(Model view controller)MVC Interview questions and answers

By Shivprasad koirala, 5 Mar 2013 4.82 (42 votes) Disclaimer What is MVC(Model view controller)? Can you explain the complete flow of MVC? Is MVC suitable for both windows and web application? What are the benefits of using MVC? Is MVC different from a 3 layered architecture? What is the latest version of MVC? What is the difference between each version of MVC? What are routing in MVC? Where is the route mapping code written? Can we map multiple URLs to the same action? How can we navigate from one view to other view using hyperlink? How can we restrict MVC actions to be invoked only by GET or POST? How can we maintain session in MVC? What is the difference between tempdata,viewdata and viewbag? What are partial views in MVC? How did you create partial view and consume the same? How can we do validations in MVC? Can we display all errors in one go? How can we enable data annotation validation on client side? What is razor in MVC? Why razor when we already had ASPX? So which is a better fit Razor or ASPX? How can you do authentication and authorization in MVC? How to implement windows authentication for MVC? How do you implement forms authentication in MVC? How to implement Ajax in MVC? What kind of events can be tracked in AJAX? What is the difference between ActionResult and ViewResult? What are the different types of results in MVC? What are ActionFiltersin MVC? Can we create our custom view engine using MVC? How to send result back in JSON format in MVC? What is WebAPI? But WCF SOAP also does the same thing, so how does WebAPI differ? With WCF also you can implement REST,So why "WebAPI"?

Disclaimer

By reading these MVC interview question it does not mean you will go and clear MVC interviews. The whole purpose of this article is to quickly brush up your MVC knowledge before you for the MVC interviews. This article does not teach MVC, its a last minute revision sheet before going for MVC interviews. In case you want to learn MVC from scratch start by reading Learn MVC ( Model view controller) step by step 7 daysor you can also start with my step by step MVC ( Model view controller) video series from youtube.

What is MVC(Model view controller)?

MVC is architectural pattern which separates the representation and the user interaction. Its divided in three broader sections, Model, View and Controller. Below is how each one of them handles the task.

The View is responsible for look and feel. Model represents the real world object and provides data to the View. The Controller is responsible to take the end user request and load the appropriate Model and View.

Figure: - MVC (Model view controller)

Can you explain the complete flow of MVC?

Below are the steps how control flows in MVC (Model, view and controller) architecture:

All end user requests are first sent to the controller. The controller depending on the request decides which model to load. The controller loads the model and attaches the model with the appropriate view. The final view is then attached with the model data and sent as a response to the end user on the browser.

Is MVC suitable for both windows and web application?

MVC architecture is suited for web application than windows. For window application MVP i.e. Model view presenter is more applicable.IfyouareusingWPFandSLMVVMismoresuitableduetobindings.

What are the benefits of using MVC?

There are two big benefits of MVC:Separation of concerns is achieved as we are moving the code behind to a separate class file. By moving the binding code to a separate class file we can reuse the code to a great extent. Automated UI testing is possible because now the behind code (UI interaction code) has moved to a simple.NET class. This gives us opportunity to write unit tests and automate manual testing.

Is MVC different from a 3 layered architecture?

MVC is an evolution of a 3 layered traditional architecture. Many components of 3 layered architecture are part of MVC. So below is how the mapping goes. 3 layered / tiered architecture Look and Feel User interface. UI logic User interface. Business logic /validations Middle layer Request is first sent to User interface Accessing data Data access layer. Functionality Model view controller architecture View. Controller Model. Controller. Data access layer.

Figure: - 3 layered architecture

What is the latest version of MVC?

When this note was written, four versions where released of MVC. MVC 1 , MVC 2, MVC 3 and MVC 4. So the latest is MVC 4.

What is the difference between each version of MVC?

Below is a detail table of differences. But during interview its difficult to talk about all of them due to time limitation. So I have highlighted important differences which you can run through before the interviewer.

MVC 2

MVC 3

MVC 4

Client-Side Validation Templated Helpers Areas Razor Asynchronous ControllersHtml.ValidationSummar Readymade project templates y Helper Method DefaultValueAttribute in ActionHTML 5 enabled Method Parameters Binding Binary templatesSupport for Data with Model Binders Multiple View DataAnnotations Attributes ModelEnginesJavaScript and Ajax Validator Providers New RequireHttpsAttribute Action Filter Templated Helpers Display Model- Model Validation Improvements Level Errors

ASP.NET Web API Refreshed and modernized default project templatesNew mobile project template Many new features to support mobile apps Enhanced support for asynchronous methods

What are routing in MVC?

