Question

I’m populated a partial view with a strongly-typed model. In this partial view is a form. When I submit the form it tells me that objects inside of my model are null, even though they are not because the partial view rendered all elements based on that same model.

More specifically, I’m having trouble passing back all of my checkboxes. If you look at my controller you can see that I check to see if CompanyOptions is null, and every time I run the program it prints STUFF IS NULL, meaning that it’s null.

Model:

public class Company
{
    public string Name { get; set; }
    public string DatabaseName { get; set; }
    public CompanyOptions CompanyOptions;
}

 public class CompanyOptions
    {

        public CompanyLicenseOptions CompanyLicenseOptions { get; set; }
    }

 public class CompanyLicenseOptions
    {
        public List<CompanyLicenseOption> CompanyLicenseOptionsList;
}

View:

@using (Html.BeginForm("Action", FormMethod.Post))
{
    for (int i = 0; i < Model.CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList.Count; i++)
    {
        @Html.CheckBoxFor(model => model.CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList[i].IsLicensed, checkboxHtmlAttributes);
        <label for="@Model.CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList[i].LicenseName">@Model.CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList[i].LicenseName</label>                                                                                       
        <br/>
    } 
    @Html.HiddenFor(model => model.DatabaseName)
    <input id="submit_licenses" type="submit" style="display:none;" />
}

Controller:

       [HttpPost]
        public void Action(Company model)
        {
            System.Diagnostics.Debug.WriteLine("STUFF:" + model.DatabaseName);
            if(model.CompanyOptions!=null)foreach (var item in model.CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList) System.Diagnostics.Debug.WriteLine("STUFF:" + item);
            else System.Diagnostics.Debug.WriteLine("STUFF IS NULL");
        }

Generated HTML:

<input class="licenses" data-val="true" disabled="" id="CompanyOptions_CompanyLicenseOptions_CompanyLicenseOptionsList_0__IsLicensed" name="CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList[0].IsLicensed" type="checkbox" value="true" /><input name="CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList[0].IsLicensed" type="hidden" value="false" />

The Irrelevant JS

$('#save_licenses').click(function () {
        swap_licenses(true);
        $('#submit_licenses').click();
    });

POST:

Request URL:http://localhost:3080/Controller/Action
Request Method:POST
Status Code:200 OK

CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList[0].IsLicensed:false
    CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList[1].IsLicensed:false
    CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList[2].IsLicensed:false
    CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList[3].IsLicensed:false
    CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList[4].IsLicensed:false
    CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList[5].IsLicensed:false
    CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList[6].IsLicensed:false
    CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList[7].IsLicensed:false
    CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList[8].IsLicensed:false
    CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList[9].IsLicensed:false
    CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList[10].IsLicensed:false
    CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList[11].IsLicensed:false
    CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList[12].IsLicensed:false
    DatabaseName:myDb

Answer 1

<input class="licenses" data-val="true" disabled="" id="CompanyOptions_CompanyLicenseOptions_CompanyLicenseOptionsList_0__IsLicensed" name="CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList[0].IsLicensed" type="checkbox" value="true" /><input name="CompanyOptions.CompanyLicenseOptions.CompanyLicenseOptionsList[0].IsLicensed" type="hidden" value="false" />

Here’s your problem:

disabled=""

Your checkbox is disabled, so nothing will ever get sent to the server. That’s how HTML works. Disabled elements are never sent. So get rid of this attribute.

If you want to prevent the user from modifying the value, and yet the initial value get sent to the server use the readonly attribute, not disabled.

Also another problem I see with your code is with the CompanyLicenseOptionsList collection field. It should be a property with public getter and setter:

public class CompanyLicenseOptions
{
    public List<CompanyLicenseOption> CompanyLicenseOptionsList { get; set; }
}

Same stands true for your CompanyOptions field (you have defined it as a field, whereas it should be a property):

public class Company
{
    public string Name { get; set; }
    public string DatabaseName { get; set; }
    public CompanyOptions CompanyOptions { get; set; }
}

---

UPDATE:

Now that you have fixed the problem with your missing getters and setters, all that’s left is make sure that all the models intervening in this object graph have default (parameterless) constructors. That’s a requirement if you want they to appear as action argument because otherwise the default model binder wouldn’t know how to instantiate them. If for some reason you cannot add a default constructor to all your objects, I would very strongly recommend you revise your object hierarchy and start using view models right away.