I have a custom server control inheriting from DropDownList. On postback, the items are lost. It looks something like this:
public class MyClientSelectList : DropDownList
{
protected override void OnInit(EventArgs e)
{
base.OnInit(e);
// design mode hack to let visual studio display in design mode
if (!DesignMode)
{
if (!Page.IsPostBack)
{
this.Items.Add(new ListItem("Select an item..."));
// add more items from db
}
}
}
}
I checked EnablePostBack = true. I select a selected value in the page load of my page which is hosting this custom server control.
Why are the items lost on postback?
EnableViewState is already True by default, so mshsayem's solution will not work.
There're 2 way to do that, a standard way is to override SaveControlState and LoadControlState Method
Refer to http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/1whwt1k7(v=VS.100).aspx
Another way is, in the Init, reload list items from database no matter postback or not, then retrieve the selected value from post data and set it back to dropdownlist
I have a web form where I register a new employee. There're 3 parts in the form: Personal info, Address info, Special Status. But there's only one button for the whole form. When I submit the form all the information is updated to the database. So three Update statements are executed against the database. The methods are UpdatePersonalInfo, UpdateAddressInfo and UpdateSpStatus. Is there a way to check if there's been a change in any field in the certain part and run update method only if it's true. So something like this:
if (There's been any change to the personal data of the employee)
{
UpdatePersonalInfo;
}
if (There's been any change to the address information of the employee)
{
UpdateAddressInfo;
}
Sure I know, I can save all the previous values in a session object in PageLoad and then compare them one by one before running the method. But I thought maybe there's a magic way of doing this more easily.
Not sure that this is a better solution than any of the alternatives you already mentioned, but you could create a default handler to attach to the TextChanged, SelectedIndexChanged, etc events of your controls to keep track of which ones have changed.
List ChangedControls = new List(Of, String);
private void ChangedValue(object sender, System.EventArgs e) {
WebControl cntrl = (WebControl) sender;
ChangedControls.Add(cntrl.ID);
}
Then on your button click scour the ChangedControls list for the relevant controls.
I understand the "why" controls vanish on postback, and up until now I have had great success just creating what I need to do dynamically in page init. However this fell apart for me when I had to add some controls to a asp.net page based on the value of an existing dropdownlist.
So my question is simple, and I don't seem to be able to find a good working code example. I need to add some controls to the page based on the value of a dropdownlist. Then persist these added controls across other postbacks (session is fine).
Here is a snippet to work off of:
protected void Page_Init(System.Object sender, System.EventArgs e)
{
RebuildPlaceholder();
}
protected void ddlGroup_Change(System.Object sender, System.EventArgs e)
{
ExampleDataContext ctxExample = new ExampleDataContext();
var aryExample = (from rslt in ctxExample.mvExample
where rslt.label.ToLower() == ddlGroup.SelectedValue
select rslt);
foreach (var objExample in aryExample)
{
TextBox txtCreated = new TextBox();
txtCreated.ID = "ddl" + objExample.ID;
plcExample.Controls.Add(txtCreated);
}
StorePlaceholder();
}
private void StorePlaceholder()
{
//Need code to store all controls in a placeholder.
}
private void RebuildPlaceholder()
{
//Need code to rebuild all of the controls from Session.
}
I found this related article: Dynamically Adding Controls but I am struggling with the syntax for serializing all the controls, etc.
This can be limited to the child controls of a single placeholder that already exists on a page, just storing/restoring that placeholder's controls is what I am after.
Any version of ASP.NET is fine, if there is something that made this easy in 4.0 great.
Instead try caching the dropdown list selection. Then during the next page load use the cache to set the value selected. Then load the new controls based on that selection.
Session["CacheKey"] = DropDownList1.SelectedValue;
Then to access the Session Cache:
var value = Session["CacheKey"];
Take a look at this Microsoft article
on ASP.NET Caching
I've found that DropDownList.SelectedValue is unavailable during Page.Init. But you can still get access to the value with Request[ddl.UniqueID] and then create and add all your dynamic controls.
It feels kind of like a hack, but the ASP.NET page lifecycle doesn't allow many alternatives, particularly if your controls are not serializable.
I have a _Click event that is firing when a chart is clicked on. In this event I immediately cast the sender to type Chart. I often follow this paradigm but feel icky each time that I do.
In this particular instance I am also immediately running out to find a corresponding UpdatePanel so I can add a dynamically rendered GridView to it. The Chart and UpdatePanel are cobbled together by having similar IDs. Both the chart and updatepanel are dynamically created at runtime.
