Saving JQuery Sortable (new order) to ASP.Net MVC controller?

Question

I've implemented JQuery sortable, and it works fine. The problem is I can't pass the list in its new order to a controller so i can save it.

<script type="text/javascript">  
    $(document).ready(function() {  
        $("#sortable").sortable({ axis: "y" });  
    });  

    $(function() {  
        $("#submit-list").button();  

        $("#submit-list").click(function() {  
            debugger;  
            $.ajax({  
                url: '/Admin/SortedLists/',  
                data: { items: $("#sortable").sortable('toArray') },  
                type: 'post',  
                traditional: true  
            });  
        });  

    });  
</script>    

<h2>Edit Roles</h2>  

<div>  
    <ul id="sortable">  
        <% foreach (var item in Model.Roles) { %>                  
            <li>                  
                <%=Html.AttributeEncode(item.Name)%>                              
            </li>                                                                               
        <% } %>             
    </ul>  

    <input type="submit" value="Save" id="submit-list"/>  
</div>  

and my controller:

[HttpPost]  
    public EmptyResult SortedLists(List<string> items)  
    {  
        return new EmptyResult();  
    }  

List items comes back with the corrent number of elements - except each item are empty strings.

If the original list looks like this

1. 1 - Car
2. 2 - Boat
3. 3 - Motorcycle
4. 4 - Plane

And the user drags and resorts to be

1. 4 - Plane
2. 1 - Car
3. 3 - Motorcycle
4. 2 - Boat

How can i pass that new order? I suppose id pass the whole thing on submit, delete the entire list and resubmit this whole list

unless theres a better way? Taking advantage of Linq (using Linq to SQL) where i can insert the new order on everychange and do a submit changes?

Answer 1

All I had to do was fill in the id field for each list item, toArray method returned the list fine after that

<ul id="sortable">  
    <% foreach (var item in Model.Roles) { %>                  
        <li id="<%=Html.AttributeEncode(item.Name)%>"><%=Html.AttributeEncode(item.Name)%></li>                                                                                    
    <% } %>             
</ul>