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Master Page Weirdness - "Content controls have to be top-level controls in a content page or a nested master page that references a master page."

Asked 2009-05-07T17:02:04.457
73

This is weird. I added a brand new Web Application project to my solution in Visual Studio 2008.

Created a master page. Made zero modifications. Created a new webform. Set its master page to the MP I just created.

Still, no modifications. No markup. No user controls. No references. Nothing. However when I try to run it, I get:

Content controls have to be top-level controls in a content page or a nested master page that references a master page.
HttpException (0x80004005): Content controls have to be top-level controls in a content page or a nested master page that references a master page.]
   System.Web.UI.MasterPage.CreateMaster(TemplateControl owner, HttpContext context, VirtualPath masterPageFile, IDictionary contentTemplateCollection) +8665016
   System.Web.UI.Page.get_Master() +51
   System.Web.UI.Page.ApplyMasterPage() +15
   System.Web.UI.Page.PerformPreInit() +45
   System.Web.UI.Page.ProcessRequestMain(Boolean includeStagesBeforeAsyncPoint, Boolean includeStagesAfterAsyncPoint) +282

If I do the same exact thing in a standalone project thats outside of this solution, it works fine. Keep in mind that I'm using a web application project vs a website project if that makes any difference.

The webform:

<%@ Page Language="vb" AutoEventWireup="false" CodeBehind="Default.aspx.vb" Inherits="WebUI._Default" MasterPageFile="~/Site1.Master" %>

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">

<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" >
<head runat="server">
    <title></title>
</head>
<body>
    <form id="form1" runat="server">
    <div>

    </div>
    </form>
</body>
</html>

The master page:

<%@ Master Language="VB" AutoEventWireup="false" CodeBehind="Site1.master.vb" Inherits="WebUI.Site1" %&
asp.net visual-studio-2008 master-pages
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2 Answers

4

For some reason, there is no option in the create page dialogue to select a master page. I have tried both programatically declaring the MP and by updating the property in the Properties pane. – NoCarrier 13 mins ago

I believe its because i'm using a "web application" vs a "web site" – NoCarrier 9 mins ago

Chances are it is in the <@PAGE> tag where your problem is. That said, it doesnt make a difference if you are using a Web Application or not. To create a Child Page, right click on your master page in the Solution Explorer and choose Add Content Page.

answered 2009-05-07T17:30:03.033
2

Better late than never i suppose... you get the option to set the MASTERPAGE only of you are developing a WEB SITE (FILE>NEW>WEBSITE)... but not when you create an ASP.NET project (FILE>NEW>PROJECT) - there you have to set the Masterpage using the properties of the newly created webform and it's up to you to modify the ASPX source to make it master page compliant (ie, removing the stock HTML, etc...)

answered 2011-08-11T15:50:28.530

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