AJAX ReorderList breaks when using EntityDataSource entity that has a Navigation Property

After some digging, I figured out the reason why the ReorderList from the AJAX Control Toolkit stopped working for me. When I use the ReorderList with the SqlDataSource it works fine. When I use it with the EntityDataSource it works also. Well sort of. It works fine if the object that you are binding to do not have a Navigation Property in ADO.NET Entity Data Model.

If the object does, you will not receive an error when you reorder items in the ReorderList, but it will not work either. The reason is that the control is not completely robust / completed. If figured this out by changing my reference to the the AjaxControlToolkit.dll that is in the source code version of the Ajax Control Toolkit Sample Application. This allowed me to step through the code. There I saw code that “swallowed” the exception and thus never reported it to the calling method. This is why there is no error, but it is not working either.

Here is the InnerException that I found when I stepped through the ReorderList code:

"Error while setting property 'ICAContract': 'This property descriptor does not support the SetValue method.'." 

   at System.Web.UI.WebControls.EntityDataSourceUtil.SetAllPropertiesWithVerification(EntityDataSourceWrapper entityWrapper, Dictionary`2 changedProperties, Boolean overwrite) 
   at System.Web.UI.WebControls.EntityDataSourceView.InstantiateEntityFromViewState(EntityDataSourceWrapper entityWrapper, IDictionary mergedKeysAndOldValues) 
   at System.Web.UI.WebControls.EntityDataSourceView.ExecuteUpdate(IDictionary keys, IDictionary values, IDictionary oldValues) 
   at System.Web.UI.DataSourceView.Update(IDictionary keys, IDictionary values, IDictionary oldValues, DataSourceViewOperationCallback callback)

Here is the code from ReorderList.cs file.

try{…}
catch (Exception ex)
{
    System.Diagnostics.Debug.Fail(ex.ToString());
    //TODO WHY ARE SWALLOWING THIS EXCEPTION!!!
}

I have to conclude that ReorderList needs to handle error properly, and that potentially the ADO.NET Entity Framework may need some more work. I can’t confirm that, but I do know that I have had to implement several work arounds as noted in these blog entries, and that the experience has been buggy at best.

• AJAX ReorderList Example for Adding and Editing Items using the EntityDataSource
• AJAX ReorderList Example for Adding and Editing Items using the SqlDataSource