How do you handle multiple submit buttons in ASP.NET MVC Framework?

Question

Is there some easy way to handle multiple submit buttons from the same form? For example:

<% Html.BeginForm("MyAction", "MyController", FormMethod.Post); %> <input type="submit" value="Send" /> <input type="submit" value="Cancel" /> <% Html.EndForm(); %> 

Any idea how to do this in ASP.NET Framework Beta? All examples I've googled for have single buttons in them.

Answer 1

Give your submit buttons a name, and then inspect the submitted value in your controller method:

<% Html.BeginForm("MyAction", "MyController", FormMethod.Post); %> <input type="submit" name="submitButton" value="Send" /> <input type="submit" name="submitButton" value="Cancel" /> <% Html.EndForm(); %> 

posting to

public class MyController : Controller {     public ActionResult MyAction(string submitButton) {         switch(submitButton) {             case "Send":                 // delegate sending to another controller action                 return(Send());             case "Cancel":                 // call another action to perform the cancellation                 return(Cancel());             default:                 // If they've submitted the form without a submitButton,                  // just return the view again.                 return(View());         }     }      private ActionResult Cancel() {         // process the cancellation request here.         return(View("Cancelled"));     }      private ActionResult Send() {         // perform the actual send operation here.         return(View("SendConfirmed"));     }  } 

EDIT:

To extend this approach to work with localized sites, isolate your messages somewhere else (e.g. compiling a resource file to a strongly-typed resource class)

Then modify the code so it works like:

<% Html.BeginForm("MyAction", "MyController", FormMethod.Post); %> <input type="submit" name="submitButton" value="<%= Html.Encode(Resources.Messages.Send)%>" /> <input type="submit" name="submitButton" value="<%=Html.Encode(Resources.Messages.Cancel)%>" /> <% Html.EndForm(); %> 

and your controller should look like this:

// Note that the localized resources aren't constants, so  // we can't use a switch statement.  if (submitButton == Resources.Messages.Send) {      // delegate sending to another controller action     return(Send());  } else if (submitButton == Resources.Messages.Cancel) {      // call another action to perform the cancellation      return(Cancel()); } 

Answer 2

Here is a mostly clean attribute-based solution to the multiple submit button issue based heavily on the post and comments from Maarten Balliauw.

[AttributeUsage(AttributeTargets.Method, AllowMultiple = false, Inherited = true)] public class MultipleButtonAttribute : ActionNameSelectorAttribute {     public string Name { get; set; }     public string Argument { get; set; }      public override bool IsValidName(ControllerContext controllerContext, string actionName, MethodInfo methodInfo)     {         var isValidName = false;         var keyValue = string.Format("{0}:{1}", Name, Argument);         var value = controllerContext.Controller.ValueProvider.GetValue(keyValue);          if (value != null)         {             controllerContext.Controller.ControllerContext.RouteData.Values[Name] = Argument;             isValidName = true;         }          return isValidName;     } } 

razor:

<form action="" method="post">  <input type="submit" value="Save" name="action:Save" />  <input type="submit" value="Cancel" name="action:Cancel" /> </form> 

and controller:

[HttpPost] [MultipleButton(Name = "action", Argument = "Save")] public ActionResult Save(MessageModel mm) { ... }  [HttpPost] [MultipleButton(Name = "action", Argument = "Cancel")] public ActionResult Cancel(MessageModel mm) { ... } 

Update: Razor pages looks to provide the same functionality out of the box. For new development, it may be preferable.