Routing helps you to define a URL structure and map the URL with the controller. For instance lets say we want that when any user types http://localhost/View/ViewCustomer/, it goes to the Customer Controller and invokes DisplayCustomer action. This is defined by adding an entry in to the routes collection using the maproute function. Below is the under lined code which shows how the URL structure and mapping with controller and action is defined.
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routes.MapRoute( "View", // Route name "View/ViewCustomer/{id}", // URL with parameters new { controller = "Customer", action = "DisplayCustomer", id = UrlParameter.Optional }); // Parameter defaults

Where is the route mapping code written?

The route mapping code is written in the global.asax file.

Can we map multiple URLs to the same action?

Yes , you can , you just need to make two entries with different key names and specify the same controller and action.

How can we navigate from one view to other view using hyperlink?
By using ActionLink method as shown in the below code. The below code will create a simple URL which help to navigate to the Home controller and invoke the GotoHome action.

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<%= Html.ActionLink("Home","Gotohome") %>

How can we restrict MVC actions to be invoked only by GET or POST?

We can decorate the MVC action by HttpGet or HttpPost attribute to restrict the type of HTTP calls. For instance you can see in the below code snippet the DisplayCustomer action can only be invoked by HttpGet. If we try to make Http post on DisplayCustomer it will throw an error.
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[HttpGet] public ViewResult DisplayCustomer(int id) { Customer objCustomer = Customers[id]; return View("DisplayCustomer",objCustomer); }

How can we maintain session in MVC?

Sessions can be maintained in MVC by 3 ways tempdata ,viewdata and viewbag.

What is the difference between tempdata ,viewdata and viewbag?

Figure:- difference between tempdata , viewdata and viewbag Temp data: -Helps to maintain data when you move from one controller to other controller or from one action to other action. In other words when you redirect,tempdata helps to maintain data between those redirects. It internally uses session variables. View data: - Helps to maintain data when you move from controller to view. View Bag: - Its a dynamic wrapper around view data. When you use Viewbag type casting is not required. It uses the dynamic keyword internally.

Figure:-dynamic keyword Session variables: - By using session variables we can maintain data from any entity to any entity. Hidden fields and HTML controls: - Helps to maintain data from UI to controller only. So you can send data from HTML controls or hidden fields to the controller using POST or GET HTTP methods. Below is a summary table which shows different mechanism of persistence. Maintains data between Controller to Controller Controller to View View to Controller ViewData/ViewB TempData Hidden fields ag No Yes No Yes No No No No Yes Session Yes Yes Yes

What are partial views in MVC?

Partial view is a reusable view (like a user control) which can be embedded inside other view. For example lets say all your pages of your site have a standard structure with left menu, header and footer as shown in the image below.

Figure:- partial views in MVC For every page you would like to reuse the left menu, header and footer controls. So you can go and create partial views for each of these items and then you call that partial view in the main view.

How did you create partial view and consume the same?
When you add a view to your project you need to check the Create partial view check box.

Figure:-createpartialview Once the partial view is created you can then call the partial view in the main view using Html.RenderPartial method as shown in the below code snippet.
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<body> <div> <% Html.RenderPartial("MyView"); %> </div> </body>

How can we do validations in MVC?

One of the easy ways of doing validation in MVC is by using data annotations. Data annotations are nothing but attributes which you can be applied on the model properties. For example in the below code snippet we have a simple customer class with a property customercode. ThisCustomerCode property is tagged with a Required data annotation attribute. In other words if this model is not provided customer code it will not accept the same.
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public class Customer { [Required(ErrorMessage="Customer code is required")] public string CustomerCode

{ set; get; } }

In order to display the validation error message we need to use ValidateMessageFor method which belongs to the Html helper class.
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<% using (Html.BeginForm("PostCustomer", "Home", FormMethod.Post)) { %> <%=Html.TextBoxFor(m => m.CustomerCode)%> <%=Html.ValidationMessageFor(m => m.CustomerCode)%> <input type="submit" value="Submit customer data" /> <%}%>

Later in the controller we can check if the model is proper or not by using ModelState.IsValid property and accordingly we can take actions.
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public ActionResult PostCustomer(Customer obj) { if (ModelState.IsValid) { obj.Save(); return View("Thanks"); } else { return View("Customer"); } }

Below is a simple view of how the error message is displayed on the view.

Figure:- validations in MVC

Can we display all errors in one go?

Yes we can, use ValidationSummary method from HTML helper class.

