ElencySolutions.MultipleProperty v1.2 Released

The ElencySolutions.MultipleProperty assembly provides a developer with the ability to easily create custom properties that are made up of other property types.  It allows the developer to create properties that are essentially lists of other property types.  This can be done by creating entity classes and decorating them with various MultipleProperty class level and property level attributes.

The properties offer features as drag and drop sorting, the ability to programmatically set property settings for entity properties, property copying, laying out properties within different tabs and various other features.

For more information please refer to previous blog posts that are linked to from here.  Very useful documentation can be found here.

The best way to get to grips with working with the base classes and attributes is to have a quick read of the documentation or to download the #example# and add it to the root of your EPiServer web application.  The example is dependent on PageTypeBuilder!

New Features in v1.2

• The previous version did not work correctly with EPiServer Commerce.  This was because the various handlers used for commerce intercept most .aspx requests and were bypassing my custom VPP handler for embedded resources.  This has been fixed in this version.
• A tab index can now be specified when create properties that have property definitions living under different tabs.
• Issue with commerce and Product picker property fixed.  Basically the product picker inherits PropertyString but does not set the editor control so when ApplyEditChanges is called the property fell over.
• Minor UI bug fixed.

Installation

The assembly is dependent on EPiServer CMS 6 and onwards.

The easiest way to install the assembly is to get it from the EPiServer nuget feed or you can download it from codeplex.

Example

A full code example can be download from here.  The example demonstrates how you could build an image gallery.  This is also covered in the documentation.

The example below demonstrates how you could create a property that would link to multiple commerce products for recommendations:

  1: namespace ClickAndTalk.CustomProperties
  2: {
  3:     using System;
  4:     using System.Collections.Generic;
  5:     using System.Runtime.Serialization;
  6:     using Mediachase.Commerce.Catalog;
  7:     using ElencySolutions.MultipleProperty;
  8:     using EPiServer.Business.Commerce.UI.Edit.ProductPicker.SpecializedProperties;
  9:     using EPiServer.PlugIn;
 10: 
 11:     [Serializable]
 12:     [PageDefinitionTypePlugIn(
 13:         DisplayName = "Product Recommendations property", 
 14:         Description = "Product Recommendations property - a collection of product recommendations")]
 15:     public class PropertyRecommendationCollection : MultiplePropertyBase<RecommendationCollection, Recommendation>
 16:     {
 17:         public override string GetListItemDescription(Recommendation entity)
 18:         {
 19:             if (entity == null)
 20:                 return string.Empty;
 21: 
 22:             string productId = entity.Product;
 23:             return CatalogContext.Current.GetCatalogEntry(productId).Name;
 24:         }
 25:     }
 26: 
 27:     [Serializable]
 28:     [CollectionDataContract]
 29:     [KnownType(typeof(RecommendationCollection))]
 30:     [MultiplePropertyEntity(
 31:         AddButtonText = "Add new recommendation", 
 32:         ListItemInformationHeader = "Recomendations")]
 33:     public class RecommendationCollection : List<Recommendation>
 34:     {
 35:         public override string ToString()
 36:         {
 37:             return MultiplePropertyHelper.SerializeObject(this);
 38:         }
 39:     }
 40: 
 41:     [Serializable]
 42:     [DataContract]
 43:     [KnownType(typeof(Recommendation))]
 44:     [MultiplePropertyEntity]
 45:     public class Recommendation
 46:     {
 47:         public Recommendation()
 48:         {
 49:             Product = string.Empty;
 50:         }
 51: 
 52:         [MultiplePropertyEntityProperty(Caption = "Product",
 53:             Type = typeof(ProductPickerProperty),
 54:             IsInformationProperty = true,
 55:             SortIndex = 100)]
 56:         [DataMember]
 57:         public string Product { get; set; }
 58: 
 59:     }
 60: }
 61: 
 62: 

When you add the Product Recommendations property to a page type in edit mode you will initially be shown the following:

When you click the "Add new recommendation” button an edit area will appear like the following:

You can then click the “Add” button and the recommendation will be added to the RecommendationCollection. An example is shown of how the properties will be shown when listed.

This is what the editing form will look like when you are editing one of the recommendations within the list:

The code below shows you how you would programmatically work with the property within the page the property has been added too.

  1: protected override void OnLoad(System.EventArgs e)
  2: {
  3:     base.OnLoad(e);
  4: 
  5:     ICatalogSystem catalogContext = CatalogContext.Current;
  6:     RecommendationCollection recommendations = CurrentPage["RecommendedProducts"] as RecommendationCollection;
  7:     IEnumerable<Entry> products = recommendations
  8:         .Select(current => catalogContext.GetCatalogEntry(current.Product));
  9: }

Feedback

Feedback as always is greatly received.  If there are bugs/issues please feel free to email or twitter me @croweman