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asp.net-mvcbreadcrumbs

How can dynamic breadcrumbs be achieved with ASP.net MVC?


How can dynamic breadcrumbs be achieved with ASP.net MVC?

If you are curious about what breadcrumbs are:

What are breadcrumbs? Well, if you have ever browsed an online store or read posts in a forum, you have likely encountered breadcrumbs. They provide an easy way to see where you are on a site. Sites like Craigslist use breadcrumbs to describe the user's location. Above the listings on each page is something that looks like this:

s.f. bayarea craigslist > city of san francisco > bicycles

EDIT

I realize what is possible with the SiteMapProvider. I am also aware of the providers out there on the net that will let you map sitenodes to controllers and actions.

But, what about when you want a breadcrumb's text to match some dynamic value, like this:

Home > Products > Cars > Toyota

Home > Products > Cars > Chevy

Home > Products > Execution Equipment > Electric Chair

Home > Products > Execution Equipment > Gallows

... where the product categories and the products are records from a database. Some links should be defined statically (Home for sure).

I am trying to figure out how to do this, but I'm sure someone has already done this with ASP.net MVC.


Solution

  • There is a tool to do this on codeplex: http://mvcsitemap.codeplex.com/ [project moved to github]

    Edit:

    There is a way to derive a SiteMapProvider from a database: http://www.asp.net/Learn/data-access/tutorial-62-cs.aspx

    You might be able to modify the mvcsitemap tool to use that to get what you want.