[Solved] Best current alternative for editing complex record in grid?

[Carl]

What is the current best alternative for editing a complex record in a grid?  I'm referring to a complex record with many columns that are difficult to display and edit as a single row. Note that this is NOT a master-detail scenario.

Perhaps, organize groups of columns and edit on different tabs for the same row? What about editing the most important columns using the inline editing and then a custom template for the rest of the columns in an inform or popup editor?  Which of these alternatives (or any others?) is possible with the current version of the Telerik MVC Grid?

Is there a demo for using a custom template to control the layout of all the columns edited in an inform or popup editor? (Note that I'm concerned here about the overall layout of all the fields, and not an edit template for an individual field.)

In particular, I did a search through the Telerik demos source code for use of GridEditingSettings(T).TemplateName with a custom template that might be useful for above concerns, but I could not find anything. More documentation of best use of GridEditingSettings(T).TemplateName and a demo showing use of a custom edit template would be greatly appreciated.

[Atanas Korchev]

Hi Carl,

Currently you cannot combine editing modes. You can use only one mode. This code library shows how to create a custom edit form from scratch. You can use it in popup and inform editing modes.

Regards,
Atanas Korchev
the Telerik team

[Juan]

That code will not run. Do you an updated version of it?

[Atanas Korchev]

Hi Juan,

 The linked code library project works as expected when I test it locally. What is not working at your side? Any details or screenshots will be of help.

All the best,
Atanas Korchev
the Telerik team

[Carl]

The problem with the project not running is not limited to Juan's machine. I can confirm that the project did not run on my machine either. In fact, I have noted that there have been various different projects downloaded from Telerik that do not run. Usually, Visual Studio complains that the project type is not recognized, or that the current installation does not support the project type, or something like that, and then the project does not load in Visual Studio. Perhaps, the project is looking for a particular (older?) version of a Telerik product that is no longer installed?

In any event, whenever this problem occurs, I simply look at individual files from the project by loading them in a simple text editor and studying the code to learn what was done....   without compiling and running the project in Visual Studio. 

[Kevin]

Does this mean that the grid in the example you posted can't have a Delete command in the row next to Edit?  If so, what is the workaround?  I find it quite surprising that, at least in my case, having a pop-up editor with a customized editor template along with Edit and Delete is resulting in this exception:

Templates can be used only with field access, property access, single-dimension array index, or single-parameter custom indexer expressions.

[Kevin]

For those above, I had to open the project with VS2010 and set the framework to version 4.  Then it at least compiles and runs properly.  The other issue is that the Northwind.ldf file appears to be missing from the solution (expand App_Data > Northwind.mdf).  I imagine that if you have a copy of Northwind you could replace it and the log and be good to go.  I actually do not so I can't confirm.

[Kiran]

As per Kevin's suggestion. replace the northwind.mdf and regenerate the dbml. rebuild and it works.

thanks!