I am wondering if there is a better/preferred way to implement this sort of behavior.
protected void Chart_Click(object sender, ImageMapEventArgs e)
{
Chart chart = (Chart)sender;
UpdatePanel up = (UpdatePanel)chart.Parent.FindControl(chart.ID + "UP");
GridView gv = new GridView();
Dictionary<string, string> displayFields =
new Dictionary<string, string>();
// add data to displayFields by using the ImageMapEventArgs.PostBackValue
// to create data for dictionary ...
gv.DataSource = displayFields;
gv.DataBind();
up.ContentTemplateContainer.Controls.Add(gv);
}
I'm not sure what else can be done about casting sender to a chart (other than using as), but there are many ways to deal with the associated controls problem.
Add a property to the Chart called
"LinkedPanel" and assign your update panel to it
You'll see a similar pattern used in a notification icon, where you associate it with a context menu)
I think this is particularly nice, because when it's done right you can just assign the linked control in the form designer. (Of course it won't help with your dynamically generated controls)
Combine both controls into a single
UserControl (if the controls always show right next to each other, this might be the right thing to do)
Create an object that knows about both controls, and have it handle the events that they raise
I agree that depending on the name just feels wrong; I'd be too embarassed/nervous to use it in production code :-/ (If you're the only developer, then I guess it's up to you...)
Using these other approaches makes it less likely that an "innocent change" made by another developer is going to start causing unexpected exceptions.
Use as instead.
Your cast will throw if it fails.
Chart chart = sender as Chart;
if (chart == null)
return; // or do something else
// the rest of your handler.
I think it's safe to cast sender to Chart because you know it's always a Chart. Note the method name is even Chart_Click.
You could, however, save a reference to the UpdatePanel in the Chart's Tag property. That saves the ugliness and risk of a name-search in the parent. Could get hard to maintain if you're constantly switching parents or moving panels around.
If you know 100% the UpdatePanel's going to be there and named properly, however, there's nothing necessarily "wrong" with your approach IMHO. You might want to throw a "don't change this name" comment next to the UpdatePanel.Name = line where you initialize it though for security. (BTW, if you're not the only one with access to your code, the 100% instantly drops to at most a 99.9%.)
There is nothing really wrong in what you have done. But you can prevent typecasting error by using 'as' instaed of explicit casting as follows.
if you want to find if the control is an UpdatePanel you can do so by using GetType() method
example:
sender.GetType().name will give you the control name
protected void Chart_Click(object sender, ImageMapEventArgs e)
{
Chart chart = (Chart)sender;
control c = Parent.FindControl(chart.ID + "UP");
UpdatePanel up ;
if (c != null)
{
up = c as UpdatePanel;**
GridView gv = new GridView();
Dictionary<string, string> displayFields =
new Dictionary<string, string>();
// add data to displayFields by using the ImageMapEventArgs.PostBackValue
// to create data for dictionary ...
gv.DataSource = displayFields;
gv.DataBind();
up.ContentTemplateContainer.Controls.Add(gv);
}
}
Problem with dynamic controls
Hello all,
I'm wanting to create some dynamic controls, and have them persist their viewstate across page loads. Easy enough, right? All I have to do is re-create the controls upon each page load, using the same IDs. HOWEVER, here's the catch - in my PreRender event, I'm wanting to clear the controls collection, and then recreate the dynamic controls with new values. The reasons for this are complicated, and it would probably take me about a page or so to explain why I want to do it. So, in the interests of brevity, let's just assume that I absolutely must do this, and that there's no other way.
The problem comes in after I re-create the controls in my PreRender event. The re-created controls never bind to the viewstate, and their values do not persist across page loads. I don't understand why this happens. I'm already re-creating the controls in my OnLoad event. When I do this, the newly created controls bind to the ViewState just fine, provided that I use the same IDs every time. However, when I try to do the same thing in the PreRender event, it fails.
In any case, here is my example code :
namespace TestFramework.WebControls
{
public class ValueLinkButton : LinkButton
{
public string Value
{
get
{
return (string)ViewState[ID + "vlbValue"];
}
set
{
ViewState[ID + "vlbValue"] = value;
}
}
}
public class TestControl : WebControl
{
protected override void OnLoad(EventArgs e)
{
base.OnLoad(e);
Controls.Clear();
ValueLinkButton tempLink = null;
tempLink = new ValueLinkButton();
tempLink.ID = "valueLinkButton";
tempLink.Click += new EventHandler(Value_Click);
if (!Page.IsPostBack)
{
tempLink.Value = "old value";
}
Controls.Add(tempLink);
}
protected override void OnPreRender(EventArgs e)
{
base.OnPreRender(e);
ValueLinkButton tempLink = ((ValueLinkButton)FindControl("valueLinkButton")); //[CASE 1]
//ValueLinkButton tempLink = new ValueLinkButton(); [CASE 2]
tempLink.ID = "valueLinkButton";
tempLink.Value = "new value";
tempLink.Text = "Click";
Controls.Clear();
Controls.Add(tempLink);
}
void Value_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
Page.Response.Write("[" + ((ValueLinkButton)sender).Value + "]");
}
}
}
So, let's examine case 1, where the line next to [CASE 1] is not commented out, but the line next to [CASE 2] is commented out. Here, everything works just fine. When I put this control on a page and load the page, I see a link that says "Click". When I click the link, the page outputs the text "[new value]", and on the next line, we see the familiar "Click" link. Every subesquent time I click on the "Click" link, we see the same thing. So far, so good.
