ASP.NET control to render a <div>

Question

The Label control in ASP.NET seems to render <span> tags, but is there a server control to render HTML within a <div>?

Sure, I could set display: block and it might look the same, but I'd rather not be nesting divs inside spans. Also I'd prefer not to use <%= MyVariable %> because that might not behave nicely on postbacks.

Any suggestions, please?

Solution 1

I think you need HtmlGenericControl class. It has a constructor which accepts a string variable which initializes a new instance of the HtmlGenericControl class with the specified tag:

var div = new HtmlGenericControl("div");

It is also has InnerHtml and InnerText properties (you mentioned this in a comment to the previous answer).

Solution 2

Of course: ASP.NET has a built-in control called Panel!

And you may use it as follows:

<asp:Panel ID="myPanel" runat="server">
    <!-- Other markup here like client and server controls/elements -->
</asp:Panel>

Solution 3

Try the Panel control.

Solution 4

Try this:

<div class="myclass">
<asp:Literal ID="mytext" runat="server"></asp:Literal>
</div>

Set your text inside Literal, which renders without html tag

Solution 5

<asp:Panel>
<div id="NoRecords" runat="server" visible="false">No records are available.</div>
</asp:Panel>

Code-Behind

 protected void MyRepeater1_PreRender(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
    if (MyRepeater1.Items.Count == 0)
    {
        NoRecords.Visible = true;
    }
    else
    {
        NoRecords.Visible = false;
    }
}

View more solutions

Comments

[James]

Thanks. Could I put this directly in the page markup, or does it have to be added to a Panel?

[Oleks]

You could use it in markup like: <div runat="server" id="myPerfectDiv">my inner text here</div>

[James]

Cool. What's the difference between the InnerText and InnerHtml properties? Should I just use InnerHtml?

[Oleks]

InnerText property provides automatic HTML encoding/decoding. See: e.g., if the InnerText property is set to <b> Hello </b>, the < and > symbols are converted to < and >, respectively. Fot the InnerHtml property the rendered output would be: <b> Hello </b>.

[Mircea Ion]

If I would decide to use Panel how will I add new HTML element attributes like ones for which Panel doesn't have a corresponding property?

[Matías Fidemraizer]

@MirceaIon As any other WebControl, you've the Attributes property: msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/…