ASP.NET MVC controller actions that return JSON or partial html

I think you should consider the AcceptTypes of the request. I am using it in my current project to return the correct content type as follows.

Your action on the controller can test it as on the request object

if (Request.AcceptTypes.Contains("text/html")) {
   return View();
}
else if (Request.AcceptTypes.Contains("application/json"))
{
   return Json( new { id=1, value="new" } );
}
else if (Request.AcceptTypes.Contains("application/xml") || 
         Request.AcceptTypes.Contains("text/xml"))
{
   //
}

You can then implement the aspx of the view to cater for the partial xhtml response case.

Then in jQuery you can fetch it passing the type parameter as json:

$.get(url, null, function(data, textStatus) {
        console.log('got %o with status %s', data, textStatus);
        }, "json"); // or xml, html, script, json, jsonp or text

Hope this helps James

Another nice way to deal with JSON data is using the JQuery getJSON function. You can call the

public ActionResult SomeActionMethod(int id) 
{ 
    return Json(new {foo="bar", baz="Blech"});
}

Method from the jquery getJSON method by simply...

$.getJSON("../SomeActionMethod", { id: someId },
    function(data) {
        alert(data.foo);
        alert(data.baz);
    }
);

I found a couple of issues implementing MVC ajax GET calls with JQuery that caused me headaches so sharing solutions here.

1. Make sure to include the data type "json" in the ajax call. This will automatically parse the returned JSON object for you (given the server returns valid json).
2. Include the JsonRequestBehavior.AllowGet; without this MVC was returning a HTTP 500 error (with dataType: json specified on the client).
3. Add cache: false to the $.ajax call, otherwise you will ultimately get HTTP 304 responses (instead of HTTP 200 responses) and the server will not process your request.
4. Finally, the json is case sensitive, so the casing of the elements needs to match on the server side and client side.

Sample JQuery:

$.ajax({
  type: 'get',
  dataType: 'json',
  cache: false,
  url: '/MyController/MyMethod',
  data: { keyid: 1, newval: 10 },
  success: function (response, textStatus, jqXHR) {
    alert(parseInt(response.oldval + ' changed to ' + newval));                                    
  },
  error: function(jqXHR, textStatus, errorThrown) {
    alert('Error - ' + errorThrown);
  }
});

Sample MVC code:

[HttpGet]
public ActionResult MyMethod(int keyid, int newval)
{
  var oldval = 0;

  using (var db = new MyContext())
  {
    var dbRecord = db.MyTable.Where(t => t.keyid == keyid).FirstOrDefault();

    if (dbRecord != null)
    {
      oldval = dbRecord.TheValue;
      dbRecord.TheValue = newval;
      db.SaveChanges();
    }
  }

    return Json(new { success = true, oldval = oldval},
                JsonRequestBehavior.AllowGet);
}

To answer the other half of the question, you can call:

return PartialView("viewname");

when you want to return partial HTML. You'll just have to find some way to decide whether the request wants JSON or HTML, perhaps based on a URL part/parameter.

You may want to take a look at this very helpful article which covers this very nicely!

Just thought it might help people searching for a good solution to this problem.

http://weblogs.asp.net/rashid/archive/2009/04/15/adaptive-rendering-in-asp-net-mvc.aspx

Alternative solution with incoding framework

Action return json

Controller

    [HttpGet]
    public ActionResult SomeActionMethod()
    {
        return IncJson(new SomeVm(){Id = 1,Name ="Inc"});
    }

Razor page

@using (var template = Html.Incoding().ScriptTemplate<SomeVm>("tmplId"))
{
    using (var each = template.ForEach())
    {
        <span> Id: @each.For(r=>r.Id) Name: @each.For(r=>r.Name)</span>
    }
}

@(Html.When(JqueryBind.InitIncoding)
  .Do()
  .AjaxGet(Url.Action("SomeActionMethod","SomeContoller"))
  .OnSuccess(dsl => dsl.Self().Core()
                              .Insert
                              .WithTemplate(Selector.Jquery.Id("tmplId"))
                              .Html())
  .AsHtmlAttributes()
  .ToDiv())

Action return html

Controller

    [HttpGet]
    public ActionResult SomeActionMethod()
    {
        return IncView();
    }

Razor page

@(Html.When(JqueryBind.InitIncoding)
  .Do()
  .AjaxGet(Url.Action("SomeActionMethod","SomeContoller"))
  .OnSuccess(dsl => dsl.Self().Core().Insert.Html())
  .AsHtmlAttributes()
  .ToDiv())

For folks who have upgraded to MVC 3 here is a neat way Using MVC3 and Json