Server Control Properties Example
This example shows how to create a control named Book
that persists simple properties and properties that have subproperties.
A simple property is a property whose type is a string or a type that maps easily to a string. A simple property is persisted as an attribute on the control's opening tag without any work on your part. Properties of type String and primitive value types in the .NET Framework class library such as Boolean, Int16, Int32, and Enum are simple properties. You can add code to store a simple property in the ViewState dictionary for state management across postbacks.
A property is referred to as complex when the property type is a class that itself has properties, which are referred to as subproperties. For example, the type of the Font property of WebControl is the FontInfo class that itself has properties such as Bold and Name. Bold and Name are subproperties of the Font property of WebControl. The ASP.NET page framework can persist subproperties on a control's opening tag using hyphenated syntax (for example, Font-Bold="true"
), but subproperties are more readable in the page when persisted within the control's tags (for example, <font Bold="true">
).
To enable a visual designer to persist subproperties as children of the control, you must apply several design-time attributes to the property and its type; the default persistence is hyphenated attributes on the control's tag. In addition, a property that has subproperties also needs custom state management to use view state, as described in the "Code Discussion" section later in this topic.
The Book
control defined in the example is a control that could be used in a Web page to display information about a book in a catalog. The Book
control defines the following properties:
Author
, a property with subproperties whose type is the custom typeAuthor
. TheAuthor
type has its own properties such asFirstName
andLastName
, which are subproperties of theAuthor
property.BookType
, a simple property whose type is the custom enumerationBookType
. TheBookType
enumeration has values such asFiction
andNonFiction
.CurrencySymbol
, a simple property whose type is the built-in String type.Price
, a simple property whose type is the built-in Decimal type.Title
, a simple property whose type is the built-in String type.
The BookType
, CurrencySymbol
, Price
, and Title
properties are all simple properties, and therefore do not need any special attributes for page persistence. The page framework persists these properties by default as attributes on the control's tag, as in the following example:
<aspSample:Book Title="Wingtip Toys Stories"
CurrencySymbol="$"
Price="16"
BookType="Fiction">
</aspSample:Book>
The Author
property and the properties of the Author
class need design-time attributes to enable persistence within the control's tags, as shown in the following example:
<aspSample:Book >
<Author FirstName="Judy" LastName="Lew" />
</aspSample:Book>
The Book
control stores its simple properties in the ViewState dictionary. However, the Book
control has to implement custom state management for the Author
property to manage the state of the property across postbacks.
A production-quality implementation of the Book
control could define properties for other book-related data such as the publisher and publication date. In addition, the Author
property could be replaced by a collection property. For information about implementing a collection property, see Web Control Collection Property Example.
Note |
---|
A page developer can disable view state for a page or for individual controls in the page. If your control needs to maintain critical state across postbacks for its internal functioning, you can use the control state mechanism defined in ASP.NET 2.0. Control state is described in Control State vs. View State Example. |
Code Listing for the Book Control
' Book.vb
Option Strict On
Imports System
Imports System.ComponentModel
Imports System.Security.Permissions
Imports System.Web
Imports System.Web.UI
Imports System.Web.UI.WebControls
Namespace Samples.AspNet.VB.Controls
< _
AspNetHostingPermission(SecurityAction.Demand, _
Level:=AspNetHostingPermissionLevel.Minimal), _
AspNetHostingPermission(SecurityAction.InheritanceDemand, _
Level:=AspNetHostingPermissionLevel.Minimal), _
DefaultProperty("Title"), _
