Question

I’ve racked my brain on this for a day and a half and I’m stumped.

I have an Mvc3 site and I’m implementing a wizard (multi-step form).

The first page receives a view model from the controller and this is serialised to Javascript.

All goes well to the post method below:

$('#nextButton').click(function (evt) {
    // Validate the form, if validation passes, submit the form.
    evt.preventDefault();
    var $form = $('form');
    if ($form.valid()) {
        var viewModel = JSON.stringify(model);
        $.post(
            "SampleSubmission/Home/Index",
            { 'viewModel': viewModel }
        );
    }
});

Then it hits the controller action below:

    [HttpPost]
    public ActionResult Index(string viewModel)
    {
        _viewModel = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<SampleSubmissionViewModel>(viewModel);

        // Save Model to Session.
        Session[SessionViewModel] = _viewModel;

        // If platform Id != null, workflow has already begun.
        if (ModelState.IsValid)
        {
            return RedirectToAction("SystemDetail");
        }
        return View(_viewModel);
    }

    [HttpGet]
    public ActionResult SystemDetail()
    {
        // Page 2- System Details.
        return View(_viewModel);
    }

The redirection works but no second page is shown.

If I look in Fiddler, the page is returned as it should be.

I’m storing the model in Session because it’s an intranet site, before anybody says 🙂

Any ideas on how to show the second page?

Cheers,

Jules

Answer 1

To merge all notes into a single answer.

When calling an ajax action to create a wizard it is curcial to handle the server response and attach it in someway to the dom. Thanks to @pilavdzice to post a complete solution.

However this way of creating a wizard is not usable without javascript and imho complexer to maintain, validation would be more complex.

From my experience a solution that uses multiple views and uses simple posts like described in the post from @Darin Dimitrov multi-step registration process or described in Steven Sanderson MVC2 book is simpler and a more robust solution.