Example of News partial routing

9 min

In the example, the part of the URL that is http://site/News/ is the URL to a page instance of model type NewsContainer. By registering a partial router for ModelType NewsContainer, the partial router routes the remaining part of the URL. The partial router handles routing Sports/TheGame/.

Extend routing for the NewsContent type

The following example extends routing for the NewsContainer content type:

[ContentType]
public class NewsContainer: PageData {}

Next, implement a NewsContent type class:

public enum NewsCategory {
  Sports,
  News,
  Economy
}
public class NewsContent {
  public virtual NewsCategory Category {
    get;
    set;
  }
  public virtual string Name {
    get;
    set;
  }
  public virtual string Body {
    get;
    set;
  }
}

This code example is just one way of implementing a partial router. It uses DDS as external storage with no caching and is not meant as production-ready code.

Implement NewsContentStore

Create a simple store to deliver NewsContent instances because NewsContent is stored outside Optimizely Content Management System (CMS) (in Optimizely Dynamic Data Store).

You also could return the routed data as IContent instances, where you can deliver the data through a custom content provider. Or, you can store the data in CMS so that no provider is needed and the data can be loaded or saved through EPiServer.IContentRepository.

In the following example, partially route URL parts like Sports/TheGame/ by adding a method to the store that accepts a category (that corresponds to Sports in the URL example) and the name of an article (that corresponds to TheGame in the URL example).

public class NewsContentStore {
  //In this example the data is stored in DDS
  public IOrderedQueryable < NewsContent > News {
    get {
      return DynamicDataStoreFactory.Instance.
      GetStore(typeof (NewsContent)).Items < NewsContent > ();
    }
  }

  public NewsContent RouteContent(NewsCategory category, string name) {
    return News.Where(n => n.Category == category &&
        n.Name == name)
      .SingleOrDefault();
  }
}

Implement IPartialRouter

Make the partial router handle incoming requests beyond pages of type NewsContainer. Also, lets you create outgoing FURLs for instances of NewsContent.

public class NewsPartialRouter: IPartialRouter < NewsContainer, NewsContent > {
  private NewsContentStore _newsStore;
  private ContentReference _newsContainer;

  public NewsPartialRouter(NewsContentStore newsStore, ContentReference newsContainer) {
    _newsStore = newsStore;
    _newsContainer = newsContainer;
  }

  #region RoutePartial
  public object RoutePartial(NewsContainer content, SegmentContext segmentContext) {
    //The format we handle is category/Name/
    NewsContent newsContent = null;

    //Use helper method GetNextValue to get the next part from the URL
    var nextSegment = segmentContext.GetNextValue(segmentContext.RemainingPath);

    NewsCategory category;
    if (Enum.TryParse < NewsCategory > (nextSegment.Next, out category)) {
      nextSegment = segmentContext.GetNextValue(nextSegment.Remaining);
      if (!String.IsNullOrEmpty(nextSegment.Next)) {
        newsContent = _newsStore.RouteContent(category, HttpUtility.UrlDecode(nextSegment.Next));
        if (newsContent != null) {
          //Update RemainingPath so the part that we have handled is removed.
          segmentContext.RemainingPath = nextSegment.Remaining;
        }
      }
    }

    return newsContent;
  }
  #endregion

  #region GetPartialVirtualPath
  public PartialRouteData GetPartialVirtualPath(NewsContent content, string language, RouteValueDictionary routeValues, RequestContext requestContext) {
    if (ContentReference.IsNullOrEmpty(_newsContainer)) {
      throw new InvalidOperationException("property NewsContainer must be set on start page");
    }
    return new PartialRouteData() {
      BasePathRoot = _newsContainer,
        PartialVirtualPath = String.Format("{0}/{1}/",
          content.Category.ToString(),
          HttpUtility.UrlPathEncode(content.Name))
    };
  }
  #endregion

}

Register a router

The following example initializes code that registers the partial router.

[ModuleDependency(typeof (EPiServer.Web.InitializationModule))]
public class InitializationModule: IInitializableModule {
  public void Initialize(EPiServer.Framework.Initialization.InitializationEngine context) {
    //It checks for a page of type NewsContainer named News under start page. If it does not exist it gets created.
    //Then partial routing is extended beyond that page.
    var newsPage = context.Locate.ContentLoader().GetChildren < NewsContainer > (ContentReference.StartPage).GetFirstOrDefault();
    if (newsPage == null) {
      newsPage = context.Locate.ContentRepository().GetDefault < NewsContainer > (ContentReference.StartPage);
      newsPage.Name = "News";
      context.Locate.ContentRepository().Save(newsPage, SaveAction.Publish, AccessLevel.NoAccess);

    }

    var partialRouter = new NewsPartialRouter(new NewsContentStore(), newsPage.ContentLink.ToReferenceWithoutVersion());
    RouteTable.Routes.RegisterPartialRouter < NewsContainer, NewsContent > (partialRouter);

