Documentation & Demos need some work

[Joe]

I have noticed many glaring omissions and incomplete documentation when trying to look up how to use some of these components.  For example, for the MVC Grid documentation found at http://demos.telerik.com/aspnet-mvc/grid/remote-data-binding it shows in the cshtml code:

@(Html.Kendo().Grid<Kendo.Mvc.Examples.Models.OrderViewModel>()
    .Name("grid")
    .Columns(columns => {
        columns.Bound(p => p.OrderID).Filterable(false);
        columns.Bound(p => p.Freight);
        columns.Bound(p => p.OrderDate).Format("{0:MM/dd/yyyy}");
        columns.Bound(p => p.ShipName);
        columns.Bound(p => p.ShipCity);
    })
    .Pageable()
    .Sortable()
    .Scrollable()
    .Filterable()
    .HtmlAttributes(new { style = "height:550px;" })
    .DataSource(dataSource => dataSource
        .Ajax()
        .PageSize(20)
        .Read(read => read.Action("Orders_Read", "Grid"))
     )
)

Notice the Read method on the DataSource method, pointing to a GET Action called "Orders_Read" in the "Grid" controller.  Of course looking at the controller code example only shows:

using System.Web.Mvc;
using Kendo.Mvc.UI;
using Kendo.Mvc.Extensions;

namespace Kendo.Mvc.Examples.Controllers
{
    public partial class GridController : Controller
    {
        public ActionResult Remote_Data_Binding()
        {
            return View();
        }
    }
}

No Orders_Read action there, and no clue as to what other actions the DataSource object can make use of in this Grid context.  I assume the user is supposed to go look up the DataSource component now, which may or may not have an HtmlHelper.  I've noticed that about a few other components...  needing to do something, trying to find hhelp and it takes one to the Kendo UI documentation, where the syntax and building of these components is vastly different than the HTML Helpers of the MVC libraries.

 

So what is the best way to actually learn how to use these components? I'm looking for all levels of help, basic, intermediary, and advanced.  Like using an MVC Grid and the MVVM model together from C# ASP.NET...

 

 

[Misho]

Hi Joe,

You are right. The online demos doesn't show the complete configuration of the MVC demos project and we are currently working on improving that. For the time being I would advise you to use our offline demos as reference, which you can obtain by installing the Telerik UI for ASP.NET MVC. Here is the place that you can find them locally:
C:\Program Files (x86)\Telerik\UI for ASP.NET MVC Q2 2016\wrappers\aspnetmvc\Examples\VS2015

http://screencast.com/t/jvDNwqppxl

I hope that helps.

Regards,
Misho
Telerik

[Joe]

In looking at the local demos that you've pointed me to, it's the same thing.  Running the solution, look under the grid, binding to remote data.  Shows a read action, but the code for the controller doesn't show any such action.  See screen shots.

So looking into the actual solution, and searching for anything "Orders_Read", which is the alleged action that grid was using, but it doesn't exist anywhere within that demo solution.  In fact the whole solution has a whole lot of controllers, but only 1 view.  This solution is not really a sample of a working MVC/Telerik application, but is instead a brochure app, just showing some of the features and not entirely in a real world working kind of way.

So it's really no different than the online demos.

 

[Brad]

I have to agree that the demo's could use some work.  You mentioned using the offline demo, but I can't even get that to work.  How am I supposed to learn if I can't even use the demos?

After updating all of the packages with Nuget, clean build, then Start, I get the following:

The type or namespace name 'Objects' does not exist in the namespace 'System.Data' (are you missing an assembly reference?)

========== Build: 0 succeeded, 1 failed, 0 up-to-date, 0 skipped ==========

After hours of searching all I could come up with was this thread on SO:

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1275043/the-type-or-namespace-name-objects-does-not-exist-in-the-namespace-system-dat

which didn't help at all.  Am I suppose to fiddle with this all day long to get a demo to work?

 

 

[Misho]

Hi,

The local demos actually have real views corresponding to each of the demos. The views are located under: Kendo.MVC.Examples/Areas/razor/Views/<Component name> http://screencast.com/t/ZLcn2WfOGR5s

Regarding the error on your side, we are not aware of such one and you are the first to report it. From the error details it looks like the issue is related to .NET assembly reference, but not to the Kendo components. 

I'm sending you a video showing how I am opening the offline demos solution on my side:
http://screencast.com/t/v26cPtIS0GX

You may find the Grid binding section in our online documentation useful:
http://docs.telerik.com/kendo-ui/aspnet-mvc/helpers/grid/binding/ajax-binding

If you still encounter issues with building the offline demos on your side, could you please specify more details about your environment, such as .NET version, Visual Studio version, OS and exact steps to reproduce so we will be able to replicate the issue on our side and research it in more details?

Beat Regards,
Misho
Telerik