Can I specify a custom location to "search for views" in ASP.NET MVC?

Question

I have the following layout for my mvc project:

• /Controllers
  • /Demo
  • /Demo/DemoArea1Controller
  • /Demo/DemoArea2Controller
  • etc...
• /Views
  • /Demo
  • /Demo/DemoArea1/Index.aspx
  • /Demo/DemoArea2/Index.aspx

However, when I have this for DemoArea1Controller:

public class DemoArea1Controller : Controller
{
    public ActionResult Index()
    {
        return View();
    }
}

I get the "The view 'index' or its master could not be found" error, with the usual search locations.

How can I specify that controllers in the "Demo" namespace search in the "Demo" view subfolder?

Answer 1

You can easily extend the WebFormViewEngine to specify all the locations you want to look in:

public class CustomViewEngine : WebFormViewEngine
{
    public CustomViewEngine()
    {
        var viewLocations =  new[] {  
            "~/Views/{1}/{0}.aspx",  
            "~/Views/{1}/{0}.ascx",  
            "~/Views/Shared/{0}.aspx",  
            "~/Views/Shared/{0}.ascx",  
            "~/AnotherPath/Views/{0}.ascx"
            // etc
        };

        this.PartialViewLocationFormats = viewLocations;
        this.ViewLocationFormats = viewLocations;
    }
}

Make sure you remember to register the view engine by modifying the Application_Start method in your Global.asax.cs

protected void Application_Start()
{
    ViewEngines.Engines.Clear();
    ViewEngines.Engines.Add(new CustomViewEngine());
}