URL Routing for Database Driven URLs in ASP.NET MVC Websites

June 19, 2019 4 min read

This Article is for setting up database-driven URL routing for Asp.net MVC website development.

Here we are going to learn, how to customize the Asp.net MVC website by URL routing and route variable URL paths to a controller and action of our choice.

Mainly URL routing is most important for making SEO-friendly Asp.net MVC websites.

Why We Need Custom URL Routing in ASP.NET MVC:

Nowadays in technology, everybody wants to access the site as www.youdomain.com/a1, www.yourdomain.com/a2, etc. with a1, a2. mainly this type of URL is used to make a decision for search engines when it is crawling for a particular keyword. This way we can set custom URLs in the Asp.net MVC website. so that we can make a successful SEO Friendly website by making a little c# code in Asp.net MVC.

Let’s discuss and set up how to make custom URL routing for making SEO friendly Asp.net MVC website.

URL routing with Asp.net MVC, I had a problem because the default was handled by only an Asp.net controller/actions.

Don’t worry about that, We have another easy way of controlling the URL routing. here we have our own custom routing and overriding IRouteConstraint interface.

Follow the step-by-step guidelines for setup URL routing in the ASP.NET MVC website. suppose we need a company based on extensionless URLs.

Let’s Start! I have one table with a name like “Companies”.

Here is the ready-made SQL code for the table.


CREATE TABLE [dbo].[Companys] 
(
    [Id] [int] IDENTITY(1,1) NOT NULL,
      NOT NULL,
    [SeoFriendlyName] [nvarchar](max) NOT NULL,
    [IsActive] [bit] NOT NULL,
      NULL,
      NULL,
      NULL,
      NULL,
    [StartDate] [datetime] NULL,
    [Employees] [int] NULL,
    [Decription] [nvarchar](max) NULL,
    
    CONSTRAINT [PK_SeoFriendlyRoute] PRIMARY KEY CLUSTERED
    (
        [Id] ASC
    )
    WITH 
    (
        PAD_INDEX = OFF, 
        STATISTICS_NORECOMPUTE = OFF, 
        IGNORE_DUP_KEY = OFF, 
        ALLOW_ROW_LOCKS = ON, 
        ALLOW_PAGE_LOCKS = ON
    ) ON [PRIMARY]
) 
ON [PRIMARY] 
TEXTIMAGE_ON [PRIMARY];

Now, create an Asp.Net web application into a solution.

Suppose I want to create a dynamic routing example to my solution with any name. Kindly follow the nine steps below for the solution.

Add Web Application to your Solution.
Add Data access in Solution And. Dbml or else .edmx.
Add your Table in a .dbml or .edmx file.
Add Interface IRepository.cs in your, DataAccess look like.


namespace Dataccess { public interface IRepository { Company GetComapnyDetailBySeoUrl(string SeoString); Company GetCompanyById(int id); } }

Implement your Interface method into Repository class add a new file in Data access with the name “Repository.cs”.


namespace DataAccess
{
    public class Repository : IRepository
    {
        // Data context initialization
        DataDataContext objContext = new DataDataContext();

        // Method to get company details by SEO-friendly URL
        public Company GetCompanyDetailBySeoUrl(string SeoString)
        {
            return objContext.Companies
                             .Where(o => o.SeoFriendlyName.ToLower().Trim() == SeoString.Trim())
                             .FirstOrDefault();
        }

        // Method to get company details by ID
        public Company GetCompanyById(int id)
        {
            return objContext.Companies
                             .Where(o => o.Id == id)
                             .FirstOrDefault();
        }
    }
}

Add Company Controller in your MVC web application Project and Index Action like.


public ActionResult Index(int Id)
{
var objDataAccess = new DataAccess.Repository();
var Result = objDataAccess.GetCompanyById(Id);
return View(Result);
}

Add View Company Index Action (design view as per your requirement).
Open your Routeconfig.cs file in your web application project and modify RouteConfig.cs file like below.


public class RouteConfig
{
    public static void RegisterRoutes(RouteCollection routes)
    {
        routes.IgnoreRoute("{resource}.axd/{*pathInfo}");

        // Mapping localized route with SEO-friendly URLs
        routes.MapLocalizedRoute(
            "SeoFriendlyUrl",
            "{SeoFriendlyName}",
            new { controller = "Company", action = "Index" },
            new[] { "DynamicRoutingExample.Controllers" }
        );

        // Default route mapping
        routes.MapRoute(
            name: "Default",
            url: "{controller}/{action}/{id}",
            defaults: new { controller = "Home", action = "Index", id = UrlParameter.Optional }
        );
    }
}

public static class LocalizedRouteExtensionMethod
{
    public static Route MapLocalizedRoute(this RouteCollection routes, string name, string url, object defaults, string[] namespaces)
    {
        return MapLocalizedRoute(routes, name, url, defaults, null /* constraints */, namespaces);
    }

    public static Route MapLocalizedRoute(this RouteCollection routes, string name, string url, object defaults, object constraints, string[] namespaces)
    {
        if (routes == null)
        {
            throw new ArgumentNullException("routes");
        }

        if (url == null)
        {
            throw new ArgumentNullException("url");
        }

        var route = new clsRouteData(url, new MvcRouteHandler())
        {
            Defaults = new RouteValueDictionary(defaults),
            Constraints = new RouteValueDictionary(constraints),
            DataTokens = new RouteValueDictionary()
        };

        if (namespaces != null && namespaces.Length > 0)
        {
            route.DataTokens["Namespaces"] = namespaces;
        }

        routes.Add(name, route);
        return route;
    }
}

public class clsRouteData : Route
{
    public clsRouteData(string url, IRouteHandler routeHandler)
        : base(url, routeHandler)
    {
    }

    public override RouteData GetRouteData(HttpContextBase httpContext)
    {
        RouteData data = base.GetRouteData(httpContext);

        if (data != null)
        {
            var SeoFriendlyName = data.Values["SeoFriendlyName"] as string;

            // Fetch company details from the database
            var objDataRep = new DataAccess.Repository();
            var results = objDataRep.GetCompanyDetailBySeoUrl(SeoFriendlyName);

            if (results != null && results.Id > 0)
            {
                data.Values["controller"] = "Company";
                data.Values["action"] = "Index";
                data.Values["Id"] = results.Id;
            }
            else
            {
                // Handle error or redirect to a 404 page
            }
        }

        return data;
    }
}

Open your Global.asax file and RegisterRoutes in Application_Start events like below.


public ActionResult Index(int id)
{
    var objDataAccess = new DataAccess.Repository();
    var result = objDataAccess.GetCompanyById(id);
    return View(result);
}

I hope this above solution will be helpful for you and if you would like any support for a related article you can just comment on a blog.

I have also uploaded the same dynamic URL routing example in the ASP.NET MVC application, You can directly download the example on below Github link below.

https://github.com/prajapatichintan/database-driven-urls-for-asp-net-mvc-website

You may also like my other interesting articles for ASP.NET MVC.

Further Reading: How to Enable Theme Customization Dynamically in ASP.NET MVC?