ASP.NET MVC - Form Layout - Code Usability Improvement (Shipping in v15.1)

Available now in the DXperience v15.1 release, we've introduced a useful improvement for working with the DevExpress MVC Form Layout extension.

Now it's much easier to configure a nested extension.

Form Layout - MVC

The DevExpress MVC Form Layout extension is great because it helps you to create beautiful forms.

The Problem

The Form Layout extension is a container control where it embeds other controls within it.

The problem is when you want to access one of these nested/embedded controls. To do this, previously, you would have to write some code like this:

settings.Items.Add(i => {
   i.NestedExtensionType = FormLayoutNestedExtensionItemType.ComboBox;
   var cbSettings = (ComboBoxSettings)itemSettings.NestedExtensionSettings;
   cbSettings.Properties.ValueType = typeof(int);
   …
});

Solution - Lambda Expression

Now with v15.1, it is simple because you can configure it using a lambda expression:

settings.Items.Add(i => {
  i.NestedExtension().ComboBox(s => {
     s.Properties.ValueType = typeof(int);
     …
   });
});

The new approach benefits you because you do not need have reference type or a separate variable for settings and properties.

And there's less code to write which makes the code more readable!

Demo sample

Check out the an example of this code here:

MVC Form Layout Demo

What do you think of this code improvement? Drop me a line below, thanks!

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