How to pass data from database to controller and then show in view in select option tag. ASP.NET MVC5

Question

I'm trying to get data from the database which i am able to do but i cant seem to pass it to the view's select option tag in html.

I've tried using a string and pasing it but it just passes the first value. havent been able to pass it through a string array either

public ActionResult GetDetails()
{
 SqlConnection con;
 string constr = ConfigurationManager.ConnectionStrings["ConnectionString"].ToString();
 con = new SqlConnection(constr);
 con.Open();
 string sqlCommand = "SELECT *FROM cityname";
 SqlCommand cmd = new SqlCommand(sqlCommand, con);
 SqlDataReader read;
 read = cmd.ExecuteReader();
 List<string> str = new List<string>();
 while(read.Read())
 {
 str.Add(read.GetValue(1).ToString());
 }
 ViewBag.mydata = str;
 return View();
}

I want to be able to show it in this

<select class="mdb-select md-form" id="PersonCity" name="PersonCountry" onchange="run1();">
 <option value="" disabled selected>Choose your Country</option>
 <option value='$country_name'>$country_name</option>

• imnotaduck: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/20387205/asp-net-mvc-selectlist-in-viewmodel ?
• Saleh Adnan: I cant iterate viewbags. I wanna be able to send it to the the selectoption in html and then iterate it through javascript
• imnotaduck: how about this? https://stackoverflow.com/questions/16836428/asp-net-mvc-return-json-result
• haldo: Why don't you use the helper method @Html.DropDownListFor()?
• Saleh Adnan: I dont know how to use helper methods. im new to mvc and asp.net

Answer 1

Try to replace your html for this

@Html.DropDownList("value", new SelectList(ViewBag.mydata))