Question

What is the correct way to dynamically change the View (the view aspx) that a controller method uses versus using the standard naming convention.

I’m guessing it has something to do with the ViewResult and ViewName, but what is the correct syntax?

Update:
One thing I forgot… is there a way to do this without having the ‘action’ or method name not be part of the resulting URL?

For example,
If I wanted to have a list of all the states in the USA.
http://localhost/list/states
(displays a simple list of state names)

And If I wanted to have a list of the 50 largest cities in the USA.
http://localhost/list/largest-cities
(displays the city and the population – two column grid)

So I’d like to be able to pull in different ‘formatters’ depending on the list name.

Should I do that in a single action / multiple views?
Could I then use Routes to hide the View name in the URL?
What is the best way to approach this?

Answer 1

Just use the method that takes the name of the view to choose. Be careful, though. Most times what you probably want to do is redirect to a different action instead. Returning a different view won’t change the url like redirecting will.

string name = ...figure out which view you want...  return View( name );