WCF Service

WCF Service project type will create a ASP.NET website. Below is the folder structure of a brand new WCF Service project:

│   Service.svc
│   Web.config
│   Web.Debug.config
│
├───App_Code
│       IService.cs
│       Service.cs
│
└───App_Data

To host WCF Service, we can just create an application, then point it to the project’s folder.

How the project looks in a browser:

Whenever the service being called, .NET runtime will first check if there’s a change to the source code. If it is changed, the runtime will then compile the website. I found this out by monitoring Temporary ASP.NET Files (which is configurable from web.config):

<system.web>
	<compilation targetFramework="4.7.2" tempDirectory="D:\projects\wcf\WCFService1\WCFService1_Temp" /> 
</system.web>

Structure of Temporary ASP.NET Files (D:\projects\wcf\WCFService1\WCFService1_Temp)

└───wcfservice
    └───b4011030
        └───a40309e8
            │   App_Code.compiled
            │   App_Code.w2tcshyi.dll
            │   preStartInitList.web
            │   service.svc.cdcab7d2.compiled
            │
            ├───assembly
            │   ├───dl3
            │   ├───temp
            │   └───tmp
            └───hash
                    hash.web

Simple console program consuming the service:

D:\projects\wcf\WCFService1\WCFService1Client\bin\Debug> WCFService1Client.exe
Enter number: 123
You entered: 123
Enter number: 12355
You entered: 12355
Enter number:

To use external library, we can need to create a bin folder, then drop the .dll into it. In this experiment, I use the dll generated from Robert Greiner’s NumberText.

The folder structure after adding the .dll:

│   Service.svc
│   Web.config
│   Web.Debug.config
│
├───App_Code
│       IService.cs
│       Service.cs
│
├───App_Data
└───Bin
        NumberText.dll

I also modified Service.cs to utilize the new library:

// .. SNIP ...
using NumberText;

// NOTE: You can use the "Rename" command on the "Refactor" menu to change the class name "Service" in code, svc and config file together.
public class Service : IService
{
	public string GetData(int value)
	{
		return string.Format("You entered: {0} ( {1} ).", value, value.ToText());
		 
	}
	// .. SNIP ...
}

The result is shown in the client:

D:\projects\wcf\WCFService1\WCFService1Client\bin\Debug> WCFService1Client.exe
Enter number: 19823
You entered: 19823 ( nineteen thousand eight hundred twenty three ).
Enter number: 1982
You entered: 1982 ( one thousand nine hundred eighty two ).
Enter number: 123
You entered: 123 ( one hundred twenty three ).
Enter number: 11
You entered: 11 ( eleven ).

The updated structure of Temporary ASP.NET Files (D:\projects\wcf\WCFService1\WCFService1_Temp):

└───wcfservice
    └───b4011030
        └───a40309e8
            │   App_Code.compiled
            │   App_Code.lvuilxx9.dll
            │   preStartInitList.web
            │   service.svc.cdcab7d2.compiled
            │
            ├───assembly
            │   ├───dl3
            │   │   └───a1784ffb
            │   │       └───24224434_efc1d701
            │   │               NumberText.DLL
            │   │               __AssemblyInfo__.ini
            │   │
            │   ├───temp
            │   └───tmp
            └───hash
                    hash.web

That’s it for today. Next, I will look into WCF Service Application. Cheers!

Incoming Search

.net, c#, wcf