ASP.NET MVC 3 - Passing variable model to controller

Question

I have this controller

public class DownloadController : Controller
{
    [HttpPost]
    public FileContentResult GetFile(MyModel model)
    {
        // Action code
    }
}

And this model

public class MyModel
{
    public string Test { get; set; }
}

Passing model from the View to the controller works fine like this

@using (Html.BeginForm("GetFile", "Download", FormMethod.Post))
{
    @Html.HiddenFor(m => m.Test)
    <button type="submit" name="submit" class="submit">Download</button>
}

The model is correctly passed to the controller and I can do what I need to do with it.

Now, what I'm trying to achieve is to make this GetFile() controller action to be generic, so I can pass it any model, without strongly typing the model class in method signature, like I did in the example above.

I know I can achieve this by overriding GetFile() method once for each model that I have, but I'm wondering is there a better way to do this, to stay DRY as much as possible?

Thank you.

Jason Evans · Accepted Answer · 2013-06-14 11:39:51Z

1

I'd suggest using a base class:

public class BaseGetFileModel {}

which various models will derive from.

[HttpPost]
public FileContentResult GetFile(BaseGetFileModel model)

EDIT:

OK, if you want a generic way of doing this, then you could do this:

[HttpPost]
public FileContentResult GetFile()
{
    var someValue = Request["SomeValue"];
}

You don't accept any model parameter, you simply pick up POST'd values from the request. Or you could iterate through the request values collection, if you want to avoid hard-coding key names.

edited Jun 14, 2013 at 11:39

answered Jun 14, 2013 at 9:27

Jason Evans

29.2k16 gold badges95 silver badges157 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

1 Comment

dizarter Over a year ago

In this case, if I pass BaseGetFileModel to my method, only those members of BaseGetFileModel are visible, while any of the other members added in deriving classes are not visible, so this solution does not work.

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

ASP.NET MVC 3 - Passing variable model to controller

1 Answer 1

1 Comment

Your Answer

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

1 Answer 1

1 Comment

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Related