Question

I’m new to MVC but I’m trying to create an MVC Web API and I’m having a problem with routing.

I’m trying to work with the following URL patterns:

/api/venue/1999          // doesn't work
/api/venue/1999/images/  // works

The second URL pattern works fine, but if I try and access the first one, I get an error which says:

Multiple actions were found that match the request:
VenuefinderWebAPI.Models.Venue Get(Int32) on type
VenuefinderWebAPI.Controllers.VenueController System.String[]
Images(Int32) on type VenuefinderWebAPI.Controllers.VenueController

I’m not sure if it’s my routing which is wrong (multiple matches) or something in my controller class. How can fix this?

In my webApiConfig I have this:

config.Routes.MapHttpRoute(
    name: "VenueImages",
    routeTemplate: "api/venue/{venueID}/images/",
    defaults: new { controller="Venue", action = "images" }
);

config.Routes.MapHttpRoute(
    name: "VenueDefault",
    routeTemplate: "api/venue/{venueID}",
    defaults: new { controller = "Venue" }
);

VenueController.cs has:

// GET api/venue/5
public Venue Get(int venueID)
{
  // code
}

and 
[HttpGet]
[ActionName("images")]
string[] Images(int venueID)
{
   // code
}

Answer 1

Try this…

Change your Venue controller:

public string Get(int venueID)
{
    // code
}

[HttpGet]
public string[] Images(int venueID)
{
    // code
}

Change your routes:

config.Routes.MapHttpRoute(
    name: "VenueDefault",
    routeTemplate: "api/venue/{venueID}/{action}",
    defaults: new { controller = "Venue", action = "get" },
    constraints: new { venueID = @"\d+" }
);

*Added Mike’s constraint to the route.

— What the above does —
The route matches urls, where the venueID is a number and the action method defaults to get method unless specified otherwise.

Remember that action methods are your methods in your controller.