Fun (?) with Linq Expressions in extension methods

Question

I wrote an HtmlHelper expression I use a lot of the time to put title tags into my dropdown lists like so:

    public static HtmlString SelectFor

        

Answer 1

If you don't need the title attribute on individual options your code could be simplified to:

public static HtmlString SelectFor<TModel, TProperty, TIdProperty, TDisplayProperty, TListItem>(
    this HtmlHelper<TModel> htmlHelper,
    Expression<Func<TModel, TProperty>> expression,
    IEnumerable<TListItem> enumeratedItems,
    Expression<Func<TListItem, TIdProperty>> idProperty,
    Expression<Func<TListItem, TDisplayProperty>> displayProperty,
    object htmlAttributes
) where TModel : class
{
    var id = (idProperty.Body as MemberExpression).Member.Name;
    var display = (displayProperty.Body as MemberExpression).Member.Name;
    var selectList = new SelectList(enumeratedItems, id, display);
    var attributes = new RouteValueDictionary(htmlAttributes);
    return htmlHelper.DropDownListFor(expression, selectList, attributes);
}

and used like this:

@Html.SelectFor(
    m => m.itemId, 
    Model.items, 
    id => id.itemId, 
    disp => disp.itemName, 
    null
)

---

And if you need the title attribute, well, you will have to implement everything that the DropDownList helper does manually which could be quite of a pain. Here's an example of only a small portion of all the functionality:

public static class HtmlExtensions
{
    private class MySelectListItem : SelectListItem
    {
        public string Title { get; set; }
    }

    public static HtmlString SelectFor<TModel, TProperty, TIdProperty, TDisplayProperty, TListItem>(
        this HtmlHelper<TModel> htmlHelper,
        Expression<Func<TModel, TProperty>> expression,
        IEnumerable<TListItem> enumeratedItems,
        Expression<Func<TListItem, TIdProperty>> idProperty,
        Expression<Func<TListItem, TDisplayProperty>> displayProperty,
        Func<TListItem, string> titleProperty,
        object htmlAttributes
    ) where TModel : class
    {
        var name = ExpressionHelper.GetExpressionText(expression);
        var fullHtmlName = htmlHelper.ViewContext.ViewData.TemplateInfo.GetFullHtmlFieldName(name);

        var select = new TagBuilder("select");
        var compiledDisplayProperty = displayProperty.Compile();
        var compiledIdProperty = idProperty.Compile();
        select.GenerateId(fullHtmlName);
        select.MergeAttributes(new RouteValueDictionary(htmlAttributes));
        select.Attributes["name"] = fullHtmlName;
        var selectedValue = htmlHelper.ViewData.Eval(fullHtmlName);
        var options = 
            from i in enumeratedItems
            select ListItemToOption(
                ItemToSelectItem(i, selectedValue, compiledIdProperty, compiledDisplayProperty, titleProperty)
            );
        select.InnerHtml = string.Join(Environment.NewLine, options);
        return new HtmlString(select.ToString(TagRenderMode.Normal));
    }

    private static MySelectListItem ItemToSelectItem<TListItem, TIdProperty, TDisplayProperty>(TListItem i, object selectedValue, Func<TListItem, TIdProperty> idProperty, Func<TListItem, TDisplayProperty> displayProperty, Func<TListItem, string> titleProperty)
    {
        var value = Convert.ToString(idProperty(i));
        return new MySelectListItem
        {
            Value = value,
            Text = Convert.ToString(displayProperty(i)),
            Title = titleProperty(i),
            Selected = Convert.ToString(selectedValue) == value
        };
    }

    private static string ListItemToOption(MySelectListItem item)
    {
        var builder = new TagBuilder("option");
        builder.Attributes["value"] = item.Value;
        builder.Attributes["title"] = item.Title;
        builder.SetInnerText(item.Text);
        if (item.Selected)
        {
            builder.Attributes["selected"] = "selected";
        }
        return builder.ToString();
    }
}

and then use like this:

@Html.SelectFor(
    m => m.itemId, 
    Model.items, 
    id => id.itemId, 
    disp => disp.itemName, 
    title => title.itemName + " " + title.itemDescription, 
    null
)