How to get client side data from Kendo Grid to controller - kendo-grid

Question

I am trying to get Kendo Grid data which is hydrated from client side to a MVC controller method. My view contains several single fields like name, date of birth etc and tabular field which I hooked with a Kendo Grid. Since its a new operation I have no data in the grid ( and other fields) and user enters them from client side.
I have no idea how to proceed on this. Ideally I would like to get this data to a list in my viewmodal. So that when the user hits save, I have all other data and the grid data coming into a controller method.
I am able to successfully bind a list with kendo grid and display it. I have very little experience on JavaScript and Kendo and web programming.
If any of you can point me to the right direction, sample code would be greatly appreciated.
$("#departmet").kendoGrid({
dataSource: dataSource,
height: 250,
scrollable: true,
sortable: true,
filterable: true,
pageable: {
input: true,
numeric: false
},
columns: [
"DepartmentName",
"SubDivision"
]
});

Answer 1

From experience I know their documentation is not easy to navigate. It seems there is the documentation and then the API. The API is usually what you will always want to find. What you will need is the information from here https://docs.telerik.com/kendo-ui/api/javascript/ui/grid. If I understand the question correctly. There are several ways you can achieve posting. You could make use of editor templates. Click the Open in Dojo to get an idea how it looks.
https://docs.telerik.com/kendo-ui/api/javascript/ui/grid/configuration/editable.template
With this you do not have to worry about modifying the data via javascript. Assuming your grid is surrounded with a form element it will get posted when submitted. Note paging is not accounted for here. Also, this method by default can auto post after each edit. If you don't want this behavior then you will have to have advanced knowledge of the API.....Correction on that last statement. The API is different when dealing with the data all on the client side. Click the Open in Dojo to see it all on the client side. If you are not wanting to use editor templates and want to manage the data editing yourself then you need to use the grid methods provided.
Once you have your grid created. To access the data source of the grid you will need to get the dataSource.
$('#departmet').data('kendoGrid').dataSource;
https://docs.telerik.com/kendo-ui/api/javascript/data/datasource
If you need to use a different data source(or change it) you can use the setDataSource method below(grid function).
https://docs.telerik.com/kendo-ui/api/javascript/ui/grid/methods/setdatasource
To add to the data source use the add function to add a new object.
$('#departmet').data('kendoGrid').dataSource.add({ id: 2, name: 'name'});
https://docs.telerik.com/kendo-ui/api/javascript/data/datasource/methods/add
It is important with kendo to ALWAYS use the methods provided to change the data source so that the proper events can fire to update the UI accordingly. This includes if you need to set a property on a specific data item. In that case you need to use the set method on the item itself.
After you are done modifying your data. Within javascript get the data and either create DOM elements within a form
//JQuery sudo code example
var data = $("#departmet").data("kendoGrid").dataSource.data();
var dataLen = data.length;
var myForm = $('#my-form'); //Already within DOM
for (var i = 0; i < dataLen; i++) {
var item = data[i];
var idEl = $('<input type="hidden" name="userData[' + i + '].id" />');
idEl.val(item.id);
var nameEl = $('<input type="hidden" name="userData[' + i + '].name" />');
nameEl.val(item.name);
myForm.append(idEl);
myForm.append(nameEl);
}
myForm.submit();
This assumes your controller function(??) on the backend is expecting an array of objects with the property name of userData.
Alternatively, you can post it via ajax. For example, the ajax jquery function. Passing your data as the data of the ajax call.
http://api.jquery.com/jquery.ajax/
Don't want to ramble. Let me know if you need more help.

Answer 2

SO won't let me comment yet so have to add another answer. You will not need to define the data source within the .NET code when dealing with client only data. Just use this.
.DataSource(dataSource => dataSource
.Ajax()
.ServerOperation(false)
)
If you will have data coming from the backend then you need to use the generic-less constructor and pass in the object else keep what you have.
Html.Kendo().Grid(Model.MyList)
However, if you are preprocessing some client data on the screen that you want to initialize then you will need to do this on ready. Don't worry about the schema part of the data source. It already knows this when you used the .NET MVC wrapper because you gave it the schema(type) via the generic or the parameter provided.
var initialDS= new kendo.data.DataSource({
data: [
{ ActionName: "Some Name", ActionType: "Some Type" }
]
});
$(document).ready(function () {
$('#docworkflow').data('kendoGrid').setDataSource(initialDS);
});
As I mentioned in the other answer. Use the data source functions for adding additional data to the data source. No need to setDataSource each time you want to add. Just
//Assuming you have 2 inputs on the screen the user is entering info into
var nameEntry = $('#action-name').val();
var typeEntry = $('#action-type').val();
$('#docworkflow').data('kendoGrid').dataSource.add({ ActionName: nameEntry , ActionType: typeEntry });

Answer 3

So after some efforts I come up with. But I don't know where to specify the
data in the html code. Is it possible this way?
#(Html.Kendo().Grid <DockData.Action> ()
.Name("docworkflow")
.Columns(columns =>
{
columns.Bound(e => e.ActionName);
columns.Bound(e => e.ActionType);
}).DataSource( **How do I load a script variable here***)
//This script variable should be fed to the above code.
This variable is populatedwhen the user adds data from the UI which works fine.
var dataSource = new kendo.data.DataSource({
data: result,
schema: {
model: {
fields: {
ActionName: { type: "string" },
ActionType: { type: "string" }
}
}
},
pageSize: 20
});