Jack @ ASP.NET

Key characteristics of VIEW
? The view is a visual element, such as a window, page, user control, or data template. The view defines the controls contained in the view and their visual layout and styling.
? The view references the view model through its DataContext property. The controls in the view are data bound to the properties and commands exposed by the view model.
? The view may customize the data binding behavior between the view and the view model. For example, the view may use value converters to format the data to be displayed in the UI, or it may use validation rules to provide additional input data validation to the user.
? The view defines and handles UI visual behavior, such as animations or transitions that may be triggered from a state change in the view model or via the user’s interaction with the UI.
? The view’s code-behind may define UI logic to implement visual behavior that is difficult to express in XAML or that requires direct references to the specific UI controls defined in the view.

Key characteristics of’ ‘VIEWMODEL’
? The view model is a non-visual class and does not derive from any WPF or Silverlight base class. It encapsulates the presentation logic required to support a use case or user task in the application. The view model is testable independently of the view and the model.
? The view model typically does not directly reference the view. It implements properties and commands to which the view can data bind. It notifies the view of any state changes via change notification events via the INotifyPropertyChanged and INotifyCollectionChanged interfaces.
? The view model coordinates the view’s interaction with the model. It may convert or manipulate data so that it can be easily consumed by the view and may implement additional properties that may not be present on the model. It may also implement data validation via the IDataErrorInfo or INotifyDataErrorInfo interfaces.
? The view model may define logical states that the view can represent visually to the user.

Key characteristics of ‘MODEL’
? Model classes are non-visual classes that encapsulate the application’s data and business logic. They are responsible for managing the application’s data and for ensuring its consistency and validity by encapsulating the required business rules and data validation logic.
? The model classes do not directly reference the view or view model classes and have no dependency on how they are implemented.
? The model classes typically provide property and collection change notification events through the INotifyPropertyChanged and INotifyCollectionChanged interfaces. This allows them to be easily data bound in the view. Model classes that represent collections of objects typically derive from the ObservableCollection<T> class.
? The model classes typically provide data validation and error reporting through either the IDataErrorInfo or INotifyDataErrorInfo interfaces.
? The model classes are typically used in conjunction with a service or repository that encapsulates data access and caching.

When you’re using ASP.NET MVC, there’s no validation controls for you compared to ASP.NET WebForms. It is always important to validate data on the server as well as the client. Back when Dynamic Data was being developed, a set of attributes was created to help tell the Dynamic Data folks about validation and other metadata so they could create smart scaffolds. What this allows you to do is decorate your classes or properties with validation attributes. A project that is available on CodePlex gives you the power to inject this validation into your MVC project. The CodePlex project can be found here. The end results are you can decorate your classes with some of the following attributes to perform server side validation:

• Required – a required field
• StringLength – allows you to set the minimum and maximum length of a string
• RegularExpression – performs regular expression validation

When you use this your validation classes will look like the following example:

Via C#

   1: public class EmployeeMetaData

   2: {

   3: [Required]

   4:       [StringLength(10, ErrorMessage="Given name cannot be more than 10 characters")]

   5:       public string GivenName { get; set; }

   6:  

   7:       [Required]

   8:       public string Surname { get; set; }

   9: }

Via VB

   1: Public Class EmployeeMetaData

   2: Private privateGivenName As String

   3: <Required, StringLength(10, ErrorMessage:="Given name cannot be more than 10 characters")> _

   4: Public Property GivenName() As String

   5:       Get

   6:             Return privateGivenName

   7:       End Get

   8:       Set(ByVal value As String)

   9:             privateGivenName = value

  10:       End Set

  11: End Property

  12:  

  13:        Private privateSurname As String

  14:        <Required> _

  15:        Public Property Surname() As String

  16:              Get

  17:                    Return privateSurname

  18:              End Get

  19:              Set(ByVal value As String)

  20:                    privateSurname = value

  21:              End Set

  22:        End Property

  23: End Class

Unfortunately, because Visual Studio 2010 Beta 2 and ASP.NET MVC 2 Beta share components which are currently not in sync, running ASP.NET MVC 2 Beta on VS10 Beta 2 is not supported. Regarding Visual Studio 2010 and .NET 4 support, that is unfortunately not a feasible option. The most recent public release of VS2010 and .NET 4 is Beta 2. However, our internal builds of MVC 2 for VS2010 and .NET 4 depend on features that were available only after Beta 2. In other words, if we released what we have right now for VS2010 and .NET 4 then it wouldn’t even run.

The good news is that the Visual Studio 2010 Release Candidate will include a newer version of ASP.NET MVC 2. 

Highlights

As you might expect from a release candidate, most of the work focused on bug fixes and improvements to existing features. We also spent a lot of time on performance profiling and optimization.

Much of the focus on this release was in the client validation scripts. For example, the validation script was moved into its own file and can be included at the top or bottom of the page. Client validation also now supports globalization.

The other change related to validation is that the ValidationSummary now supports overloads where only model-level errors are displayed. This is useful if you are displaying validation messages inline next to each form field. Previously, these messages would be duplicated in the validation summary. With these new changes, you can have the summary display an overall validation message (ex. “There were errors in your form submission”) as well as a list of validation messages which don’t apply to a specific field.

What’s Next?

RTM of course! The RTM release of ASP.NET MVC will be included in the RTM release of Visual Studio 2010, which is slated for some time in March. The VS2008 version of ASP.NET MVC 2 might release earlier than that. We’re still working out those details.