ASP.NET MVC Email

Question

Is their a solution to generate an email template using an ASP.NET MVC View without having to jump through hoops.

Let me elaborate jumping through hoops.

Answer 1

Try using spark view engine (http://www.sparkviewengine.com/). It is easy to use, nicer than standard engine and doesn't require to fake context.

You can also use function from this answer Render a view as a string , but it requires faking context. This is the way standard view engine works and you can do nothing about that.

This is my extension class that is used to generate views to string. First is for standard view engine, second for Spark:

public static class ControllerHelper
{
    /// 
Renders a view to string.
    public static string RenderViewToString(this Controller controller,
                                            string viewName, object viewData)
    {
        //Getting current response
        var response = HttpContext.Current.Response;
        //Flushing
        response.Flush();

        //Finding rendered view
        var view = ViewEngines.Engines.FindPartialView(controller.ControllerContext, viewName).View;
        //Creating view context
        var viewContext = new ViewContext(controller.ControllerContext, view,
                                          controller.ViewData, controller.TempData);

        //Since RenderView goes straight to HttpContext.Current, we have to filter and cut out our view
        var oldFilter = response.Filter;
        Stream filter = new MemoryStream(); ;
        try
        {
            response.Filter = filter;
            viewContext.View.Render(viewContext, null);
            response.Flush();
            filter.Position = 0;
            var reader = new StreamReader(filter, response.ContentEncoding);
            return reader.ReadToEnd();
        }
        finally
        {
            filter.Dispose();
            response.Filter = oldFilter;
        } 
    }

    /// 
Renders a view to string.
    public static string RenderSparkToString(this Controller controller,
                                            string viewName, object viewData)
    {
        var view = ViewEngines.Engines.FindPartialView(controller.ControllerContext, viewName).View;
        //Creating view context
        var viewContext = new ViewContext(controller.ControllerContext, view,
                                          controller.ViewData, controller.TempData);

        var sb = new StringBuilder();
        var writer = new StringWriter(sb);

        viewContext.View.Render(viewContext, writer);
        writer.Flush();
        return sb.ToString();
    }
}