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<%= Html.ValidationSummary() %>

What are the other data annotation attributes for validation in MVC? If you want to check string length, you can use StringLength.
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[StringLength(160)] public string FirstName { get; set; }

In case you want to use regular expression, you can use RegularExpression attribute.
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[RegularExpression(@"[A-Za-z0-9._%+-]+@[A-Za-z0-9.-]+\.[A-Za-z]{2,4}")]public string Email { get; set; }

If you want to check whether the numbers are in range, you can use the Range attribute.
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[Range(10,25)]public int Age { get; set; }

Some time you would like to compare value of one field with other field, we can use the Compare attribute.
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public string Password { get; set; }[Compare("Password")]public string ConfirmPass { get; set; }

In case you want to get a particular error message , you can use the Errors collection.
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var ErrMessage = ModelState["Email"].Errors[0].ErrorMessage;

If you have created the model object yourself you can explicitly call TryUpdateModel in your controller to check if the object is valid or not.
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TryUpdateModel(NewCustomer);

In case you want add errors in the controller you can use AddModelError function.
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ModelState.AddModelError("FirstName", "This is my server-side error.");

How can we enable data annotation validation on client side?

Its a two-step process first reference the necessary jquery files.
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<script src="<%= Url.Content("~/Scripts/jquery-1.5.1.js") %>" type="text/javascript"></script> <script src="<%= Url.Content("~/Scripts/jquery.validate.js") %>" type="text/javascript"></script> <script src="<%= Url.Content("~/Scripts/jquery.validate.unobtrusive.js") %>" type="text/javascript"></script>

Second step is to call EnableClientValidation method.

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<% Html.EnableClientValidation(); %>

What is razor in MVC?

Its a light weight view engine. Till MVC we had only one view type i.e.ASPX, Razor was introduced in MVC 3.

Why razor when we already had ASPX?

Razor is clean, lightweight and syntaxes are easy as compared to ASPX. For example in ASPX to display simple time we need to write.
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<%=DateTime.Now%>

In Razor its just one line of code.

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@DateTime.Now

So which is a better fit Razor or ASPX?

As per Microsoft razor is more preferred because its light weight and has simple syntaxes.

How can you do authentication and authorization in MVC?

You can use windows or forms authentication for MVC.

How to implement windows authentication for MVC?

For windows authentication you need to go and modify the web.config file and set authentication mode to windows.
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<authentication mode="Windows"/> <authorization> <deny users="?"/> </authorization>

Then in the controller or on the action you can use the Authorize attribute which specifies which users have access to these controllers and actions. Below is the code snippet for the same. Now only the users specified in the controller and action can access the same.
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[Authorize(Users= @"WIN-3LI600MWLQN\Administrator")] public class StartController : Controller { // // GET: /Start/ [Authorize(Users = @"WIN-3LI600MWLQN\Administrator")] public ActionResult Index() { return View("MyView"); } }

How do you implement forms authentication in MVC?

Forms authentication is implemented the same way as we do in ASP.NET. So the first step is to set authentication mode equal to forms. The loginUrl points to a controller here rather than page.
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<authentication mode="Forms"> <forms loginUrl="~/Home/Login" timeout="2880"/> </authentication>

We also need to create a controller where we will check the user is proper or not. If the user is proper we will set the cookie value.
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public ActionResult Login() { if ((Request.Form["txtUserName"] == "Shiv") && (Request.Form["txtPassword"] == "Shiv@123")) { FormsAuthentication.SetAuthCookie("Shiv",true); return View("About"); } else { return View("Index");

} }

All the other actions need to be attributed with Authorize attribute so that any unauthorized user if he makes a call to these controllers it will redirect to the controller ( in this case the controller is Login) which will do authentication.
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[Authorize] PublicActionResult Default() { return View(); } [Authorize] publicActionResult About() { return View(); }

How to implement Ajax in MVC?

You can implement Ajax in two ways in MVC:

Ajax libraries Jquery Below is a simple sample of how to implement Ajax by using Ajax helper library. In the below code you can see we have a simple form which is created by using Ajax.BeginForm syntax. This form calls a controller action called as getCustomer. So now the submit action click will be an asynchronous ajax call.
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<script language="javascript"> function OnSuccess(data1) { // Do something here } </script> <div> <% var AjaxOpt = new AjaxOptions{OnSuccess="OnSuccess"}; %> <% using (Ajax.BeginForm("getCustomer","MyAjax",AjaxOpt)) { %> <input id="txtCustomerCode" type="text" /><br /> <input id="txtCustomerName" type="text" /><br /> <input id="Submit2" type="submit" value="submit"/></div> <%} %>

In case you want to make ajax calls on hyperlink clicks you can use Ajax.ActionLink function as shown in the below code.

