Using Microsoft.AspNetCore.Html.HtmlString

Question

Its a .Net Core 2.0 application running on Visual Studio 2017 I want to display an HTML string returned on the View.

I have added the Microsoft.AspNetCore.Html.Abstractions Nuget to my application, and I want to display an HTML sting on the Razor view, this is how my CSHTML looks like

@model EDMTLC.Models.QuickResultViewModel
@using Microsoft.AspNetCore.Html;
<div>@Html.Display(Model.ResultHTML) </div>
<div>TEST</div>

I don't think @Html.Display is the way I should be doing. In previous version .Net I used to to

<div>
    <text> @MvcHtmlString.Create(Model.ReportHTML)</text>
 </div>

but this will not work anymore with Core 2.0

Can someone help with an example? I found this thread, but it didn't help!

Thanks

Answer 1

A more elegant solution is to build an extension method:

using Microsoft.AspNetCore.Html;
public static class StringExtensions
{
    /// <summary>
    /// Convert a standard string into a htmlstring for rendering in a view
    /// </summary>
    /// <param name="value"></param>
    /// <returns></returns>
    public static HtmlString ToHtmlString(this string value)
    {
        return new HtmlString(value);
    }
}

In your _ViewImports file, include the namespace if required:

@using MyProject.Extensions

Now in your views you will be able to do:

<div>@Model.ReportHTML.ToHtmlString()</div>

I'd advise doing additional sanitization in a real world app but this should answer the OP's question.

Answer 2

Have you tried @Html.Raw()? It should display the value as raw string, without encoding.

<pre>
    <code>@Html.Raw(Model.ReportHTML)</code>
</pre>

This should work in Asp.Net Core Mvc 2.0 and previous versions as well, without the need of installing additional NuGet packages.

Notes

1. In order to use @Html.Display(), if you're passing a string expression into the argument, that argument has to match one of your properties defined in your view model.

   // This doesn't work
   @Html.Display(Model.ResultHTML)
   
   // This works but it encodes your HTML
   @Html.Display("ResultHtml")
   

2. Or you can use @Html.DisplayFor() and pass a lamba expression to avoid magic strings in your View

   // This works but it encodes your HTML
   @Html.DisplayFor(x => x.ResultHTML)