ToolboxData("<{0}:Book runat=""server""> </{0}:Book>") _
> _
Public Class Book
Inherits WebControl
Private authorValue As Author
Private initialAuthorString As String
< _
Bindable(True), _
Category("Appearance"), _
DefaultValue(""), _
Description("The name of the author."), _
DesignerSerializationVisibility( _
DesignerSerializationVisibility.Content), _
PersistenceMode(PersistenceMode.InnerProperty) _
> _
Public Overridable ReadOnly Property Author() As Author
Get
If (authorValue Is Nothing) Then
authorValue = New Author()
End If
Return authorValue
End Get
End Property
< _
Bindable(True), _
Category("Appearance"), _
DefaultValue(BookType.NotDefined), _
Description("Fiction or Not") _
> _
Public Overridable Property BookType() As BookType
Get
Dim t As Object = ViewState("BookType")
If t Is Nothing Then t = BookType.NotDefined
Return CType(t, BookType)
End Get
Set(ByVal value As BookType)
ViewState("BookType") = value
End Set
End Property
< _
Bindable(True), _
Category("Appearance"), _
DefaultValue(""), _
Description("The symbol for the currency."), _
Localizable(True) _
> _
Public Overridable Property CurrencySymbol() As String
Get
Dim s As String = CStr(ViewState("CurrencySymbol"))
If s Is Nothing Then s = String.Empty
Return s
End Get
Set(ByVal value As String)
ViewState("CurrencySymbol") = value
End Set
End Property
< _
Bindable(True), _
Category("Appearance"), _
DefaultValue("0.00"), _
Description("The price of the book."), _
Localizable(True) _
> _
Public Overridable Property Price() As Decimal
Get
Dim p As Object = ViewState("Price")
If p Is Nothing Then p = Decimal.Zero
Return CType(p, Decimal)
End Get
Set(ByVal value As Decimal)
ViewState("Price") = value
End Set
End Property
< _
Bindable(True), _
Category("Appearance"), _
DefaultValue(""), _
Description("The title of the book."), _
Localizable(True) _
> _
Public Overridable Property Title() As String
Get
Dim s As String = CStr(ViewState("Title"))
If s Is Nothing Then s = String.Empty
Return s
End Get
Set(ByVal value As String)
ViewState("Title") = value
End Set
End Property
Protected Overrides Sub RenderContents( _
ByVal writer As HtmlTextWriter)
writer.RenderBeginTag(HtmlTextWriterTag.Table)
writer.RenderBeginTag(HtmlTextWriterTag.Tr)
writer.RenderBeginTag(HtmlTextWriterTag.Td)
writer.WriteEncodedText(Title)
writer.RenderEndTag()
writer.RenderEndTag()
writer.RenderBeginTag(HtmlTextWriterTag.Tr)
writer.RenderBeginTag(HtmlTextWriterTag.Td)
writer.WriteEncodedText(Author.ToString())
writer.RenderEndTag()
writer.RenderEndTag()
writer.RenderBeginTag(HtmlTextWriterTag.Tr)
writer.RenderBeginTag(HtmlTextWriterTag.Td)
writer.WriteEncodedText(BookType.ToString())
writer.RenderEndTag()
writer.RenderEndTag()
writer.RenderBeginTag(HtmlTextWriterTag.Tr)
writer.RenderBeginTag(HtmlTextWriterTag.Td)
writer.Write(CurrencySymbol)
writer.Write(" ")
writer.Write(String.Format("{0:F2}", Price))
writer.RenderEndTag()
writer.RenderEndTag()
writer.RenderEndTag()
End Sub
Protected Overrides Sub LoadViewState( _
ByVal savedState As Object)
MyBase.LoadViewState(savedState)
Dim auth As Author = CType(ViewState("Author"), Author)
If auth IsNot Nothing Then
authorValue = auth
End If
End Sub
Protected Overrides Function SaveViewState() As Object
If authorValue IsNot Nothing Then
Dim currentAuthorString As String = _
authorValue.ToString()
If Not _
(currentAuthorString.Equals(initialAuthorString)) Then
ViewState("Author") = authorValue
End If
End If
Return MyBase.SaveViewState()
End Function
Protected Overrides Sub TrackViewState()
If authorValue IsNot Nothing Then
initialAuthorString = authorValue.ToString()
End If
MyBase.TrackViewState()
End Sub
End Class
End Namespace
// Book.cs
using System;
using System.ComponentModel;
using System.Security.Permissions;
using System.Web;
using System.Web.UI;
using System.Web.UI.WebControls;
namespace Samples.AspNet.CS.Controls
{
[
AspNetHostingPermission(SecurityAction.Demand,
Level = AspNetHostingPermissionLevel.Minimal),
AspNetHostingPermission(SecurityAction.InheritanceDemand,
Level=AspNetHostingPermissionLevel.Minimal),
DefaultProperty("Title"),
ToolboxData("<{0}:Book runat=\"server\"> </{0}:Book>")
]
public class Book : WebControl
{
private Author authorValue;
private String initialAuthorString;
[
Bindable(true),
Category("Appearance"),
DefaultValue(""),
Description("The name of the author."),
