Question

I have a partial view that displays a search options like search by category, region, date etc. This exists on every page. The partial uses a viewmodel containing lists of regions, cats etc.

As this is being used on every page – I have to load these properties on the viewmodel in every action in my controllers to ensure the data is available to the partial view. Not that happy with that. (Have simply used inherited viewmodels)

I see the partial can call a renderaction method on the controller to get the data, but now I would have a view calling data from a controller – breaking the mvc pattern.

what are other people doing in this situation?

Answer 1

You can use custom ActionFilters to inject common functionality to your actions/controllers to avoid repeating the same code.

For example :

public class RequiresSearchOptions : ActionFilterAttribute {
    public override void OnResultExecuting(ResultExecutingContext filterContext){
        filterContext.Controller.ViewData["SearchOptions"] =
            GetSearchOptions();

        //Or manipulate the model :
        //YourViewModel m = 
        //    (YourViewModel)filterContext.Controller.ViewData.Model;
        //m.SearchOptions = GetSearchOptions();
    }
}

And then decorate your actions/controllers.

[RequiresSearchOptions]
public ActionResult Index() {
    return View();
}
//or
[RequiresSearchOptions]
public class HomeController : Controller {
    //Actions
}