Question

I’ve something similar to this:

public class employee
{
    Int id;
    String Name;
    String FamilyName;
    String SecondFamilyName;
}  

public class orders
{
    Int id;
    Int employeeid;
    Int amount;
}

(an employee can have many orders, orders and employee are related via “employeeid” property)

Strong-typed “create orders” form in MVC:

• A DropDownList will allow me to select the right employee when creating orders.

• The DropDownList should display employee names in a way defined by a third method, that it concatenates “FamilyName SecondFamilyName, Name” for employees that SecondFamilyName is not null and “FamilyName, Name” for the other.

What should I do? Using default VS 2010 templates, the runtime picks “Name” to show in DropDownList. I need the composite name, but I can’t figure how to it…

Regards.

Answer 1

Update 2,

After working for a couple of hours, I’ve noticed that, by default, VS 2010 generates a template which is being populated in Create method, with employees id and single names…

So,

Create method:

• add ViewBag.employeeid with the list of (ids, composite names)

Create view:

• replace server side code with

  @Html.DropDownList(“employeeid”, String.Empty)

That’s all. I feel stupid not seeing this so-obvious-thing before…

What do you think, Dave A?

EDIT

Just adding the code used to build the list and the composite name:

–> Employee html helper, to generate SelectList (with selected item)

public static class employeeHelper
{
    public static IEnumerable<SelectListItem> toSelectListItems(this IEnumerable<employee> Employees, Nullable<Int32> selectedID)
    {
        List<SelectListItem> lEmployees = new List<SelectListItem>();

        foreach (employee ee in Employees)
            lEmployees.Add(new SelectListItem
            {
                Selected = selectedID != null && ee.id == selectedID.Value,
                Text = employeeExtender.getEmployeeNames(pp),
                Value = pp.id.ToString()         
            });

        lEmployees = lEmployees.OrderBy(p => p.Text).ToList();

        return lEmployees;
    }
}

–> Employee extender, to get the composite name
Using Stringbuilder for performance

public class employeeExtender
{
    public static String getEmployeeNames(employee e)
    {
        if (e == null)
            return null;

        StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder();

        sb.Append(e.FamilyName.ToLower());

        if (!String.IsNullOrEmpty(e.SecondFamilyName) && e.SecondFamilyName.Trim() != String.Empty)
            sb.Append(" " + e.SecondFamilyName.ToLower());

        sb.Append(", ");
        sb.Append(e.Name.ToLower());

        //Capitalize String
        return Thread.CurrentThread.CurrentCulture.TextInfo.ToTitleCase(sb.ToString());
    }
}