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Version: v1.2

📓 3.2.0.12 Creating and Using Views

We've set up a few routes that return strings. However, that's not very helpful for building a functional site. Let's add HTML to our site by using views — the "V" in MVC.

View File Structure​

In MVC applications, views are .cshtml files instead of .html files. .cshtml files support both plain old HTML and inline C# logic. Views always reside in a Views subdirectory of the production project. If you haven't already, go ahead and add a Views subdirectory in FriendLetter now.

The Views directory is further divided into subdirectories, one for each controller. We only have a HomeController so we'll create a Home subdirectory in Views. In Views/Home we'll create our first view file: Letter.cshtml. This name matches our Letter() route exactly.

The resulting structure for our Views should look like this:

FriendLetter.Solution └── FriendLetter └── Views └── Home └── Letter.cshtml

Writing a View​

Let's add HTML to our view:

FriendLetter/Views/Home/Letter.cshtml
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
  <head>
    <title>Hello Friend!</title>
    <link 
      href="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/npm/bootstrap@5.2.3/dist/css/bootstrap.min.css" 
      rel="stylesheet" 
      integrity="sha384-rbsA2VBKQhggwzxH7pPCaAqO46MgnOM80zW1RWuH61DGLwZJEdK2Kadq2F9CUG65" 
      crossorigin="anonymous">
    <meta charset='utf-8'>
  </head>
  <body>
    <h1>Hello From Afar</h1>
    <p>Dear Friend,</p>
    <p>How are you? I hope that you are having a nice weekend. I'm vacationing in Iceland while I learn programming! </p>
    <p>Friend, you would not believe how cold it is here. I should have gone to Hawaii instead.</p>
    <p>But I like programming a lot, so I've got that going for me. </p>
    <p>Looking forward to seeing you soon. I'll bring you back a souvenir. </p>
    <p>Cheers,</p>
    <p>Travel Enthusiast Jane</p>
  </body>
</html>

Now we need to update our controller code for the Letter() route to render the Letter.cshtml view.

FriendLetter/Controllers/HomeController.cs
using Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc;

namespace FriendLetter.Controllers
{
  public class HomeController : Controller
  {

    [Route("/hello")]
    public string Hello() { return "Hello friend!"; }

    [Route("/goodbye")]
    public string Goodbye() { return "Goodbye friend."; }

    [Route("/")]
    // Notice the changes below!
    public ActionResult Letter() { return View(); }

  }
}

We just made several changes to our Letter() route:

  • The return type of our Letter() method is now an ActionResult, not a string. This is a built-in MVC class that handles rendering views.

  • Our method returns another method called View(). This is a built-in method from the Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc namespace. When our route is invoked, it will return a view.

Invoking Views​

If we save, build and run our application, we'll see our HTML-formatted letter appear at localhost:5000. But how does Letter() know which view in the Views directory to render?

Naming Convention Functionality​

The View() method has built-in functionality to locate views by name. Here's how it works:

  • Because views should always reside in a Views directory, View() first locates the Views directory in the production project.

  • Then the method looks for a subdirectory with a name that matches the controller name. Our Letter() route is in a HomeController so it looks for the subdirectory Home.

  • Once in the Home directory, the method looks for a file that corresponds with the route itself. In this case, it's looking for Letter(). Our Letter.cshtml file name matches the name of this route so the View() method returns the HTML in this file.

Following correct naming convention is essential here. If any of our directories or files are incorrectly named, the View() method won't be able to render the right HTML.

Before we move on, let's discuss an important clarification in these naming conventions: the View() method only cares about the name of the method that invokes it. In the example above, the method Letter() invokes View(), so View() looks for Letter.cshtml.

In other words, View() does not care about the route decorator. The route decorator is simply a convenience so users can more easily access a route. This means that .cshtml files should never be named based on route decorators. If they are, View() won't be able to find them.

In the next lesson, we'll create our first model. Then, we'll use a markup syntax called Razor to dynamically render information from our model.