But now let's examine case 2, where the line next to [CASE 1] is commented out, but the line next to [CASE 2] is not commented out. Here we run into problems. When we load the page, we see the "Click" link. However, when I click on the link, the page outputs the text "[]" instead of "[new value]". The click event is firing normally. However, the "new value" text that I assigned to the Value attribute of the control does not get persisted. Once again, this is a bit of a mystery to me. How come, when I recreate the control in OnLoad, everything's fine and dandy, but when I recreate the control in PreRender, the value doesn't get persisted?
I feel like there simply has to be a way to do this. When I re-create the control in PreRender, is there some way to bind the newly created control to the ViewState?
I've struggled with this for days. Any help that you can give me will be appreciated.
Thanks.
ViewState-backed properties are only persisted to ViewState if the control is currently tracking ViewState. This is by design to keep ViewState as small as possible: it should only contain data that is truly dynamic. The upshot of this is that:
ViewState propeties set during the Init event are not backed to ViewState (because the Page has not yet started tracking ViewState). Thus Init is a good place to add controls and set (a) properties that won't change between postbacks (ID, CssClass...) as well as initial values for dynamic properties (which can then be modified by code in the rest of the page lifecycle - Load, event handlers, PreRender).
When dynamically adding controls in Load or PreRender, ViewState is being tracked. The developer can then control which propeties are persisted for dynamically added controls as follows:
Properties set before the control is added to the page's control tree are not persisted to ViewState. You typically set properties that are not dynamic (ID etc) before adding a control to the control tree.
Properties set after the control is added to the page's control tree are persisted to ViewState (ViewState tracking is enabled from before the Load Event to after the PreRender event).
In your case, your PreRender handler is setting properties before adding the control to the page's control tree. To get the result you want, set dynamic properties after adding the control to the control tree:
.
protected override void OnPreRender(EventArgs e)
{
base.OnPreRender(e);
ValueLinkButton tempLink = new ValueLinkButton(); // [CASE 2]
tempLink.ID = "valueLinkButton"; // Not persisted to ViewState
Controls.Clear();
Controls.Add(tempLink);
tempLink.Value = "new value"; // Persisted to ViewState
tempLink.Text = "Click"; // Persisted to ViewState
}
As others have statement you'll need to ensure that you are creating via the Init method. To learn more about the ASP.NET page life cycle check out this article: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms178472.aspx
I'm already re-creating the controls in my OnLoad event.
That's your problem. OnLoad is too late. Use Init instead.
Thank you for your help, but I tried that and it didn't make a difference. Besides, OnLoad works just as well for dynamic controls as OnInit, as long as you give your controls the same IDs every time.
I believe that once you have added the dynamic controls to the page in PageLoad, the ViewState is bound to the controls and the "ViewState still needs to be bound" flag (in concept, not an actual flag) is cleared. Then, when you recreate the controls, the existing ViewState is no longer bound.
I faced something similar last year, only in my case I did not want the ViewState to rebind. My issue is that I was not recreating the previous controls, which is why I think that the pseudo-flag notion above applies.
Try calling Page.RegisterRequiresControlState(). You can also use RequiresControlState() to check if it's already been registered.
ViewState works on the Page and its child objects. The new control in [Case 2] has not been added to the Page (or any of its children). In fact, in case of the code above, the object will be out of scope as soon as the OnPreRender method ends and will be garbage collected.
If you absolutely have to swap out the control, you will need to remove the old control from its parent using Remove() method and add the new control at the right place using AddAt().
If the control was the only child of the parent, the code would be something like the following.
ValueLinkButton tempLink = new ValueLinkButton();
Control parent = FindControl("valueLinkButton").Parent;
parent.Remove(FindControl("valueLinkButton"));
parent.AddAt(0, tempLink);
Control added before SaveViewState method called in control life cycle should persist their values. I would concur with Joe's answer. Check this image
http://emanish.googlepages.com/Asp.Net2.0Lifecycle.PNG
I figured out yesterday that you can actually make your app work like normal by loading the control tree right after the loadviewstateevent is fired. if you override the loadviewstate event, call mybase.loadviewstate and then put your own code to regenerate the controls right after it, the values for those controls will be available on page load. In one of my apps I use a viewstate field to hold the ID or the array info that can be used to recreate those controls.
Protected Overrides Sub LoadViewState(ByVal savedState As Object)
MyBase.LoadViewState(savedState)
If IsPostBack Then
CreateMyControls()
End If
End Sub