Variable from usercontrol works in .ascx but not .ascx.cs - any ideas?

[katebp]

Hello everyone,

I have an annoying bug, I have built one usercontrol called BlogPost.ascx and one called BlogPostWithComments.ascx which loads the BlogPost one and then adds some extra features to the output.

If I refer to a variable in the .ascx file (i.e. BlogPost1.BlogId) it works fine, but if I try to use this in the class file, despite it coming up in the Visual Studion intellisense it returns a null value.

BlogPostWithComments.ascx

<%@ Control Language="C#" AutoEventWireup="true" CodeFile="BlogPostWithComments.ascx.cs" Inherits="managed_content_usercontrols_BlogPostWithComments" %>
<%@ Register src="BlogPost.ascx" tagname="BlogPost" tagprefix="uc1" %>
<uc1:BlogPost ID="BlogPost1" runat="server" />
<%=BlogPost1.BlogId %>

BlogPostWithComments.ascx.cs

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Globalization;
using System.Text;
using System.IO;
using System.Web;
using System.Web.Caching;
using System.Xml;
using System.Xml.Xsl;
using System.Xml.XPath;
//
public partial class managed_content_usercontrols_BlogPostWithComments : System.Web.UI.UserControl
{
 protected void Page_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)
 {
 Response.Write("[" + BlogPost1.BlogId + "," + BlogPost1.PostAuthor + ",");
 }
}

Does anyone have any idea why? The <%=BlogPost1.BlogId%> outputs fine.

Thanks.

[marcel]

sorry, I am not at a development PC right now, so I can't test anything. Could you try the following?

protected void Page_PreRender(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
Response.Write("[" + BlogPost1.BlogId + "," + BlogPost1.PostAuthor + ",");
}

[kb5nju]

I've not worked too much with User Controls like this. But, that won't stop me from tossing my $0.02 in ...

What happens when you try to response.write BlogPost1.BlogId.ToString() and BlogPost1.PostAuthor.ToString() ?

[Ocean10000]

I am assuming BlogPost1.BlogId is an int or some other unquie value which is not a string value. I am guessing the same thing for the PostAuthor property as well that it is an object and not a string.

<%=BlogPost1.BlogId %> will automaticly convert this to
Response.Write(BlogPost1.BlogId.ToString());

Example Below
<%@ Control Language="C#" AutoEventWireup="true" %>
<table border="1">
<tr><td><%=BlogID%></td><td><%=PostAuthor%></td></tr>
</table>
<script runat="Server" language="C#">

private Guid _BlogID = Guid.NewGuid();
public Guid BlogID
{
get
{
return _BlogID;
}
set
{
_BlogID = value;
}

}
private object _PostAuthor = new object();
public object PostAuthor
{
get
{
return _PostAuthor;
}
set
{
_PostAuthor = value;
}
}

protected void Page_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
Response.Write("[" + this.BlogID.ToString() + "," + this.PostAuthor.ToString() + "]");
}
</script>

[katebp]

Thanks everyone, sorry for the delay in replying - I got stuck on another project.

I've tried Marcel's suggestion and bizarrely while the text in the Page_PreRender doesn't work the text in the Page_Load does.

So adding the code above generates the text:
[,,[173,Mr Blogger,

Ocean10000, I'm having a look at your suggestion now.

[marcel]

Page_PreRender comes after Page_Load in the Page Lifecycle [msdn.microsoft.com], so the result you have shown is what I would have expected after adding the PreRender code.

What's most likely happening is that you are trying to get the values from BlogPost in the Page_Load event before the UserControl BlogPost itself has loaded. By moving the code to PreRender, BlogPost has already loaded and you are inserting the values just before it is being rendered to HTML.

[katebp]

Ah - so simple! I shall have to swot up on the Page Lifecycle.

Thanks Marcel.