Holi Sale. Get upto 40% OFF on Job-oriented Training! Offer Ending in
D
H
M
S
Get Now
Browse Tutorials

02 Intermediate

Understanding AJAX Helpers in ASP.NET MVC

Understanding AJAX Helpers in ASP.NET MVC

05 Mar 2024
Intermediate
191K Views
3 min read

AJAX Helpers are used to create AJAX enabled elements like as Ajax enabled forms and links which performs request asynchronously. AJAX Helpers are extension methods of AJAXHelper class which exist in System.Web.Mvc namespace.

AJAX HTML
Element Example
AJAX-enabled link based on action/controller
@Ajax.ActionLink("Load Products", "GetProducts", new AjaxOptions {UpdateTargetId = "Products-container", HttpMethod = "GET" }) Output: <a data-ajax="true" data-ajax-method="GET" data-ajax-mode="replace" data-ajax-update="#Products-container" href="/Home/GetProducts">Load Products</a>

Unobtrusive AJAX

ASP.NET MVC supports unobtrusive Ajax which is based on jQuery. The unobtrusive Ajax means that you use helper methods to define your Ajax features, rather than adding blocks of code throughout your views.

Various configuration options for AJAX Helpers

The AjaxOptions class defines properties that allow you to specify callbacks for different stages in the AJAX request life cycle. There are following properties provided by AjaxOptions class for AJAX helpers:

Property
Description
Url
Specify the URL that will be requested from the server.
Confirm
Specify a message that will be displayed in a confirm dialog to the end user. When user clicks on OK button in the confirmation dialog, the Ajax call performs.
OnBegin
Specify a JavaScript function name which is called at the beginning of the Ajax request.
OnComplete
Specify a JavaScript function name which is called at the end of the Ajax request.
OnSuccess
Specify a JavaScript function name which is called when the Ajax request is successful.
OnFailure
Specify a JavaScript function name which is called if the Ajax request fails.
LoadingElementId
Specify progress message container’s Id to display a progress message or animation to the end user while an Ajax request is being made.
LoadingElementDuration
Specify a time duration in milliseconds that controls the duration of the progress message or animation.
UpdateTargetId
Specify the target container’s Id that will be populated with the HTML returned by the action method.
InsertionMode
Specify the way of populating the target container. The possible values are InsertAfter, InsertBefore and Replace (which is the default).

What is Cross Domain AJAX?

By default, web browsers allows AJAX calls only to your web application’s site of origin i.e. site hosted server. This restriction help us to prevent various security issues like cross site scripting (XSS) attacks. But, sometimes you need to interact with externally hosted API(s) like Twitter or Google. Hence to interact with these external API(s) or services your web application must support JSONP requests or Cross-Origin Resource Sharing (CORS). By default, ASP.NET MVC does not support JSONP or Cross-Origin Resource Sharing. For this you need to do a little bit of coding and configuration.

What do you think?

I hope you will enjoy the AJAX Helpers while programming with ASP.NET MVC. I would like to have feedback from my blog readers. Your valuable feedback, question, or comments about this article are always welcome.

Share Article
About Author
Shailendra Chauhan (Microsoft MVP, Founder & CEO at Scholarhat by DotNetTricks)

Shailendra Chauhan is the Founder and CEO at ScholarHat by DotNetTricks which is a brand when it comes to e-Learning. He provides training and consultation over an array of technologies like Cloud, .NET, Angular, React, Node, Microservices, Containers and Mobile Apps development. He has been awarded Microsoft MVP 8th time in a row (2016-2023). He has changed many lives with his writings and unique training programs. He has a number of most sought-after books to his name which has helped job aspirants in cracking tough interviews with ease.
Accept cookies & close this