    NewsContentGenerator.CreateFakeData();
  }

  public void Preload(string[] parameters) {}

  public void Uninitialize(EPiServer.Framework.Initialization.InitializationEngine context) {}
}

Register MVC controllers

In CMS, you register an MVC controller for a Model type by implementing the EPiServer.Web.IRenderTemplate<TModel> interface, which occurs implicitly if your controller inherits EPiServer.Web.Mvc.PageController<TPage> or EPiServer.Web.Mvc.BlockController<TBlock>. The following code is for an MVC controller for NewsContent and NewsContainer that uses an extension method in the EPiServer.Web.Routing namespace.

public class NewsContentController: System.Web.Mvc.Controller, IRenderTemplate < NewsContent > {
  public ActionResult Index() {
    //You get the routed custom data from extension method in EPiServer.Web.Routing
    var newsContent = Request.RequestContext.GetRoutedData < NewsContent > ();
    return View(newsContent);
  }
}

public class NewsContainerController: PageController < NewsContainer > {
  public ActionResult Index() {
    //The view for news container displays a list of all news.
    var newsStore = new NewsContentStore();
    return View(newsStore.News.ToList());
  }
}

Create MVC views

To display a single news from the above controller, create a view located as /Views/NewsContent/index.aspx. Also, create a view for the NewsContainer class that lists news with partially routed FURLs.

<%@ Page Title="" Language="C#"
    Inherits="System.Web.Mvc.ViewPage<CodeSamples.Additional_Content.HowTo.PartialRouting.NewsContent>" %>
    
    <h2><%=Model.Name%></h2>
    <p><%=Model.Body %></p>

    <%@ Page Title="" Language="C#" 
    Inherits="System.Web.Mvc.ViewPage<List<CodeSamples.Additional_Content.HowTo.PartialRouting.NewsContent>>" %>
    <%@ Import Namespace="System.Web.Routing" %>
    <%@ Import Namespace="EPiServer.Web.Routing" %>
    <h2>List of news</h2>
    <ul>
    <%foreach (var news in Model) {%>
        <li>
            <a href="<%=UrlResolver.Current.GetVirtualPathForNonContent(news, null, null).GetUrl()%>"><%=news.Name%></a>
        </li>
    <%}%>
    </ul>

Create outgoing URLs

To create an outgoing URL for a NewsContent item, call the EPiServer.Web.UrlResolver.Current.GetVirtualPathForNonContent method. For IContent instances, you also can call the GetVirtualPath or GetUrl methods and pass in the reference to the content. In web forms, you can create a link in the HTML, such as /Templates/NewsContent.aspx?id=7__news, then the FURL module calls the partial router during outgoing parsing to create an FURL for the content. The following example shows how to construct outgoing FURLs.

NewsContent news = GetNewsContent();
var furl = urlResolver.GetVirtualPathForNonContent(news, null, null).GetUrl();

//In case the item is an IContent then in webforms you can also output a link like:
IContent iContent = GetIContent();
var anchor = new System.Web.UI.HtmlControls.HtmlAnchor();
anchor.HRef = "/templates/NewsContent.aspx?id=" + iContent.ContentLink.ToString();

Create NewsContent

The following example shows how to route to data stored outside CMS. Use DynamicDataStore to store NewsContent. The following code creates NewsContent instances and stores them in DynamicDataStore.

public class NewsContentGenerator {
  public static void CreateFakeData() {
    var newsContentStore = DynamicDataStoreFactory.Instance.GetStore(typeof (NewsContent));
    if (newsContentStore == null) {
      newsContentStore = DynamicDataStoreFactory.Instance.CreateStore(typeof (NewsContent));

      var soccerNews = new NewsContent() {
        Category = NewsCategory.Sports,
          Name = "Sweden",
          Body = "Sweden have qualified for EURO 2012 championship in soccer"
      };
      newsContentStore.Save(soccerNews);

      var olymicNews = new NewsContent() {
        Category = NewsCategory.Sports,
          Name = "Olympic",
          Body = "The next summer olympic will take place in London"
      };
      newsContentStore.Save(olymicNews);

      var euroNews = new NewsContent() {
        Category = NewsCategory.Economy,
          Name = "Euro",
          Body = "The euro has reached new levels"
      };
      newsContentStore.Save(euroNews);

      var oilNews = new NewsContent() {
        Category = NewsCategory.Economy,
          Name = "Oil",
          Body = "New oil findings have been made in the artic"
      };
      newsContentStore.Save(oilNews);

      var politicNews = new NewsContent() {
        Category = NewsCategory.News,
          Name = "Selection",
          Body = "Sweden have selected a new government"
      };
      newsContentStore.Save(politicNews);

      var earthQuakeNews = new NewsContent() {
        Category = NewsCategory.News,
          Name = "Eartquake",
          Body = "An earthquake was registered this morning"
      };
      newsContentStore.Save(earthQuakeNews);
    }
  }
}