Figure:- implement Ajax in MVC So if you want to create Ajax asynchronous hyperlink by name GetDate which calls the GetDate function on the controller , below is the code for the same. Once the controller responds this data is displayed in the HTML DIV tag by name DateDiv.
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<span id="DateDiv" /> <%: Ajax.ActionLink("Get Date","GetDate", new AjaxOptions {UpdateTargetId = "DateDiv" }) %>

Below is the controller code. You can see how GetDate function has a pause of 10 seconds.
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public class Default1Controller : Controller { public string GetDate() { Thread.Sleep(10000); return DateTime.Now.ToString(); } }

The second way of making Ajax call in MVC is by using Jquery. In the below code you can see we are making an ajax POST call to a URL /MyAjax/getCustomer. This is done by using $.post. All this logic is put in to a function called as GetData and you can make a call to the GetData function on a button or a hyper link click event as you want.
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function GetData() { var url = "/MyAjax/getCustomer"; $.post(url, function (data) { $("#txtCustomerCode").val(data.CustomerCode);

$("#txtCustomerName").val(data.CustomerName); } ) }

What kind of events can be tracked in AJAX?

Figure:- tracked in AJAX

What is the difference between ActionResult and ViewResult?

ActionResult is an abstract class while ViewResult derives from ActionResult class. ActionResult has several derived classes like ViewResult ,JsonResult , FileStreamResult and so on. ActionResult can be used to exploit polymorphism and dynamism. So if you are returning different types of view dynamically ActionResult is the best thing. For example in the below code snippet you can see we have a simple action called as DynamicView. Depending on the flag (IsHtmlView) it will either return ViewResult or JsonResult.
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public ActionResult DynamicView() { if (IsHtmlView) return View(); // returns simple ViewResult else return Json(); // returns JsonResult view }

What are the different types of results in MVC?

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Note: -Its difficult to remember all the 12 types. But some important ones you can remember for the interview are ActionResult, ViewResult and JsonResult. Below is a detailed list for your interest.

There 12 kinds of results in MVC, at the top is ActionResultclass which is a base class that canhave11subtypessas listed below: -

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

ViewResult - Renders a specified view to the response stream PartialViewResult - Renders a specified partial view to the response stream EmptyResult - An empty response is returned RedirectResult - Performs an HTTP redirection to a specified URL RedirectToRouteResult - Performs an HTTP redirection to a URL that is determined by the routing engine, based on given route data 6. JsonResult - Serializes a given ViewData object to JSON format 7. JavaScriptResult - Returns a piece of JavaScript code that can be executed on the client 8. ContentResult - Writes content to the response stream without requiring a view 9. FileContentResult - Returns a file to the client 10. FileStreamResult - Returns a file to the client, which is provided by a Stream 11. FilePathResult - Returns a file to the client

What are ActionFiltersin MVC?

ActionFilters helps you to perform logic while MVC action is executing or after a MVC action has executed.

Figure:- ActionFiltersin MVC Action filters are useful in the following scenarios:1. 2. 3. 4. Implement post-processing logic before the action happens. Cancel a current execution. Inspect the returned value. Provide extra data to the action. You can create action filters by two ways:

Inline action filter. Creating an ActionFilter attribute. To create a inline action attribute we need to implement IActionFilter interface.The IActionFilter interface has two methods OnActionExecuted and

OnActionExecuting. We can implement pre-processing logic or cancellation logic in these methods.

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public class Default1Controller : Controller , IActionFilter { public ActionResult Index(Customer obj) { return View(obj); } void IActionFilter.OnActionExecuted(ActionExecutedContext filterContext) { Trace.WriteLine("Action Executed"); } void IActionFilter.OnActionExecuting(ActionExecutingContext filterContext) { Trace.WriteLine("Action is executing"); } }

The problem with inline action attribute is that it cannot be reused across controllers. So we can convert the inline action filter to an action filter attribute. To create an action filter attribute we need to inherit from ActionFilterAttribute and implement IActionFilter interface as shown in the below code.
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public class MyActionAttribute : ActionFilterAttribute , IActionFilter { void IActionFilter.OnActionExecuted(ActionExecutedContext filterContext) { Trace.WriteLine("Action Executed"); } void IActionFilter.OnActionExecuting(ActionExecutingContext filterContext) { Trace.WriteLine("Action executing"); } }

Later we can decorate the controllers on which we want the action attribute to execute. You can see in the below code I have decorated the Default1Controller with MyActionAttribute class which was created in the previous code.
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[MyActionAttribute] public class Default1Controller : Controller { public ActionResult Index(Customer obj) { return View(obj); } }

Can we create our custom view engine using MVC?

