Question

I have created a simple WCF service that is to be configured by an MVC3 UI.

When I call the index page from my controller, I want to display the values held in the configuration, which has been returned by the service. The user could then chose to edit these settings and then send them back to the service.

I want to do something like this in the index view …

<div>
    @Html.ActionLink("Edit", "Edit", model)
</div>

and then consume the model in the controller like this…

[HttpPost]
    public ActionResult Edit( SettingsModel Config)
    {
        try
        {
            List<string> configErrors = null;

            if (ModelState.IsValid)
            {
                // Set up a channel factory to use the webHTTPBinding
                using (WebChannelFactory<IChangeService> serviceChannel = new WebChannelFactory<IChangeService>(new Uri(baseServiceUrl)))
                {
                    IChangeService channel = serviceChannel.CreateChannel();
                    configErrors = channel.SetSysConfig(Config);
                }
          }
            return RedirectToAction("Index");
        }
        catch
        {
            return View();
        }
    }

but this doesn’t work.

Any suggestions???

Answer 1

When the form gets posted, all the input type fields data is collected and sent to the server. You can see this data using FireBug. The key point here is that, is the data that is being posted in a form, that MVC’s default model binder can understand and map it to the model object, which is being passed as input parameter to the action method.

In your case, the model is of type “SettingsModel”. You have to ensure that, the form data that is being posted is in format, that can be mapped to the “SettingsModel” object.

Same kind of question discussed in another thread : Can't figure out why model is null on postback?

Check Out this article : NerdDinner Step 6: ViewData and ViewModel

In the above article, carefully go through the “Using a ViewModel Pattern” section. My guess is that, this is what you are looking for.