Asp.Net MVC: how to determine if you are currently in a particular view?

Question

I need to determine if I have a specific look. My use case is that I would like to decorate the navigation elements with the "on" class for the current view. Is there a built-in way to do this?

Answer 1

Here is what I use. I think this is actually generated by the MVC project template in VS:

public static bool IsCurrentAction(this HtmlHelper helper, string actionName, string controllerName) { string currentControllerName = (string)helper.ViewContext.RouteData.Values["controller"]; string currentActionName = (string)helper.ViewContext.RouteData.Values["action"]; if (currentControllerName.Equals(controllerName, StringComparison.CurrentCultureIgnoreCase) && currentActionName.Equals(actionName, StringComparison.CurrentCultureIgnoreCase)) return true; return false; } 

Answer 2

My current solution with extension methods:

 public static class UrlHelperExtensions { /// <summary> /// Determines if the current view equals the specified action /// </summary> /// <typeparam name="TController">The type of the controller.</typeparam> /// <param name="helper">Url Helper</param> /// <param name="action">The action to check.</param> /// <returns> /// <c>true</c> if the specified action is the current view; otherwise, <c>false</c>. /// </returns> public static bool IsAction<TController>(this UrlHelper helper, LambdaExpression action) where TController : Controller { MethodCallExpression call = action.Body as MethodCallExpression; if (call == null) { throw new ArgumentException("Expression must be a method call", "action"); } return (call.Method.Name.Equals(helper.ViewContext.ViewName, StringComparison.OrdinalIgnoreCase) && typeof(TController) == helper.ViewContext.Controller.GetType()); } /// <summary> /// Determines if the current view equals the specified action /// </summary> /// <param name="helper">Url Helper</param> /// <param name="actionName">Name of the action.</param> /// <returns> /// <c>true</c> if the specified action is the current view; otherwise, <c>false</c>. /// </returns> public static bool IsAction(this UrlHelper helper, string actionName) { if (String.IsNullOrEmpty(actionName)) { throw new ArgumentException("Please specify the name of the action", "actionName"); } string controllerName = helper.ViewContext.RouteData.GetRequiredString("controller"); return IsAction(helper, actionName, controllerName); } /// <summary> /// Determines if the current view equals the specified action /// </summary> /// <param name="helper">Url Helper</param> /// <param name="actionName">Name of the action.</param> /// <param name="controllerName">Name of the controller.</param> /// <returns> /// <c>true</c> if the specified action is the current view; otherwise, <c>false</c>. /// </returns> public static bool IsAction(this UrlHelper helper, string actionName, string controllerName) { if (String.IsNullOrEmpty(actionName)) { throw new ArgumentException("Please specify the name of the action", "actionName"); } if (String.IsNullOrEmpty(controllerName)) { throw new ArgumentException("Please specify the name of the controller", "controllerName"); } if (!controllerName.EndsWith("Controller", StringComparison.OrdinalIgnoreCase)) { controllerName = controllerName + "Controller"; } bool isOnView = helper.ViewContext.ViewName.SafeEquals(actionName, StringComparison.OrdinalIgnoreCase); return isOnView && helper.ViewContext.Controller.GetType().Name.Equals(controllerName, StringComparison.OrdinalIgnoreCase); } } 

Answer 3

Here is something a little different, use FilterAttribute:

  [NavigationLocationFilter("Products")] public ViewResult List() { return View(); } 

...

 public class NavigationLocationFilterAttribute : ActionFilterAttribute { public string CurrentLocation { get; set; } public NavigationLocationFilterAttribute(string currentLocation) { CurrentLocation = currentLocation; } public override void OnActionExecuting(ActionExecutingContext filterContext) { var controller = (Controller)filterContext.Controller; controller.ViewData.Add("NavigationLocation", CurrentLocation); } } 

...

And in the view:

 <%= ViewData["NavigationLocation"] %>