Why Does Html.DisplayForModel() display only one item from list?

Question

I would like to display a list of items in a View using Html.DisplayModelFor().

Here is the controller:

public ActionResult Index() {

        var person = new ApplicationUser();
        person.Email = "Greg@gmail.com";
        person.UserName = "Greg";

        var person2 = new ApplicationUser();
        person.Email = "Gary@gmail.com";
        person.UserName = "Gary";

        var list = new List<ApplicationUser>();
        list.Add(person);
        list.Add(person2);

        return View(list);
    }

Here is the view:

@model  IEnumerable<WebApplication32.Models.ApplicationUser>


@Html.DisplayForModel()

Here is the DisplayTemplate named ApplicationUser:

@model WebApplication32.Models.ApplicationUser
<div>
  @Html.DisplayFor(u=> u.UserName)
  @Html.DisplayFor(u=> u.Email)
</div>

The result is only the first item being displayed.

If I change the view to:

@model  IEnumerable<WebApplication32.Models.ApplicationUser>

@foreach (var item in Model)
{
    @Html.DisplayFor(x => x)
}

Then each item is displayed.

But the second view makes no sense to me: In the foreach, 'item' does not appear to be used. Yet it is looping through the items.

Answer 1

DisplayFor expects an expression that identifies the object that contains the properties to display. The Model is already given by the HtmlHelper (=@Html). Therefor you don't need to use your item variable.

Answer 2

Why do not use model's itself:

@foreach (var item in Model)
{
    <label>@item.UserName</label>
    <label>@item.Email</label>
}

Or one can use

@foreach (var item in Model)
{
    @Html.Display(item.UserName)
}