Yes, we can create our own custom view engine in MVC. To create our own custom view engine we need to follow 3 steps:Let say we want to create a custom view engine where in the user can type a command like <DateTime> and it should display the current date and time. Step 1:- We need to create a class which implements IView interface. In this class we should write the logic of how the view will be rendered in the render function. Below is a simple code snippet for the same.
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public class MyCustomView : IView { private string _FolderPath; // Define where our views are stored public string FolderPath { get { return _FolderPath; } set { _FolderPath = value; } } public void Render(ViewContext viewContext, System.IO.TextWriter writer) { // Parsing logic <dateTime> // read the view file string strFileData = File.ReadAllText(_FolderPath); // we need to and replace <datetime> datetime.now value string strFinal = strFileData.Replace("<DateTime>", DateTime.Now.ToString()); // this replaced data has to sent for display writer.Write(strFinal); } }

Step 2 :-We need to create a class which inherits from VirtualPathProviderViewEngine and in this class we need to provide the folder path and the extension of the view name. For instance for razor the extension is cshtml , for aspx the view extension is .aspx , so in the same way for our custom view we need to provide an extension. Below is how the code looks like. You can see the ViewLocationFormats is set to the Views folder and the extension is .myview.
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public class MyViewEngineProvider : VirtualPathProviderViewEngine { // We will create the object of Mycustome view public MyViewEngineProvider() // constructor { // Define the location of the View file this.ViewLocationFormats = new string[] { "~/Views/{1}/{0}.myview", "~/Views/Shared/ {0}.myview" }; //location and extension of our views } protected override IView CreateView(ControllerContext controllerContext, string viewPath, string masterPath) { var physicalpath = controllerContext.HttpContext.Server.MapPath(viewPath); MyCustomView obj = new MyCustomView(); // Custom view engine class obj.FolderPath = physicalpath; // set the path where the views will be stored

return obj; // returned this view paresing logic so that it can be registered in the view engine collection } protected override IView CreatePartialView(ControllerContext controllerContext, string partialPath) { var physicalpath = controllerContext.HttpContext.Server.MapPath(partialPath); MyCustomView obj = new MyCustomView(); // Custom view engine class obj.FolderPath = physicalpath; // set the path where the views will be stored return obj; // returned this view paresing logic so that it can be registered in the view engine collection } }

Step 3:- We need to register the view in the custom view collection. The best place to register the custom view engine in the ViewEngines collection is the global.asax file. Below is the code snippet for the same.
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protected void Application_Start() { // Step3 :- register this object in the view engine collection ViewEngines.Engines.Add(new MyViewEngineProvider()); <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>.. }

Below is a simple output of the custom view written using the commands defined at the top.

Figure:-customviewengineusingMVC If you invoke this view you should see the following output.

How to send result back in JSON format in MVC?

In MVC we have JsonResult class by which we can return back data in JSON format. Below is a simple sample code which returns back Customer object in JSON format using JsonResult.

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public JsonResult getCustomer() { Customer obj = new Customer(); obj.CustomerCode = "1001"; obj.CustomerName = "Shiv"; return Json(obj,JsonRequestBehavior.AllowGet); }

Below is the JSON output of the above code if you invoke the action via the browser.

What is WebAPI?
HTTP is the most used protocol.For past many years browser was the most preferred client by which we can consume data exposed over HTTP. But as years passed by client variety started spreading out. We had demand to consume data on HTTP from clients like mobile,javascripts,windows application etc. For satisfying the broad range of client REST was the proposed approach. You can read more about REST from WCF chapter. WebAPI is the technology by which you can expose data over HTTP following REST principles.

But WCF SOAP also does the same thing, so how does WebAPI differ?
SOAP Size WEB API

Heavy weight because of complicated WSDL Light weight, only the necessary information structure. is transferred. Only for HTTP protocol

Protocol Independent of protocols.

To parse SOAP message, the client needs to understand WSDL format. Writing custom Output of WebAPI are simple string code for parsing WSDL is a heavy duty task. message,JSON,Simple XML format etc. So Formats If your client is smart enough to create proxy writing parsing logic for the same in very objects like how we have in .NET (add easy. reference) then SOAP is easier to consume and call.

Principl SOAP follows WS-* specification. es

WEB API follows REST principles. (Please refer about REST in WCF chapter).

With WCF also you can implement REST,So why "WebAPI"?

WCF was brought in to implement SOA, never the intention was to implement REST."WebAPI'" is built from scratch and the only goal is to create HTTP services using REST. Due to the one point focus for creating REST service WebAPI is more preferred.

How to implement WebAPI in MVC?