DesignerSerializationVisibility(
DesignerSerializationVisibility.Content),
PersistenceMode(PersistenceMode.InnerProperty),
]
public virtual Author Author
{
get
{
if (authorValue == null)
{
authorValue = new Author();
}
return authorValue;
}
}
[
Bindable(true),
Category("Appearance"),
DefaultValue(BookType.NotDefined),
Description("Fiction or Not"),
]
public virtual BookType BookType
{
get
{
object t = ViewState["BookType"];
return (t == null) ? BookType.NotDefined : (BookType)t;
}
set
{
ViewState["BookType"] = value;
}
}
[
Bindable(true),
Category("Appearance"),
DefaultValue(""),
Description("The symbol for the currency."),
Localizable(true)
]
public virtual string CurrencySymbol
{
get
{
string s = (string)ViewState["CurrencySymbol"];
return (s == null) ? String.Empty : s;
}
set
{
ViewState["CurrencySymbol"] = value;
}
}
[
Bindable(true),
Category("Appearance"),
DefaultValue("0.00"),
Description("The price of the book."),
Localizable(true)
]
public virtual Decimal Price
{
get
{
object price = ViewState["Price"];
return (price == null) ? Decimal.Zero : (Decimal)price;
}
set
{
ViewState["Price"] = value;
}
}
[
Bindable(true),
Category("Appearance"),
DefaultValue(""),
Description("The title of the book."),
Localizable(true)
]
public virtual string Title
{
get
{
string s = (string)ViewState["Title"];
return (s == null) ? String.Empty : s;
}
set
{
ViewState["Title"] = value;
}
}
protected override void RenderContents(HtmlTextWriter writer)
{
writer.RenderBeginTag(HtmlTextWriterTag.Table);
writer.RenderBeginTag(HtmlTextWriterTag.Tr);
writer.RenderBeginTag(HtmlTextWriterTag.Td);
writer.WriteEncodedText(Title);
writer.RenderEndTag();
writer.RenderEndTag();
writer.RenderBeginTag(HtmlTextWriterTag.Tr);
writer.RenderBeginTag(HtmlTextWriterTag.Td);
writer.WriteEncodedText(Author.ToString());
writer.RenderEndTag();
writer.RenderEndTag();
writer.RenderBeginTag(HtmlTextWriterTag.Tr);
writer.RenderBeginTag(HtmlTextWriterTag.Td);
writer.WriteEncodedText(BookType.ToString());
writer.RenderEndTag();
writer.RenderEndTag();
writer.RenderBeginTag(HtmlTextWriterTag.Tr);
writer.RenderBeginTag(HtmlTextWriterTag.Td);
writer.Write(CurrencySymbol);
writer.Write(" ");
writer.Write(String.Format("{0:F2}", Price));
writer.RenderEndTag();
writer.RenderEndTag();
writer.RenderEndTag();
}
protected override void LoadViewState(object savedState)
{
base.LoadViewState(savedState);
Author auth = (Author)ViewState["Author"];
if (auth != null)
{
authorValue = auth;
}
}
protected override object SaveViewState()
{
if (authorValue != null)
{
String currentAuthorString = authorValue.ToString();
if (!(currentAuthorString.Equals(initialAuthorString)))
{
ViewState["Author"] = authorValue;
}
}
return base.SaveViewState();
}
protected override void TrackViewState()
{
if (authorValue != null)
{
initialAuthorString = authorValue.ToString();
}
base.TrackViewState();
}
}
}
Code Discussion
The DesignerSerializationVisibilityAttribute and PersistenceModeAttribute applied to the Author
property of the Book
control are described in Web Control Collection Property Example. These attributes are needed to serialize and persist the properties of the Author
class.
The view state mechanism refers to the technique that ASP.NET uses for maintaining state across postbacks. The mechanism serializes the state of a page and its control tree into string representations at the end of page processing and deserializes the string on postback. By default, the page sends the strings to the browser as hidden fields. For more information, see ASP.NET State Management Overview.
To manage the state of a simple property, you define it as a read/write property that is stored in the control's ViewState property. The Book
control defines its simple properties (BookType
, CurrencySymbol
, Price
, and Title
) this way. The state of properties that you store in the ViewState property is managed for you without any work on your part.
To manage a property that has subproperties, you can define the property as read-only and write code to manage the state of the object. To do so, you override the following methods:
TrackViewState, to signal the control to start tracking property changes after initialization.
SaveViewState, to save the property (if it has changed) at the end of the page request.
LoadViewState, to load the saved state into the property on postback.
