Custom Insert and Edit Forms

[Albert]

Hi,

I have a radgrid bound to an entitydatasource control, I want to use user controls for the insert and edit forms, what is the best way to do this?

Is it possible to alter the auto generated edit forms or are user controls the only way to go?

Regards

[Shinu]

Hello Albert,

You can create customize the Edit form with Form template or by using User control.
Take a look into the following demo which explains the same.
Grid / Form Template Edit Form.
Grid / User Control Edit Form.

Thanks,
Shinu.

[Albert]

Hi,

The examples in your previous reply are for SQL Datasources (and datatables), I really need an example using the entity framework datasources.

I am beginning to think that I am better of using Microsoft FormView controls to update and edit records rather than trying to use Web User Controls in a Telerik grid, there seems to be a lot less code, am I wrong?

Thank you in advance for your time.

Regards

[Iana Tsolova]

Hello Albert ,

If your grid works with SqlDataSource, there is no reason for it not to work with EntityDataSource in case it is properly configured. Can you share the grid and the EntityDataSource controls declaration as well as any related code, and this for the user control so we can perform further check on it?

Greetings,
Iana Tsolova
the Telerik team

[Albert]

Hi Iana (nice name!),

Thank you for your reply. I am trying to convert your own Telerik example that uses SQL datasources to Entity Framework datasources. Here is the link.

http://demos.telerik.com/aspnet-ajax/grid/examples/dataediting/usercontroleditform/defaultcs.aspx

Please could you send me an altered version amended for Entity framework, I have yet to be convinced that the code needed to get this to work (if it does work!) is easier than using Microsoft FormView controls. I am hoping that you can prove me wrong. 

Regards

[Iana Tsolova]

Hello Albert ,

This demo uses manual data source operations and it cannot work with automatic DataSource operations as is because the user control does not implement the IBindableTemplate interface. You can see how this should be done in this blog post.
Otherwise you will have to implement the CRUD operations manually or give try of the FormTemplate edit form type. 

Kind regards,
Iana Tsolova
the Telerik team

[Albert]

Hi Iana,

I have managed to get the template form to work with the entity datasource so I will be marking your last response as the answer.

However, I noticed that the RadGrid does not have "inserting" or "updating" events, how can I access and change values or set default values before they are committed to the database?

Regards

[Kevin]

Hello Albert,

You can use the EntityDataSource's Inserting and Updating events and access the entry that will be inserted/updated and make any changes to it there. It would look something like so:

protected void EntityDataSource1_Inserting(object sender, EntityDataSourceChangingEventArgs e)
    {
        // get car that will be inserted
        Car car = (Car)e.Entity;
        // set default value
        car.ProductionDate = DateTime.Now;
    }

I hope that helps.