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Route to generic Razor page only if physical resource doesn't exist

I am a front-end dev and don't know a lot about C#. I have been dabbling in Razor views so I can sort-of make my way around it. I am developing a project that might require some C# routing and I can't get it working (I think this is due to my limited understanding).
We built a website that contains a mix of static resources (physical .cshtml pages) and then also content that is stored in a database. All the links to these content pieces are generated via handlebars templates so I cannot use Razor within my templates (that I know of). The database content needs to use page.cshtml, which should then also be routed to remove page from the URL.
So in essence, when you hit http://www.example.com/my-page it should check if my-page.cshtml exists, else use http://www.example.com/page/my-page rewritten as http://www.example.com/my-page.
I'm trying to use this but it isn't working:
using System.Web.Routing;
public class Routes
{
void RegisterRoutes(RouteCollection routes)
{
routes.MapPageRoute("Deals",
"/{page}", "~/page.cshtml");
}
}
Is this possible using only Razor? I have tried routing via C# RouteConfig but the project is using V4 of .NET so attribute routing doesn't work. I also can't use a catchall route as there are some pages that are within directories.
Or is my only option to explicitly state a link to /page/ in the DB and do IIS rewrites?
My other option is to always hit page.cshtml and if it can't find the content in my DB, it loads in my-page.cshtml as a partial. But then what happens if someone types http://www.example.com/my-page into the address bar?

You can check if your my-page.cshtml file exist in your controller
string myFile = Server.MapPath("path to my-page.cshtml");
if(File.Exists(myFile))
{
return View("path to my-page.cshtml");
}
else
{
//from db
}
ps: you need to use System.IO in your controller

Proper way to route to controllers in Umbraco ASP.NET / IApplicationEventHander vs ApplicationEventHandler vs RouteConfig.cs, RenderMvcController etc

