IEnumerable to SelectList, no value is selected

Question

I have something like the following in an ASP.NET MVC application:

IEnumerable list = GetTheValues();
var selectList = new SelectList(list, \"S         


        

Answer 1

Try this instead:

IDictionary list = GetTheValues();
var selectList = new SelectList(list, "Key", "Value", "SelectedValue");

SelectList (at least in Preview 5) is not clever enough to see that elements of IEnumerable are value type and so it should use the item for both value and text. Instead it sets the value of each item to "null" or something like that. That's why the selected value has no effect.