Below are the steps to implement "webAPI" :Step1:-Create the project using the "WebAPI" template.

Figure:- implement WebAPI in MVC Step 2:- Once you have created the project you will notice that the controller now inherits from "ApiController" and you can now implement "post","get","put" and "delete" methods of HTTP protocol.
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public class ValuesController : ApiController { // GET api/values public IEnumerable<string> Get() { return new string[] { "value1", "value2" }; } // GET api/values/5 public string Get(int id) { return "value"; }

// POST api/values public void Post([FromBody]string value) { } // PUT api/values/5 public void Put(int id, [FromBody]string value) { } // DELETE api/values/5 public void Delete(int id) { } }

Step 3:-If you make a HTTP GET call you should get the below results.

What do you mean by Razor

The Razor is the new View engine introduced in MVC 3.0. The View engine is responsible for processing the view files [e.g. .aspx, .cshtml] in order to generate HTML response. The previous versions of MVC were dependent on ASPX view engine.

4. Can we use ASPX view engine in latest versions of MVC

Yes. The Recommended way is to prefer Razor View

5. What are the benefits of Razor View?

The syntax for server side code is simplified The length of code is drastically reduced Razor syntax is easy to learn and reduces the complexity

6. What is the extension of Razor View file?

.cshtml (for c#) and .vbhtml (for vb)

7. How to create a Controller in MVC

Create a simple class and extend it from Controller class. The bare minimum requirement for a class to become a controller is to inherit it from ControllerBase is the class that is required to inherit to create the controller but Controller class inherits from ControllerBase.

8. How to create an Action method in MVC

Add a simple method inside a controller class with ActionResult return type.

9. How to access a view on the server

The browser generates the request in which the information like Controller name, Action Name and Parameters are provided, when server receives this URL it resolves the Name of Controller and Action, after that it calls the specified action with provided parameters. Action normally does some processing and returns the ViewResult by specifying the view name (blank name searches according to naming conventions).

10. What is the default Form method (i.e. GET, POST) for an action method
GET. To change this you can add an action level attribute i.e. [HttpPost]

11. What is a Filter in MVC?

When user (browser) sends a request to server an action method of a controller gets invoked; sometimes you may require executing a custom code before or after action method gets invoked, this custom code is called as Filter.

12. What are the different types of Filters in MVC?

a. Authorization filter b. Action filter c. Result filter d. Exception filter [Do not forget the order mentioned above as filters gets executed as per above mentioned sequence]

13. Explain the use of Filter with an example?

Suppose you are working on a MVC application where URL is sent in an encrypted format instead of a plain text, once encrypted URL is received by server it will ignore action parameters because of URL encryption. To solve this issue you can create global action filter by overriding OnActionExecuting method of controller class, in this you can extract the action parameters from the encrypted URL and these parameters can be set on filterContext to send plain text parameters to the actions.

14. What is a HTML helper?

A HTML helper is a method that returns string; return string usually is the HTML tag. The standard HTML helpers (e.g. Html.BeginForm(),Html.TextBox())available in MVC are lightweight as it does not rely on event model or view state as that of in ASP.Net server controls.
What are the 3 main components of an ASP.NET MVC application? 1. M - Model 2. V - View 3. C - Controller In which assembly is the MVC framework defined? System.Web.Mvc Is it possible to combine ASP.NET webforms and ASP.MVC and develop a single web application? Yes, it is possible to combine ASP.NET webforms and ASP.MVC and develop a single web application. What does Model, View and Controller represent in an MVC application? Model: Model represents the application data domain. In short the applications business logic is contained with in the model. View: Views represent the user interface, with which the end users interact. In short the all the user interface logic is contained with in the UI. Controller: Controller is the component that responds to user actions. Based on the user actions, the respective controller, work with the model, and selects a view to render that displays the user interface. The user input logic is contained with in the controller. What is the greatest advantage of using asp.net mvc over asp.net webforms?

