MVC3 SelectListItem. Is it possible to decorate it with custom html attributes?

if I have something like this:

@{
   var cats = GetCategories();
   var selectList = from c in cats
   select new SelectListItem
   {
     Selected = (c.Id == Model.SessionCategory.Id),
     Text = c.Name,
     Value = c.Id.ToString(),
    };
  }
 @Html.DropDownList("categories", selectList)

The markup would be like this:

 <select id="categories" name="categories">
    <option value="1">Category1</option>
    <option value="2">Category2</option>
    <option selected="selected" value="3">Category3</option>
 </select>

And no开发者_如何转开发w, the question is:

Is it possible to add additional attributes to each <option> tag? I mean from the Razor template. Without jQuery workarounds?

---

I think the most practical solution would be some jQuery or maybe something like this..

<select id="categories" name="categories">
    @foreach (var item in selectList) {
        <option @if (item.Selected) { <text>selected="selected"</text>} value="@item.Value">@item.Text</option>
    }
</select>

you could obviously add in attributes as needed...

---

By default, no. The SelectListItem does not contain any additional properties to add your attributes to. However, you could create your own DropDownList method or DropDownListFor and create your own ListItemToOption with a custom SelectListItem to add your own attributes.

But it's probably overkill.

---

Here's how I did it:

I created my own DropDownListFor:

    public static MvcHtmlString TheDropDownListFor<TModel, TProperty>(this HtmlHelper<TModel> htmlHelper, Expression<Func<TModel, TProperty>> expression, IEnumerable<SelectListItem> listOfValues, string placeHolder)
    {
        var model = htmlHelper.ViewData.Model;
        var metaData = ModelMetadata .FromLambdaExpression(expression, htmlHelper.ViewData);

        var tb = new TagBuilder("select");

        if (listOfValues != null)
        {
            tb.MergeAttribute("id", metaData.PropertyName);
            tb.MergeAttribute("name", metaData.PropertyName);

            if (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(placeHolder))
            {
                var option = new TagBuilder("option");
                option.MergeAttribute("value", placeHolder);

                tb.InnerHtml += option.ToString();
            }

            foreach (var item in listOfValues)
            {
                var option = new TagBuilder("option");
                option.MergeAttribute("value", item.Value);

                var textNdata = item.Text.Split('|');

                option.InnerHtml = textNdata[0];

                if (textNdata.Length == 2)
                    option.MergeAttribute("data-name", textNdata[1]);

                if(item.Selected)
                    option.MergeAttribute("selected", "selected");

                tb.InnerHtml += option.ToString();
            }
        }

        return MvcHtmlString.Create(tb.ToString());
    }

Then my SelectListItem List is created like this:

    public List<SelectListItem> EmployerList
    {
        get
        {
            return Employers.Select(x => new SelectListItem
            {
                Text = x.EAN + "|" + x.Name,
                Value = x.Id.ToString(),
                Selected = (SelectedEmployer != null && SelectedEmployer.Id == x.Id)
            }).ToList();
        }
    }