I have a Solution structure like this:
MyApp.Core
--Properties
--References
--bin
--Events
|EventHandlers.cs
--Directory
--Controllers
|DirectoryController.cs
--Helpers
|ContextHelpers.cs
--Models
|DirectoryModel.cs
--AnotherSite
--Controllers
--Helpers
--Models
--Services
--Shared
--Controllers
|HomePageController.cs
--Helpers
|Extensions.cs
|app.config
|packages.config
MyApp.Umbraco
--Properties
--References
--bin
etc........
--Views
--Directory
--Partials
|DirectoryFilters.cshtml
|DirectoryBase.cshtml
|DirectoryHome.cshtml
|FDirectory.cshtml
|SDirectory.cshtml
--Partials
--Shared
|Base.cshtml
|Web.config
etc........
My Umbraco instance uses the models and controllers from my "Core" project. There is nested directory structure, because of multiple websites in one installation, in the "Core", and also in the "Views" directory in the Umbraco instance.
I am still fairly noob to .NET MVC, and I understand route hijacking, but the documentation for Umbraco's routing is slim. I have the following:
EventHandlers.cs
namespace MyApp.Core.Events
{
/// <summary>
/// Registers site specific Umbraco application event handlers
/// </summary>
public class MyAppStartupHandler : IApplicationEventHandler
{
public void OnApplicationInitialized(UmbracoApplicationBase umbracoApplication, ApplicationContext applicationContext)
{
}
public void OnApplicationStarted(UmbracoApplicationBase umbracoApplication, ApplicationContext applicationContext)
{
RegisterCustomRoutes();
}
public void OnApplicationStarting(UmbracoApplicationBase umbracoApplication, ApplicationContext applicationContext)
{
}
private static void RegisterCustomRoutes()
{
// Custom Routes
RouteTable.Routes.MapUmbracoRoute(
"FDirectory",
"fdirectory/{id}",
new
{
controller = "Directory",
action = "FDirectory",
id = UrlParameter.Optional
},
new PublishedPageRouteHandler(1000));
RouteTable.Routes.MapUmbracoRoute(
"SDirectory",
"sdirectory/{id}",
new
{
controller = "Directory",
action = "SDirectory",
id = UrlParameter.Optional
},
new PublishedPageRouteHandler(1001));
RouteTable.Routes.MapUmbracoRoute(
"HomePage",
"",
new
{
controller = "HomePage",
action = "Index",
id = UrlParameter.Optional
},
new PublishedPageRouteHandler(1002));
}
}
public class PublishedPageRouteHandler : UmbracoVirtualNodeRouteHandler
{
private readonly int _pageId;
public PublishedPageRouteHandler(int pageId)
{
_pageId = pageId;
}
protected override IPublishedContent FindContent(RequestContext requestContext, UmbracoContext umbracoContext)
{
if (umbracoContext != null)
{
umbracoContext = ContextHelpers.EnsureUmbracoContext();
}
var helper = new UmbracoHelper(UmbracoContext.Current);
return helper.TypedContent(_pageId);
}
}
}
DirectoryController.cs
namespace MyApp.Core.Directory.Controllers
{
public class DirectoryController : RenderMvcController
{
public DirectoryController() : this(UmbracoContext.Current) { }
public DirectoryController(UmbracoContext umbracoContext) : base(umbracoContext) { }
public ActionResult FDirectory(RenderModel model)
{
return CurrentTemplate(new DirectoryModel(model.Content));
}
public ActionResult SDirectory(RenderModel model)
{
return CurrentTemplate(new DirectoryModel(model.Content));
}
}
}
So Umbraco does not install with an App_Start folder. I would like to know what the best approach is for a multi-site installation of Umbraco for registering the routes to the controllers. My implementation works, but it seems like I shouldn't have to create actions for every single page I am going to have in a site, in every controller. I know Umbraco has its own routing, so using Umbraco concepts, ASP.NET MVC concepts, and whatever else is available, what is the best way to implement this type of solution structure? Should I even worry about using a RouteConfig.cs and create a App_Start directory? Or is what I am doing the best approach? Should I use IApplicationEventHandler or ApplicationEventHandler?
Also, I have to hard code the node ID's. I've read that there is a way to Dynamically? And example of this would be great.
Examples of the best way to implement a structured multi-site Umbraco MVC solution is what I am asking for I guess, in regards to routing the controllers, with some detail, or links to strong examples. I have searched and researched, and there are bits and pieces out there, but not really a good example like what I am working with. I am going to have to create a RouteMap for every single page I create at this point, and I don't know if this is the most efficient way of doing this. I even tried implementing a DefaultController, but didn't see the point of that when your solution is going to have multiple controllers.

I'm not entirely sure what you are trying to achieve with this, but I'll try to explain how it works and maybe you can clarify afterwards.
I assume you have the basics of Umbraco figured out (creating document types + documents based on the document types). This is how Umbraco is normally used and it will automatically do routing for you for each of these "content nodes" (documents) you create in a site.
So create a document named document1 and it will be automatically routed in your site at URL: http://localhost/document1. By default this document will be served through a default MVC controller and it will all take place behind the scenes without you having to do anything.
Route hijacking allows you to override this default behavior and "shove in" a controller that lets you interfere with how the request is handled. To use hijacking you create a RenderMvcController with the alias of your document type. That could be HomePageController : RenderMvcController.
This controller should have an action with the following signature:
public override ActionResult Index(RenderModel model)
In this action you are able to modify the model being sent to the view in any way you like. That could be - getting some external data to add on to the model or triggering some logic or whatever you need to do.
This is all automatically hooked up by naming convention and you will not have to register any routes manually for this to work.
The other type of Umbraco MVC controller you can create is a SurfaceController. This one is usually used for handling rendering of child actions and form submissions (HttpPost). The SurfaceController is also automatically routed by Umbraco and will be located on a "not so pretty" URL. However since it is usually really not used for anything but rendering child actions and taking form submits, it doesn't really matter what URL it is located at.
Besides these auto-routed controllers you are of course able to register your own MVC controllers like in any standard MVC website. The one difference though is that unlike a normal ASP.NET MVC website, an Umbraco site does not have the automagical default registration of controllers allowing the routing to "just work" when creating a new controller.
So if you want to have a plain old MVC controller render in an Umbraco site without it being related to a document/node in Umbraco, you would have to register a route for it like you would do in any other MVC site. The best way of doing that is to hook in and add it to the Routes using an ApplicationEventHandler class. That will automatically be triggered during application startup - essentially allowing you to do what you would normally do in App_Start.
Just to be clear though - if you plan on using data from Umbraco, you should not be using normal MVC controllers and should not require any manual route registration to be done. You usually want to render a template/view in context of a document/node created in Umbraco (where you can modify data/properties of the document) and then the route hijacking is the way to go.
From what it looks like, it could seem that the correct way to do what you are trying to do is to simply create two document types:
FDirectory and SDirectory
You click to allow both of these to be created in root and then you create documents called FDirectory and SDirectory and they will be automatically routed on these URLs. Creating a RenderMvcController's called FDirectoryController : RenderMvcController will then make sure it is used to hijack the routing whenever that page is requested.
If you're simply trying to set up a multi-site solution I would suggest you create a Website document type and create a node for each site you want, in the root of your Umbraco content tree. Right click each of these nodes and edit the hostname to be whatever you need it to be. This can also be some "child url" like /fdirectory or /sdirectory in case you need to test this on localhost without using multiple hostnames.
Hope this gives you the pointers needed, otherwise try to explain what you are trying to do and I'll see if I can refine my answer a bit!

skip all Umbraco magic for single method

I was just assigned to implement one functionality in project that uses Umbraco. My job is to basically generate specific XML and return it to user. However i cannot get it to work, because when i create new controller (i've tried creating
Controller, RenderMvcController and SurfaceController
) and method in it (also if i just create new method in existing controller), i get error 404 after typing url into browser. Example: I create TestController and method Index in it. I've tried combinations where TestController was derived from RenderMvcController or SurfaceController or just Controller. After compiling, etc. when i run
http://my_address/Test
or
http://my_address/Test/Index
i get 404 error from umbraco. I looked at another pages in umbraco that were already in project and they all are also configured somehow in umbraco web panel:
http://my_address/umbraco
I aslo tried adding new methods to existings controllers, but no luck (again 404 errors). I've never worked with umbraco and i don't know how to configure it. I just want to know if there is any way to create method which will be accessible at:
http://my_address/MyMethod
or
http://my_address/MyController/MyMethod
and would return just exactly what i will program it to (without any Views, Partial Views, etc. - i can set Headers and ContentType manually and my content is pure text) in an existing Umbraco project without having to deal with umbraco admin panel?
Thanks for any help :)
//Edit
My mind is officially blown... My response is culture dependent (i mean i pull different data from db depending on country), but it's not as simple as
CurrentCulture.CultureInfo
Umbraco is configured to return different culture based on domain extension (Germany for .de, Great Britain for .co.uk, and Dennmark for .dk - it's just a manual configuration in umbraco admin panel assigning different culture info and views to different hostnames). Regular controllers get this modified culture from
RenderModel.CurrentCulture
passed as argument to controller's method. Is there a way to create umbraco controller/method/anthing that will not have layout/model assigned to it (so i can display pure XML data i receive from external service) and still have access to umbraco's RenderModel's culture? What i am trying to create is if user types url:
http://my_address.de/myController/myMethod
my controller will get current culture, call external service passing culture as parameter and display received data without wrapping it in any views. Example:
public class myController : SomeBaseUmbracoControllerOrsomething
{
public string/XmlDocument/ActionResult myMethod(RenderModel model)
{
int countryId = myFunctionToTranslateCultureToCountryId(model.CurrentCulture);
return MethodThatCallsExternalServiceAndReturnsXml(countryId);
}
}
Sorry for confusion, but i've learned about this whole mess with countries just now...

You don't want to use
controller, because this is not picked up by umbraco routing process
you don't want to use RenderMvcController, because this is overkill
you don't want to use Surfacecontroller because you are not using a Child action or form.
What you need is a UmbracoApiController (http://our.umbraco.org/documentation/Reference/WebApi/) or is your umbraco version is PRE 6.1 then use /Base extention (http://our.umbraco.org/documentation/Reference/Api/Base/Index)
Or if you really want to skip ALL umbraco magic for a certain route, add the path to the web.config/AppSettings/umbracoReservedUrls.

.NET MVC3 : Create Virtual file URL and redirect to controller

Suppose I got a MVC3 website with a URL like this:
http://www.anything.com/feed.xml
The trick is, the file feed.xml does not really exist, it will be generated dynamically by a controller at runtime. That way, it will be transparent to people. Any idea how should I bind the controller to the virtual URL?
Thank you very much.

Is this what you need?
routes.MapRoute("", "feed.xml", new { controller = "Feed", action = "Index" });

Create custom route and return File result from action. Look at this links:
Back to Basics: Dynamic Image Generation, ASP.NET Controllers,
Routing, IHttpHandlers, and runAllManagedModulesForAllRequests
(in your situation no need for custom RouteHandler)
ASP.NET MVC Uploading and Downloading Files (how return file)

ASP.NET MVC in a virtual directory

I have the following in my Global.asax.cs
routes.MapRoute(
"Arrival",
"{partnerID}",
new { controller = "Search", action = "Index", partnerID="1000" }
);
routes.MapRoute(
"Default",
"{controller}/{action}/{id}",
new { controller = "Home", action = "Index", id = "" }
);
My SearchController looks like this
public class SearchController : Controller
{
// Display search results
public ActionResult Index(int partnerID)
{
ViewData["partnerID"] = partnerID;
return View();
}
}
and Index.aspx simply shows ViewData["partnerID"] at the moment.
I have a virtual directory set up in IIS on Windows XP called Test.
If I point my browser at http://localhost/Test/ then I get 1000 displayed as expected. However, if I try http://localhost/Test/1000 I get a page not found error. Any ideas?
Are there any special considerations for running MVC in a virtual directory?

IIS 5.1 interprets your url such that its looking for a folder named 1000 under the folder named Test. Why is that so?
This happens because IIS 6 only
invokes ASP.NET when it sees a
“filename extension” in the URL that’s
mapped to aspnet_isapi.dll (which is a
C/C++ ISAPI filter responsible for
invoking ASP.NET). Since routing is a
.NET IHttpModule called
UrlRoutingModule, it doesn’t get
invoked unless ASP.NET itself gets
invoked, which only happens when
aspnet_isapi.dll gets invoked, which
only happens when there’s a .aspx in
the URL. So, no .aspx, no
UrlRoutingModule, hence the 404.
Easiest solution is:
If you don’t mind having .aspx in your
URLs, just go through your routing
config, adding .aspx before a
forward-slash in each pattern. For
example, use
{controller}.aspx/{action}/{id} or
myapp.aspx/{controller}/{action}/{id}.
Don’t put .aspx inside the
curly-bracket parameter names, or into
the ‘default’ values, because it isn’t
really part of the controller name -
it’s just in the URL to satisfy IIS.
Source: http://blog.codeville.net/2008/07/04/options-for-deploying-aspnet-mvc-to-iis-6/

If you are doing this on Windows XP, then you're using IIS 5.1. You need to get ASP.Net to handle your request. You need to either add an extension to your routes ({controller}.mvc/{action}/{id}) and map that extension to ASP.Net or map all requests to ASP.Net. The http://localhost/Test works because it goes to Default.aspx which is handled specially in MVC projects.
Additionally, you need to specify http://localhost/Test/Search/Index/1000. The controller and action pieces are not optional if you want to specify an ID.

There are a number of considerations when using virtual directories in your application.
One is particular is that most browsers will not submit cookies that came from one virtual directory to another, even if the apps reside on the same server.

Try set virtual path: right click on mvc project, properties, web tab, there enter appropriate location.