Getting Started

First Steps

Welcome to the First Steps guide on getting started with Progress® Telerik® UI for ASP.NET MVC with Visual Studio!

The guide creates a use-case scenario which demonstrates how to start working with the suite and implements the Kendo UI DatePicker for ASP.NET MVC in your project by using the Telerik UI DatePicker HtmlHelper. For its purposes, the guide uses Visual Studio for Windows 2019.

To configure an ASP.NET MVC web application to use UI for ASP.NET MVC, you can use either of the following approaches:

To get up and running with the project:

  1. Create the ASP.NET MVC Web Application
  2. Include the Telerik UI for ASP.NET MVC client-side resources
  3. Reference the Kendo.Mvc.dll assembly
  4. Update the web.config file of the application
  5. Set the HtmlHelper initialization

Creating the Application

  1. Open Visual Studio for Windows 2019 and select Create a New Project.
  2. Select ASP.NET Web Application (.NET Framework) and click Next.
  3. Set a name and location for the project and click Create.
  4. Select MVC and click Create.

Including the Client-Side Resources

  • The CDN links and/or package versions have to point to the same UI for ASP.NET MVC version which your project references.
  • The Kendo UI scripts have to be placed after jQuery.

To include the necessary Telerik UI for ASP.NET MVC JavaScript and CSS files:

  1. Go to ~\Views\Shared\_Layout.cshtml and add the theme of your choice to the <head> of the document. Since the Microsoft project uses Bootstrap, you can use the Kendo UI SASS Bootstrap v4 theme to match it.

  2. The Microsoft template comes with a jQuery script referenced in the body. Find it and move it to the head.

    @Scripts.Render("~/bundles/jquery")

  3. After jQuery, copy and paste the scripts from this snippet. Make sure that the versions match Kendo.Mvc.dll. For more information, refer to the article on including client-side resources.

    <link rel="stylesheet" href="https://kendo.cdn.telerik.com/2019.3.1023/styles/kendo.bootstrap-v4.min.css" />
<script src="https://kendo.cdn.telerik.com/2019.3.1023/js/kendo.all.min.js"></script>   
<script src="https://kendo.cdn.telerik.com/2019.3.1023/js/kendo.aspnetmvc.min.js"></script>

Adding the Kendo.Mvc.dll Reference

The Kendo.Mvc.dll assembly contains the Telerik UI for ASP.NET MVC helpers. Kendo.Mvc.dll depends on the latest version of System.Web.Mvc. If the application uses a previous MVC version, upgrade to the latest version.

  1. Right-click the References node in Solution Explorer. Click Add Reference.
  2. Select the Browse tab of the Add Reference dialog. Navigate to the install location of Telerik UI for ASP.NET MVC.
  3. Navigate to wrappers/aspnetmvc/Binaries/MVC5. This directory contains the ASP.NET MVC 5 version of Telerik UI for ASP.NET MVC.
  4. Select Kendo.Mvc.dll. Click OK.

Alternatively, use the following approach:

  1. Copy the assembly from the Telerik UI for ASP.NET MVC install location.
  2. Paste the assembly in the bin folder of the application.
  3. Add a reference to the assembly in Visual Studio.

Updating the web.config File

By updating the web.config file of the web application you indicate the Kendo.Mvc.UI namespace where the helpers are located. For issues related to unmatching System.Web.Mvc versions, refer to the article on troubleshooting.

  1. Open Views/Web.config or, if using ASPX, the root Web.config file.
  2. Locate the namespaces tag.

  3. Append an add tag to the namespaces tag.

    <namespaces>
    <add namespace="System.Web.Mvc" />
    <add namespace="System.Web.Mvc.Ajax" />
    <add namespace="System.Web.Mvc.Html" />
    <add namespace="System.Web.Routing" />
    <add namespace="Kendo.Mvc.UI" />
</namespaces>

  4. Add a binding redirect to your current System.Web.Mvc version.

    <configuration>
    <runtime>
        <assemblyBinding xmlns="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:asm.v1">
            <dependentAssembly>
                <assemblyIdentity name="System.Web.Mvc" publicKeyToken="31bf3856ad364e35" />
                <bindingRedirect oldVersion="1.0.0.0-5.2.7.0" newVersion="5.2.7.0" />
            </dependentAssembly>
        </assemblyBinding>
    </runtime>
</configuration>

Setting the HtmlHelper Initialization

When you use a Kendo UI widget through its MVC server-side wrapper initialization:

  1. Open the ~/Views/Home/Index.cshtml view or, if using ASPX, the Index.aspx file.

  2. Add a Kendo UI Grid HtmlHelper.

        <div class="text-center">
        <h2>Kendo UI Grid</h2>
        @(Html.Kendo().Grid<GridInTabStrip.Models.Product>()
            .Name("grid")
            .Columns(columns =>
            {
                columns.Bound(c => c.ProductID).Width(100);
                columns.Bound(c => c.ProductName).Width(300);
                columns.Bound(c => c.UnitPrice).Width(100);
                columns.Bound(c => c.Discontinued).Width(200);
            })
            .DataSource(dataSource => dataSource
                .Ajax()
                .Read(read => read.Action("Select", "Home"))
            )
        )
    </div>

  3. Open the HomeController.cs and add a new action method which will return the data as JSON. The Grid makes Ajax requests to this action. Import the Kendo.Mvc.UI and the Kendo.Mvc.Extensions namespaces do that you can use Kendo.Mvc.UI.DataSourceRequest and the ToDataSourceResult extension method.

    public ActionResult Select([DataSourceRequest]DataSourceRequest request)
{
    var data = Enumerable.Range(1, 10)
        .Select(index => new Product
        {
            ProductID = index,
            ProductName = "Product #" + index,
            UnitPrice = index * 10,
            Discontinued = false
        });

    return Json(data.ToDataSourceResult(request), JsonRequestBehavior.AllowGet);
}

  4. Press CTRL+F5 to build and run the application. As a result, the following sample page is created.

    Sample page

Next Steps

See Also

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