Asp.net razor textbox array for list items

Question

I can't find or figure out how to take a list of items (cupcakes) and display them in razor with a quantity field.

What is happening is I am not able to get the values for each cupcake quantity in the list. Can you do textbox arrays in Razor?

VIEW

<div class="form-group">
    <label>Cupcakes</label>
    @foreach (var cupcake in Model.CupcakeList)
    {
        @Html.TextBox("CupcakeQuantities", cupcake.Id)  @cupcake.Name <br/>
    }
</div>

MODEL

public List<Cupcake> CupcakeList { get; set; }
public List<int> CupcakeQuantities { get; set; }

CONTROLLER

public ActionResult Create()
{
    var model = new PartyBookingModel()
    {
        CupcakeList = db.Cupcakes.ToList(),
        CupcakeQuantities = new List<int>()
    };

    return View(model);
}

CUPCAKE (ENTITY)

public class Cupcake
{
    public int Id { get; set; }
    public string Name { get; set; }
    public decimal PerDozen { get; set; }
}

Answer 1

You have to use an index, rather than foreach for it to work.

@for (int i = 0; i < Model.CupcakeList.Count; i++)
{
    @Html.TextBoxFor(x=>Model.CupcakeQuantities[i]) @Model.CupcakeList[i].Name <br/>
}

This will create sequentially named+number entries that will be recombined back into the model on post back.

I realise this may seem like "why doesn't foreach work?", but with foreach there is not enough reflected information available to TextBoxFor (as it is just a single object), whereas the array index is extracted by reflection from the Model.CupcakeQuantities[i] expression.

The receiving controller method should take the same as the model passed to the view:

e.g.

[HttpPost]
public ActionResult(PartyBookingModel model)

Answer 2

Try it this way:

view:

@for (int i = 0; i < Model.Count; i++)
{
    @Html.HiddenFor(x=>Model[i].Id) @Model[i].Name  
    @Html.TextBoxFor(x => Model[i].Quantity) <br/>
}

model:

public class CupcakeViewModel
{
   public int Id {get;set;}
   public string Name {get;set;}
   public int Quantity {get;set;}   
}

controller:

public ActionResult Create()
{
    var model = db.Cupcakes.Select(c => new CupcakeViewModel {
                                                Id = c.Id,
                                                Name = c.Name,
                                                Quantity = 0 
                           })
                           .ToList();

    return View(model);
}

[HttpPost]
public ActionResult Create(CupcakeViewModel[] cakes)
{
     //Save choosen cakes
}