asp.net mvc How to add placeholder for html.dropdownlist

Question

I\'m using asp.net mvc 3.

I have this dropdownlist of countries and I want to add a placeholder for it. Here\'s my code:

@Html.DropDownList(\"country         


        

Answer 1

A quick and (not so) dirty solution involving jQuery.

Instead of adding a dummy item at the start of the list, prepend a new option that is disabled. The main advantage is that you don't have to mess with a dummy item in your list, and most important, you won't be able to select that dummy item in the page:

@Html.DropDownList("yourName", yourSelectList, new { @class = "form-control select-add-placeholder" })

Then somewhere after:

$(".select-add-placeholder").prepend("Select an option...");

Which looks like: