How do you read POST data in an ASP.Net MVC 3 Web API 2.1 controller?

Question

This does not seem to be as easy as I thought. I found some solutions on the web, but they are not working for me. I have an ASP.Net MVC 3 project with the Microsoft ASP.Net Web API 2.1 nuget package installed. Now, I want to be able to read data posted to a web api controller. The data sent will vary, so I cannot used a strongly typed ViewModel.

Here are the solutions I tried:

    public void Post([FromBody]string value)
    {
        ...
    }


    public void Post([FromBody]List<string> values)
    {
        ...
    }


    public void Post([FromBody]NameValueCollection values)
    {
        ...
    }

But my value or values variables are always empty. I know the controller is receiving data however because I can check it by accessing (System.Web.HttpContextWrapper)Request.Properties["MS_HttpContext"].Request.Form. It does not look like the proper way to retrieve the data though. There ought to be a cleaner way.

UPDATE:

Here is how I am posting the information:

I am posting the data from another controller in the same web application:

    public ActionResult SendEmailUsingService()
    {
        dynamic email = new ExpandoObject();

        email.ViewName = "EmailTest";
        email.From = "[email protected]";
        email.To = "[email protected]";
        email.Fullname = "John Smith";
        email.Url = "www.mysite.com";

        IDictionary<string, object> data = email;

        using (var wb = new WebClient())
        {
            string url = BaseUrlNoTrailingSlash + Url.RouteUrl("DefaultApi", new { httproute = "", controller = "Emailer" });
             var response = wb.UploadValues(url, "POST", data.ToNameValueCollection());
        }

        return View();
    }

And here is what I am getting in my Post web api controller if I declare an httpContext variable like this:

var httpContext = (System.Web.HttpContextWrapper)Request.Properties["MS_HttpContext"];

httpContext.Request.Form = {ViewName=EmailTest&From=fromaddress%40yahoo.com&To=toaddress%40gmail.com&Fullname=John+Smith&Url=www.mysite.com}

httpContext.Request.Form is a System.Collections.Specialized.NameValueCollection {System.Web.HttpValueCollection}

Can you add examples of how you are Posting the data to the API? — Jon Susiak
– Jon Susiak, Commented Mar 7, 2014 at 9:32
@JonSusiak Please see the UPDATE section in my original post. I just added the information you are asking me. — Jean-François Beauchamp
– Jean-François Beauchamp, Commented Mar 7, 2014 at 12:13

Community · Accepted Answer · 2017-05-23 12:34:08Z

3

I finally found the answer to my question here:

Web API Form Data Collection

The solution is to use FormDataCollection:

    public void Post([FromBody]FormDataCollection formData)
    {
        ...
    }

edited May 23, 2017 at 12:34

CommunityBot

11 silver badge

answered Mar 7, 2014 at 18:02

Jean-François Beauchamp

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