So as I was working on the Direct Sales CRM application, I came to the part where I needed to upload CSV files to be imported / processed.

From the early days of webforms, I recalled this being quite a pain in the neck.

And, honestly, I wasn’t looking forward to figuring out how to make it work in MVC.

But, boy was I worrying about nothing. NOTHING.

It was so stupid simple, I had it completely implemented, including saving a reference record of the file to the database, in a matter of a few hours.

The following code is a verbatim copy from http://www.aspdotnet-pools.com/. Not that anything will happen to it, but I’m a digital hoarder and would also like a place for me to reference in the event something changes on their end.

Here is the code for the View:

@{
ViewBag.Title = "Multiple file upload with asp.net mvc and HTML5";
}

@using (Html.BeginForm("Index", "Home", FormMethod.Post, new { enctype = "multipart/form-data" }))
{
<h3>Multiple file upload with asp.net MVCc/MVC3/MVC4/MVC5, C# and HTML5</h3>
<input multiple="multiple" name="files" type="file" value="" />
<input title="Uplad" type="submit" value="Upload You Image" />
<div style="color: red; font-size: 14px;">@ViewBag.Message</div>
}

And here is the code for the Controller

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Web;
using System.Web.Mvc;

namespace ProjectDemo_MVC.Controllers
{
    public class HomeController : Controller
    {
        /// <summary>
        /// Multiple file upload with asp.net mvc and HTML5
        /// </summary>
        /// <returns></returns>
        public ActionResult Index()
        {
            return View();
        }
        /// <summary>
        /// Post method for uploading files
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="files"></param>
        /// <returns></returns>
        [HttpPost]
        public ActionResult Index(HttpPostedFileBase[] files)
        {
            try
            {
                /*Lopp for multiple files*/
                foreach (HttpPostedFileBase file in files)
                {
                    /*Geting the file name*/
                    string filename = System.IO.Path.GetFileName(file.FileName);
                    /*Saving the file in server folder*/
                    file.SaveAs(Server.MapPath("~/Images/" + filename));
                    string filepathtosave = "Images/" + filename;
                    /*HERE WILL BE YOUR CODE TO SAVE THE FILE DETAIL IN DATA BASE*/
                }

                ViewBag.Message = "File Uploaded successfully.";
            }
            catch
            {
                ViewBag.Message = "Error while uploading the files.";
            }
            return View();
        }

    }
}

I hope it’s as easy for you to implement as it was for me.

I look forward to these other little gems that I’ll find.

Code On!
RJ

RJ Hatch

RJ writes custom Windows and Web applications using the Microsoft .NET framework, and enjoys solving problems with code, often while listening to a techno soundcloud stream. He hopes to one day write an application that many businesses will use.