Question

How do I distinguish between these 2 routes in my area registration?

These are the last 2 routes in that area registration.

The first route is when the view is loaded. Works fine.

First route loads a form which then get posted to the same controller but different action.

I never get OK from controller. It might not hitting controller due to routing issue.

What I am missing?

    context.MapRoute(
        "Load",
        "app/respond/{Id}",
        new { controller = "Controller1", action = "Index" }
    );

    context.MapRoute(
        "Update",
        "app/respond/{action}",
        new { controller = "Controller1", action = "Update" }
    );

This is how the form looks:

@using (Html.BeginForm("Update", "Respond", FormMethod.Post, new { id = "frmUpdate" }))
{
   //all form fields go here
}

This is how the posting is done:

$('#frmUpdate').submit(function () {
    //verify all field values

    $.ajax({
        url: this.action,
        type: this.method,
        data: $(this).serialize(),
        success: function (result) {
            if (result.s == 'OK')
                alert("Success! Response updated");
            else
                alert("Sorry! Update failed.");//this is what I get
        }
    });

    return false;
});

My Controller:

[HttpPost]
public ActionResult Update(MyModel model)
{
    return Json(new { s = "OK", m = "Hi from controller" });
}

Answer 1

You can’t distinguish between those 2 routes because they follow absolutely the same url pattern app/respond/something. You didn’t put any constraint on something so the first route will always match.

If you want to have any chance of the routing system being able of distinguishing you need to use a constraint, for example let’s say that an {id} must contain only numbers:

context.MapRoute(
    "Load",
    "app/respond/{id}",
    new { controller = "Controller1", action = "Index" },
    new { id = @"[0-9]+" }
);

context.MapRoute(
    "Update",
    "app/respond/{action}",
    new { controller = "Controller1", action = "Update" }
);

Now when you request app/respond/123 the Index action will be called and when you invoke app/respond/FooBar the FooBar action will be called. And if you request app/respond the Update action will be invoked.