Create a MVC 3 web solution template – Part 1, Create template projects

I am implementing a web application visual studio 2010 template at work. So it saves everyone’s time on a fresh start project. I decide to have 3 layers, presentation layer – web mvc3, business layer, and data access layer.

I have created a MVC3.WebTemplate solution with 3 projects, Business.Template , Data.Template and Web.Template. Let’s see what I have included in the three layers solution.

1. Web.Template

1.1 CodeTemplates

This folder contains the t4 templates to generate codes for views and controllers. I have included this in the project and it overrides the MVC default one. For more information, please read this blog https://kevww.wordpress.com/?s=t4+template

Have done this provides me ability to create my own t4 templates in the future, eg. in this template, I have modified the default template to make all controllers inherit a BaseController. When you create a new controller using the scaffolding template, it will create YourController : BaseController.

In the future I will create some view templates to make use of Twitter.Bootstrap and save you some time on styling the views.

1.2 Nuget Packages

I have included the latest packages for Jquery, Modernizr, Elmah, Ninject, Twitter.Bootstrap, etc.

<packages>
  <package id="elmah" version="1.2.0.1" />
  <package id="elmah.corelibrary" version="1.2.1" />
  <package id="Elmah.MVC" version="1.3.2" />
  <package id="EntityFramework" version="4.3.0" />
  <package id="jQuery" version="1.7.1" />
  <package id="jQuery.UI.Combined" version="1.8.17" />
  <package id="jQuery.Validation" version="1.9" />
  <package id="jQuery.vsdoc" version="1.6" />
  <package id="Microsoft.Web.Infrastructure" version="1.0.0.0" />
  <package id="Modernizr" version="1.7" />
  <package id="Ninject" version="2.2.1.4" />
  <package id="Ninject.MVC3" version="2.2.2.0" />
  <package id="Twitter.Bootstrap" version="2.0.0" />
  <package id="WebActivator" version="1.4.4" />
</packages>

Of course, you know Nuget will download all the packages in a Package folder in your solution folder. You don’t need to include those files into your template. You can easily restore the Nuget packages to a new solution thsi is created from the template.

2. Business.Template

Not much to talk about for this project, really it should contain all your business logics.

3. Business.Template

3.1 DataContext

For data access, I am using EntityFramework 4.3. I have included a empty context edmx file with t4 templates to generate DbContext & POCOs.

If you want do CodeFirst, you can remove my stuff under Data folder and put your POCOs there.

3.2 Repositories

I have included a generic base repository. To help you start building your repositories. It has the default CRUD operation methods which you can inherit from.

————————————————————————————-

This is all about my project template, please refer to blog part 2 for the VS Template Creation.

Download the sample vstemplate from http://mvc3projecttemplate.codeplex.com/