It is difficult to unit test UI with webforms, where views in mvc can be very easily unit tested. Which approach provides better support for test driven development - ASP.NET MVC or ASP.NET Webforms? ASP.NET MVC What are the advantages of ASP.NET MVC? 1. Extensive support for TDD. With asp.net MVC, views can also be very easily unit tested. 2. Complex applications can be easily managed 3. Seperation of concerns. Different aspects of the application can be divided into Model, View and Controller. 4. ASP.NET MVC views are light weight, as they donot use viewstate. Is it possible to unit test an MVC application without running the controllers in an ASP.NET process? Yes, all the features in an asp.net MVC application are interface based and hence mocking is much easier. So, we don't have to run the controllers in an ASP.NET process for unit testing. Is it possible to share a view across multiple controllers? Yes, put the view into the shared folder. This will automatically make the view available across multiple controllers. What is the role of a controller in an MVC application? The controller responds to user interactions, with the application, by selecting the action method to execute and alse selecting the view to render. Where are the routing rules defined in an asp.net MVC application? In Application_Start event in Global.asax Name a few different return types of a controller action method? The following are just a few return types of a controller action method. In general an action method can return an instance of a any class that derives from ActionResult class. 1. ViewResult 2. JavaScriptResult 3. RedirectResult 4. ContentResult 5. JsonResult What is the significance of NonActionAttribute? In general, all public methods of a controller class are treated as action methods. If you want prevent this default behaviour, just decorate the public method with NonActionAttribute. What is the significance of ASP.NET routing? ASP.NET MVC uses ASP.NET routing, to map incoming browser requests to controller action methods. ASP.NET Routing makes use of route table. Route table is created when your web application first starts. The route table is present in the Global.asax file. What are the 3 segments of the default route, that is present in an ASP.NET MVC

application? 1st Segment - Controller Name 2nd Segment - Action Method Name 3rd Segment - Parameter that is passed to the action method Example: http://pragimtech.com/Customer/Details/5 Controller Name = Customer Action Method Name = Details Parameter Id = 5 ASP.NET MVC application, makes use of settings at 2 places for routing to work correctly. What are these 2 places? 1. Web.Config File : ASP.NET routing has to be enabled here. 2. Global.asax File : The Route table is created in the application Start event handler, of the Global.asax file. What is the adavantage of using ASP.NET routing? In an ASP.NET web application that does not make use of routing, an incoming browser request should map to a physical file. If the file does not exist, we get page not found error. An ASP.NET web application that does make use of routing, makes use of URLs that do not have to map to specific files in a Web site. Because the URL does not have to map to a file, you can use URLs that are descriptive of the user's action and therefore are more easily understood by users. What are the 3 things that are needed to specify a route? 1. URL Pattern - You can include placeholders in a URL pattern so that variable data can be passed to the request handler without requiring a query string. 2. Handler - The handler can be a physical file such as an .aspx file or a controller class. 3. Name for the Route - Name is optional. Is the following route definition a valid route definition? {controller}{action}/{id} No, the above definition is not a valid route definition, because there is no literal value or delimiter between the placeholders. Therefore, routing cannot determine where to separate the value for the controller placeholder from the value for the action placeholder. What is the use of the following default route? {resource}.axd/{*pathInfo} This route definition, prevent requests for the Web resource files such as WebResource.axd or ScriptResource.axd from being passed to a controller. What is the difference between adding routes, to a webforms application and to an mvc application? To add routes to a webforms application, we use MapPageRoute() method of the RouteCollection class, where as to add routes to an MVC application we use MapRoute() method.

How do you handle variable number of segments in a route definition? Use a route with a catch-all parameter. An example is shown below. * is referred to as catchall parameter. controller/{action}/{*parametervalues} What are the 2 ways of adding constraints to a route? 1. Use regular expressions 2. Use an object that implements IRouteConstraint interface Give 2 examples for scenarios when routing is not applied? 1. A Physical File is Found that Matches the URL Pattern - This default behaviour can be overriden by setting the RouteExistingFiles property of the RouteCollection object to true. 2. Routing Is Explicitly Disabled for a URL Pattern - Use the RouteCollection.Ignore() method to prevent routing from handling certain requests. What is the use of action filters in an MVC application? Action Filters allow us to add pre-action and post-action behavior to controller action methods. If I have multiple filters impleted, what is the order in which these filters get executed? 1. Authorization filters 2. Action filters 3. Response filters 4. Exception filters What are the different types of filters, in an asp.net mvc application? 1. Authorization filters 2. Action filters 3. Result filters 4. Exception filters Give an example for Authorization filters in an asp.net mvc application? 1. RequireHttpsAttribute 2. AuthorizeAttribute Which filter executes first in an asp.net mvc application? Authorization filter

What are the levels at which filters can be applied in an asp.net mvc application? 1. Action Method 2. Controller 3. Application [b]Is it possible to create a custom filter?[/b] Yes What filters are executed in the end?