Note There are other methods to manage the state of complex property in addition to the method discussed here. You can extend the method used in Walkthrough: Developing and Using a Custom Server Control by modifying view state with each property change. You can also manage the state within the property class, as shown in Custom Property State Management Example.
The ViewState property's type, StateBag, is a dictionary with built-in state management. The StateBag class implements the IStateManager interface, which defines the TrackViewState, SaveViewState and LoadViewState methods. The StateBag class implements these methods to start tracking changes to control properties after initialization, save the items that have been modified at the end of the page request, and load saved state into items on postback. StateBag tracks items by marking an item as modified if the item is set after the OnInit method is executed for a page request. For example, if any code in the page that runs after page initialization sets the Title
property of the Book
control, a change is made to ViewState["Title"]
. As a consequence, the value stored under the "Title"
key in ViewState is marked as modified. For more information, see ASP.NET Page Life Cycle Overview.
The Book
control defines the Author
property as a read-only property and implements custom state management as follows:
In the TrackViewState method, the
Book
control first saves the initialAuthor
property to a string and then starts state tracking by invoking the TrackViewState method of the base class.In the SaveViewState method, the
Book
control determines whether theAuthor
property has changed from its initial value. If the property has changed,Book
saves theAuthor
property in the ViewState dictionary using the key "Author". TheBook
control then invokes the SaveViewState method of the base class. Because state tracking is on, theAuthor
object saved in ViewState is automatically marked as modified and saved as part of the view state of the base class.In LoadViewState, the
Book
control first invokes the base class's LoadViewState method. This call automatically restores the ViewState dictionary. TheBook
control then determines whether the ViewState dictionary has an item stored under "Author". If so, the control loads the view state value into theAuthor
property.
The Author
type (defined in the code listing that follows) has a custom type converter so that an Author
instance can be stored in view state. The type converter converts an Author
instance to a string and vice versa. Defining a type converter allows the subproperties of Author
to be set in a visual designer. The custom type converter is described in Type Converter Example. The types that you can store in view state are limited by the LosFormatter class that ASP.NET uses for view state serialization. The types that are most efficiently serialized are String; primitive value types in the .NET Framework class library such as Boolean, Int16, Int32, Enum, Pair, Triplet, Array, ArrayList, and Hashtable; and any types that contain any of these primitive types. In addition, you can also store in view state custom types that have type converters defined for them, such as Pair, Triplet, Array, ArrayList, and Hashtable. When defining view state serialization for your control, you must convert your control data to one of these types. If you store types in view state that are not compatible with the view state serialization mechanism, your control might compile but will generate an error at run time. Finally, serializable types (that is, types that implement the ISerializable interface or are marked with SerializableAttribute) can be stored in view state but serialization for these types is significantly slower than for primitive types.
The state object contributed by a control for serialization is the control's view state. The ViewState property of a control is only one piece of a control's view state—it is the piece that automatically participates in the view state mechanism without any work on your part. The Control class implements the logic for saving and loading the modified items in the ViewState dictionary in its SaveViewState and LoadViewState methods. The other part or parts of view state are additional objects that you (and your control's base class) save in view state by overriding the SaveViewState method. When you override the SaveViewState and LoadViewState methods, you must call the corresponding methods of the base class.
Code Listing for the Author Class
Applying the NotifyParentPropertyAttribute to the FirstName
, LastName
, and MiddleName
properties and setting the attribute's constructor argument to true causes a visual designer to propagate and serialize changes for these properties into their parent property (an Author
instance).
