CODEWITHSUNDEEP
.netasp.net-mvcwinforms
yu_ominae
yu_ominae

Reputation: 2935

displaying views from ASP.NET MVC project from a winforms project

I have this idea where I would like to generate some forms in html and then display them in winforms in a web browser control. The hitch is that I am not sure how to go about doing so.

Is it possible to have one solution with an ASP.NET MVC project and a Windows forms (or WPF) project and call display the views from the asp.net project in a web browser control in the windows forms project?

I am trying to put together a quick test project and have done the easy stuff so far:

If somebody could explain to me how to go about displaying the MVC view in the winforms browser I'd be most grateful.

EDIT:

Basically what would like to figure out how to do is this:

In the form containing my web browser, I'd do something like this:

public partial class Form1 : Form
{
    public Form1()
    {
        InitializeComponent();

        DisplayReport();
    }

    public void DisplayReport()
    {
        this.webBrowser1.Navigate(MyMvcProject.Controller.MyCoolView);
    }
}

And I'd get the html from MyCoolView displayed in the web browser control... I just don't have a clue how to do it, what using statements are required etc.

Upvotes: 1

Views: 1610

Answers (2)

Phil1970
Phil1970

Reputation: 2623

I think it might be possible but you would have to create a bunch of object yourself. In a sense, it might be similar to unit testing where mocks are created for many objects.

In the past, I have used that function (from Inside a controller function) to create a string by rendering a partial view and it was used to generated emails from an ASP.NET MVC application.

    protected string RenderPartialViewToString(string viewName, object model)
    {
        if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(viewName))
            viewName = ControllerContext.RouteData.GetRequiredString("action");

        ViewData.Model = model;

        using (StringWriter sw = new StringWriter())
        {
            ViewEngineResult viewResult = 
                ViewEngines.Engines.FindPartialView(ControllerContext, viewName);

            ViewContext viewContext = new ViewContext(ControllerContext, 
                viewResult.View, ViewData, TempData, sw);

            viewResult.View.Render(viewContext, sw);

            return sw.GetStringBuilder().ToString();
        }
    }

Upvotes: 1

TGH
TGH

Reputation: 39248

This link shows how you can communicate between the web browser control and your wpf/winforms app. This works seamlessly and is a very neat way to facilitate two way communication between the browser control and the web page http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.windows.forms.webbrowser.objectforscripting.aspx

http://www.west-wind.com/weblog/posts/2008/Sep/27/Calling-JavaScript-functions-in-the-Web-Browser-Control

It requires a scripting object that you define as a regular class. Methods defined on this object can be called from the Website in JavaScript through the window.external.WhateverMethod

EX:

webBrowser1.Document.InvokeScript("test",
            new String[] { "called from client code" });

This calls the JavaScript method "test" - defined on the webpage (and passes a string variable.)

Upvotes: 1

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