View(pagedViewModel);
        }
        ...
    }
}

 

 

Listing Razor View page for MvcContrib Grid

Let's make List View Page. We can easily fill two dropdown lists without any additional code from PagedViewModel<T>. Also, We add link using Html.ActionQueryLink helper method to keep query string like "/Album/Details/420?albumTitle=Ro&genreId=1".

@using MvcMusicStore.Common
@using MvcMusicStore.Models;
@using MvcContrib.UI.Grid;
@model PagedViewModel<AlbumViewModel>

@{
    ViewBag.Title = "Album List";
}

<h2>Album List</h2>

@using (Html.BeginForm("Index", "Album", FormMethod.Get, new { id = "albumSearch" }))
{   
<label>
Title   @Html.TextBox("albumTitle")
  Genre @Html.DropDownList("genreId", "-- Select All --")
</label>
<label>
Artist @Html.DropDownList("artistId", "-- Select All --")
  <input class="button" value="Search" type="submit" />
</label>
}

@{Html.RenderPartial("Pager", Model.PagedList);}
@Html.Grid(Model.PagedList).AutoGenerateColumns().Columns(column =>
 column.For(x => Html.ActionQueryLink(x.AlbumTitle, "Details", new { id = x.AlbumId }))
 .Named("AlbumTitle").InsertAt(2);
}).Sort(Model.GridSortOptions).Attributes(@class => "grid-style")

 
Let's see SearchBox with title keyword, Genre&Album Dropdown list. The contrib Grid provides Colum filtering and paging UI.

 

We can back to List page with preserved query option from Details page. Let's add a snippet to save routing url to ViewBag by using added ToRouteDic extension method.

namespace MvcMusicStore.Controllers
{
    public class AlbumController : Controller
    {   
        ...
        public ActionResult Details(int id)
        {
            var viewModel = _service.FindAlbumView(id);
            ViewBag.RouteDicForList = Request.QueryString.ToRouteDic();
            return View(viewModel);
        }
    }
}

Let's restore the ViewBag data to restore the query url in Details View page.

@model MvcMusicStore.Models.AlbumViewModel
@{
    ViewBag.Title = "Details";
}
<h2>Album Details - @Model.AlbumTitle</h2>
<p>
    @Html.ActionLink("Back to List", "Index", 
    ViewBag.RouteDicForList as RouteValueDictionary)
</p>

 

Conclusion

MvcContrib Grid is nice web grid component for MVC3 framework. We can use great paging,filtering,ordering grid functions easily.

EDIT: You can download the source code from here
 

Reference

• Raj Kaimal : ASP.NET MVC Paging/Sorting/Filtering using the MVCContrib Grid and Pager
• MVC Contrib Homepage
• Chinook Sample Database
• Css and design : Styleshout.com