How do you register an MVC Area with Sitecore 9?

Question

I have a pre-existing Sitecore 9 instance that houses an existing website.

I have created a new solution, with a new web project, and am attempting to install this project into the existing Sitecore 9 instance. This new web project simply exposes a handful of Controller Actions that return JSON.

I have decided to create this new project using MVC Areas. Currently, the project is empty except for an Area Registration and a single controller with a single action.

public class MyApiAreaRegistration : AreaRegistration
{
    public override string AreaName
    {
        get
        {
            return "MyApi";
        }
    }

    public override void RegisterArea(AreaRegistrationContext context)
    {
        context.Namespaces.Add("MyApi.Web.Areas.MyApi.Controllers");

        var aboutRoute = context.MapRoute(
            "MyApi_about",
            "myapi/about/version",
            new { controller = "About", action = "Version"},
            new[] {"MyApi.Web.Areas.MyApi.Controllers"});

        aboutRoute.RouteHandler = new Sitecore.Mvc.Routing.RouteHandlerWrapper(aboutRoute.RouteHandler);
    }
}

This project has the following nuget references:

<package id="Microsoft.AspNet.Mvc" version="5.2.3" targetFramework="net462" />
<package id="Microsoft.AspNet.Razor" version="3.2.4" targetFramework="net462" />
<package id="Microsoft.AspNet.WebPages" version="3.2.4" targetFramework="net462" />
<package id="Microsoft.Web.Infrastructure" version="1.0.0.0" targetFramework="net462" />
<package id="Sitecore.Mvc.NoReferences" version="9.0.171219" targetFramework="net462" developmentDependency="true" />

And the AboutController referenced above simply returns a JSON Response with the assembly info version number.

When I compile this project, I get a single .dll file. I copy this .dll file to my running Sitecore instance and restart it within IIS. When I go to check my logs, however, I do not see where the "MyApi" area is registered. What else must be done to register a custom area within Sitecore?

Answer 1

I am on Sitecore 9.1. I've added the following Area Registration and Controller and it seems working:

MyApiAreaRegistration:

using System.Web.Mvc;

namespace Test.Areas.MyApi
{
    public class MyApiAreaRegistration : AreaRegistration 
    {
        public override string AreaName 
        {
            get 
            {
                return "MyApi";
            }
        }

        public override void RegisterArea(AreaRegistrationContext context) 
        {
            context.Namespaces.Add("Test.Areas.MyApi.Controllers");

            context.MapRoute(
                "MyApi_default",
                    "myapi/about/version",
                    new { controller = "About", action = "Version" },
                    new[] { "Test.Areas.MyApi.Controllers" }
            );
        }
    }
}

Controller:

using System.Web.Mvc;

namespace Test.Areas.MyApi.Controllers
{
    public class AboutController : Sitecore.Mvc.Controllers.SitecoreController
    {
        [HttpGet]
        public ActionResult Version()
        {
            return Content("test", "application/json");
        }
    }
}

Solution structure:

And, finally, result:

Please, compare it with your implementation.