' Author.vb
Option Strict On
Imports System
Imports System.Collections
Imports System.ComponentModel
Imports System.Globalization
Imports System.Web.UI
Namespace Samples.AspNet.VB.Controls
< _
TypeConverter(GetType(AuthorConverter)) _
> _
Public Class Author
Dim firstNameValue As String
Dim lastNameValue As String
Dim middleNameValue As String
Public Sub New()
Me.New(String.Empty, String.Empty, String.Empty)
End Sub
Public Sub New(ByVal firstname As String, _
ByVal lastname As String)
Me.New(firstname, String.Empty, lastname)
End Sub
Public Sub New(ByVal firstname As String, _
ByVal middlename As String, ByVal lastname As String)
firstNameValue = firstname
middleNameValue = middlename
lastNameValue = lastname
End Sub
< _
Category("Behavior"), _
DefaultValue(""), _
Description("First name of author."), _
NotifyParentProperty(True) _
> _
Public Overridable Property FirstName() As String
Get
Return firstNameValue
End Get
Set(ByVal value As String)
firstNameValue = value
End Set
End Property
< _
Category("Behavior"), _
DefaultValue(""), _
Description("Last name of author."), _
NotifyParentProperty(True) _
> _
Public Overridable Property LastName() As String
Get
Return lastNameValue
End Get
Set(ByVal value As String)
lastNameValue = value
End Set
End Property
< _
Category("Behavior"), _
DefaultValue(""), _
Description("Middle name of author."), _
NotifyParentProperty(True) _
> _
Public Overridable Property MiddleName() As String
Get
Return middleNameValue
End Get
Set(ByVal value As String)
middleNameValue = value
End Set
End Property
Public Overrides Function ToString() As String
Return ToString(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture)
End Function
Public Overloads Function ToString( _
ByVal culture As CultureInfo) As String
Return TypeDescriptor.GetConverter( _
Me.GetType()).ConvertToString(Nothing, culture, Me)
End Function
End Class
End Namespace
// Author.cs
using System;
using System.Collections;
using System.ComponentModel;
using System.Globalization;
using System.Web.UI;
namespace Samples.AspNet.CS.Controls
{
[
TypeConverter(typeof(AuthorConverter))
]
public class Author
{
private string firstnameValue;
private string lastnameValue;
private string middlenameValue;
public Author()
:
this(String.Empty, String.Empty, String.Empty)
{
}
public Author(string firstname, string lastname)
:
this(firstname, String.Empty, lastname)
{
}
public Author(string firstname,
string middlename, string lastname)
{
firstnameValue = firstname;
middlenameValue = middlename;
lastnameValue = lastname;
}
[
Category("Behavior"),
DefaultValue(""),
Description("First name of author."),
NotifyParentProperty(true),
]
public virtual String FirstName
{
get
{
return firstnameValue;
}
set
{
firstnameValue = value;
}
}
[
Category("Behavior"),
DefaultValue(""),
Description("Last name of author."),
NotifyParentProperty(true)
]
public virtual String LastName
{
get
{
return lastnameValue;
}
set
{
lastnameValue = value;
}
}
[
Category("Behavior"),
DefaultValue(""),
Description("Middle name of author."),
NotifyParentProperty(true)
]
public virtual String MiddleName
{
get
{
return middlenameValue;
}
set
{
middlenameValue = value;
}
}
public override string ToString()
{
return ToString(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture);
}
public string ToString(CultureInfo culture)
{
return TypeDescriptor.GetConverter(
GetType()).ConvertToString(null, culture, this);
}
}
}
Code Listing for the BookType Enumeration
' BookType.vb
Option Strict On
Imports System
Namespace Samples.AspNet.VB.Controls
Public Enum BookType
NotDefined = 0
Fiction = 1
NonFiction = 2
End Enum
End Namespace
// BookType.cs
using System;
namespace Samples.AspNet.CS.Controls
{
public enum BookType
{
NotDefined = 0,
Fiction = 1,
NonFiction = 2
}
}
Test Page for the Book Control
The following example shows an .aspx page that uses the Book
control.
<%@ Page Language="C#" Debug="true" Trace="true"%>
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
<script runat="server">
void Button_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
Book1.Author.FirstName = "Bob";
Book1.Author.LastName = "Kelly";
Book1.Title = "Contoso Stories";
Book1.Price = 39.95M;
Button1.Visible = false;
}
</script>
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" >
<head id="Head1" runat="server">
<title>
Book test page
</title>
</head>
<body>
<form id="Form1" runat="server">
<aspSample:Book ID="Book1" Runat="server"
Title="Tailspin Toys Stories" CurrencySymbol="$"
BackColor="#FFE0C0" Font-Names="Tahoma"
Price="16" BookType="Fiction">
<Author FirstName="Judy" LastName="Lew" />
</aspSample:Book>
<br />
<asp:Button ID="Button1" OnClick="Button_Click"
Runat="server" Text="Change" />
<asp:Button ID="Button2" Runat="server" Text="Refresh" />
<br />
<br />
<asp:HyperLink ID="Hyperlink1" NavigateUrl="BookTest.aspx"
Runat="server">
Reload Page</asp:HyperLink>
</form>
</body>
</html>
Building and Using the Example
Compile the classes in this example with the AuthorConverter
class listed in Type Converter Example.
For information about compiling and using the custom control examples, see Building the Custom Server Control Examples.
See Also
Reference
Concepts
Value Types in the Common Type System