Exception Filters Is it possible to cancel filter execution? Yes What type of filter does OutputCacheAttribute class represents? Result Filter What are the 2 popular asp.net mvc view engines? 1. Razor 2. .aspx What symbol would you use to denote, the start of a code block in razor views? @ What symbol would you use to denote, the start of a code block in aspx views? <%= %> In razor syntax, what is the escape sequence character for @ symbol? The escape sequence character for @ symbol, is another @ symbol When using razor views, do you have to take any special steps to proctect your asp.net mvc application from cross site scripting (XSS) attacks? No, by default content emitted using a @ block is automatically HTML encoded to protect from cross site scripting (XSS) attacks. When using aspx view engine, to have a consistent look and feel, across all pages of the application, we can make use of asp.net master pages. What is asp.net master pages equivalent, when using razor views? To have a consistent look and feel when using razor views, we can make use of layout pages. Layout pages, reside in the shared folder, and are named as _Layout.cshtml What are sections? Layout pages, can define sections, which can then be overriden by specific views making use of the layout. Defining and overriding sections is optional. What are the file extensions for razor views? 1. .cshtml - If the programming lanugaue is C# 2. .vbhtml - If the programming lanugaue is VB How do you specify comments using razor syntax? Razor syntax makes use of @* to indicate the begining of a comment and *@ to indicate the end. An example is shown below. @* This is a Comment *@

2 What is best way to get a reference to the viewport from anywhere in the code? 3 How to run an app in a page with existing content? (no viewport i am guessing, but what

else do i need to know?) 4 How to use model validation rules with a form? 5 Suppose that if i want to open a contacts view, i should call contactsController.view(id), or what have you, which would then open the view for me. correct? 6 Tell me in other mvc systems, the rule is fat models, skinny controllers. ie the business logic goes in the models and all controllers do is load/save models and load/kill views. is this the extjs way? 9 Is it possible to combine ASP.NET webforms and ASP.MVC and develop a single web application? 10 What does Model, View and Controller represent in an MVC application? 11 What is the greatest advantage of using asp.net mvc over asp.net webforms?

It is difficult to unit test UI with webforms, where views in mvc can be very easily unit tested.
12 What are the advantages of ASP.NET MVC?
Extensive support for TDD. With asp.net MVC, views can also be very easily unit tested. Complex applications can be easily managed 3. Seperation of concerns. Different aspects of the application can be divided into Model, View and Controller. 4. ASP.NET MVC views are light weight, as they donot use viewstate.

13 Is it possible to unit test an MVC application without running the controllers in an ASP.NET process? Yes, all the features in an asp.net MVC application are interface based and hence mocking is much easier. So, we don't have to run the controllers in an ASP.NET process for unit testing. 14 Is it possible to share a view across multiple controllers? Yes, put the view into the shared folder. This will automatically make the view available across multiple controllers. 15 What is the role of a controller in an MVC application? The controller responds to user interactions, with the application, by selecting the action method to execute and alse selecting the view to render 16 Where are the routing rules defined in an asp.net MVC application?

In Application_Start event in Global.asax

17 Name a few different return types of a controller action method? 18 What is the significance of NonActionAttribute? 19 What is the significance of ASP.NET routing? 20 What are the 3 segments of the default route, that is present in an ASP.NET MVC application? 21 ASP.NET MVC application, makes use of settings at 2 places for routing to work correctly. What are these 2 places? 22 What is the adavantage of using ASP.NET routing? 23 What are the 3 things that are needed to specify a route? 24 Is the following route definition a valid route definition? 25 What is the use of the following default route? 26 What is the difference between adding routes, to a webforms application and to an mvc

application? 27 How do you handle variable number of segments in a route definition? 28 What are the 2 ways of adding constraints to a route? 29 Give 2 examples for scenarios when routing is not applied? 30 What is the use of action filters in an MVC application? 31 If I have multiple filters impleted, what is the order in which these filters get executed? 32 What are the different types of filters, in an asp.net mvc application? 33 Give an example for Authorization filters in an asp.net mvc application? 34 Which filter executes first in an asp.net mvc application? 35 What are the levels at which filters can be applied in an asp.net mvc application? 36 Is it possible to create a custom filter? 37 What filters are executed in the end? 38 Is it possible to cancel filter execution? 39 What type of filter does OutputCacheAttribute class represents? 40 What are the 2 popular asp.net mvc view engines? 41 What symbol would you use to denote, the start of a code block in razor views? 42 What symbol would you use to denote, the start of a code block in aspx views? 43 In razor syntax, what is the escape sequence character for @ symbol? 44 When using razor views, do you have to take any special steps to proctect your asp.net mvc application from cross site scripting (XSS) attacks? 45 When using aspx view engine, to have a consistent look and feel, across all pages of the application, we can make use of asp.net master pages. What is asp.net master pages equivalent, when using razor views? 46 How do you specify comments using razor syntax? 47 What are the file extensions for razor views? 48 What are sections?