WCF Service Error - DispatchOperation requires Formatter - wcf

I recently started getting an error when browsing one of my WCF services (from IIS) and I have no idea what the root cause is at the moment. Any input would be appreciated as I can't seem to find much (if anything) on the web about it.
I should note that the service is configured no differently than other services I have that are running fine.
The error is:
The DispatchOperation '[service method]' requires Formatter, since DeserializeRequest and SerializeReply are not both false.

Related

Topshelf Windows Service times out Error 7000 7009

I have a windows service programmed in vb.NET, using Topshelf as Service Host.
Once in a while the service doesn't start. On the event log, the SCM writes errors 7000 and 7009 (service did not respond in a timely fashion). I know this is a common issue, but I (think) I have tried everything with no result.
The service only relies in WMI, and has no time-consuming operations.
I read this question (Error 1053: the service did not respond to the start or control request in a timely fashion), but none of the answers worked for me.
I Tried:
Set topshelf's start timeout.
Request additional time in the first line of "OnStart" method.
Set a periodic timer wich request additional time to the SCM.
Remove TopShelf and make the service with the Visual Studio Service Template.
Move the initialization code and "OnStart" code to a new thread to return inmediately.
Build in RELEASE mode.
Set GeneratePublisherEvidence = false in the app.config file (per application).
Unchecked "Check for publisher’s certificate revocation" in the internet settings (per machine).
Deleted all Alternate Streams (in case some dll was marked as web and blocked).
Removed any "Debug code"
Increased Window's general service timeout to 120000ms.
Also:
The service doesn't try to communicate with the user's desktop in any way.
The UAC is disabled.
The Service Runs on LOCAL SYSTEM ACCOUNT.
I believe that the code of the service itself is not the problem because:
It has been on production for over two years.
Usually the service starts fine.
There is no exception logged in the Event Log.
The "On Error" options for the service dosn't get called (since the service doesn't actually fails, just doesn't respond to the SCM)
I've commented out almost everything on it, pursuing this error! ;-)
Any help is welcome since i'm completely out of ideas, and i've been strugling with this for over 15 days...
For me the 7009 error was produced by my NET core app because I was using this construct:
var builder = new ConfigurationBuilder()
.SetBasePath(Directory.GetCurrentDirectory())
.AddJsonFile("appsettings.json");
and appsettings.json file obviously couldn't be found in C:\WINDOWS\system32.. anyway, changing it to Path.Combine(AppContext.BaseDirectory, "appsettings.json") solved the issue.
More general help - for Topshelf you can add custom exception handling where I finally found some meaningfull error info, unlike event viewer:
HostFactory.Run(x => {
...
x.OnException(e =>
{
using (var fs = new StreamWriter(#"C:\log.txt"))
{
fs.WriteLine(e.ToString());
}
});
});
I've hit the 7000 and 7009 issue, which fails straight away (even though the error message says A timeout was reached (30000 milliseconds)) because of misconfiguration between TopShelf and what the service gets installed as.
The bottom line - what you pass in HostConfigurator.SetServiceName(name) needs to match exactly the SERVICE_NAME of the Windows service which gets installed.
If they don't match it'll fail straight away and you get the two event log messages.
I had this start happening to a service after Windows Creator's Edition update installed. Basically it made the whole computer slower, which is what I think triggered the problem. Even one of the Windows services had a timeout issue.
What I learned online is that the constructor for the service needs to be fast, but OnStart has more leeway with the SCM. My service had a C# wrapper and it included an InitializeComponent() that was called in the constructor. I moved that call to OnStart and the problem went away.

WCF message: protocol in To element changes

I have a WCF service to consume in .NET. As per requirement the Action element in the header has to be "http://abc" and the To element has to be "ws://xyz" in order for the service to recognize and respond to the request. The soapAction of the operation is however blank in WSDL and it can't be changed.
My service configuration built programmatically is this:
text message encoding binding with Soap11 envelope version and WSAddressing10 addressing version
no security biding
http transport binding
The setup I found achieving this requirement is "ws://xyz" as the endpoint URL and Request.Headers.Action set to "http://abc" in BeforeSendRequest using a message inspector added using an endpoint behaviour attached to the endpoint. Then I also attach a ClientViaBehavior with the URL of "http://abc".
On my development machine this causes as required
<a:Action>http://abc</a:Action>
<a:To>ws://xyz</a:To>
However on the test server it generates
<a:Action>http://abc</a:Action>
<a:To>http://xyz</a:To>
I don't know exact configuration of the server but I believe it is Windows server as is my development box. Does the same code generates different messages on two different machines or how else would I achieve this? I should also say it worked fine for several weeks and stopped last Monday.
I have found the following later:
The test server has .NET 4.5 on it as well as another machine I tried it on (also failed). The dev machine where it works fine has just .NET 4.0 on it which would suggest it could have something to do with it. However I have no evidence it is caused by .NET 4.5 as it was installed several weeks before the problem appeared. Moreover there have been no Windows updates since it stopped to work!
I've also tried to set the To element in my ClientMessageInspector implementation but the protocol still gets flipped to http.
I think the BeforeSendRequest is not called due miss configration of your service bindings. Check if you have added the the extention configuration to you service endpoints you want to have the behavior.

WCF wsdualhttpbinding strange behaviour at client side that has no clear (Exception details)

to make long story as short as possible, I made a duplex WCF service, using wsdualhttpbinding, tested it on my local machine using Visual Stuido and using IIS7, thigs are working fine (i had to use windows authentication on IIS7 to make it work thu). Any way, I published the duplex service on my company network (LAN network, windows domain, IIS 6) which i used to for many WCF services (basic and ws http bindings and worked fine) and the problem is I can not get the service to work, I tried all possible configurations to the app.config and to the web.config files, still i can not make it work.. The problem is when the client start calling the duplex service It hangs and no error message or whatsoever, and after few minutes it gives me a timeout error.. there is no error at server side ( i have checked the even viewer). There is not error about port 80 or access privileges. Is there anything i am missing? anything i should take care of and i forgot? i have been awake for 20 hours trying to find a solution because i have a time line to follow or my boss will Dispose() Me..
i have tried the following:
1- I set the IsOneWay = true..
2- I run the program as admin.
3- I i set the base address to another port.. same result..
4- I used windows auth, none... same result..
5- i have tried another machine to test the client.. same result.. it hangs with no reponse.
6- I also tried running the client on windows vista, 7 and xp... same result..
7- I have played with all kind of configurations in config files and i made sure its the same on both files (app.config and web.config)..
8- I have added a static constructor in the service side to see if the service was ever reached by the client, i added few lines to add a value in the db.. and nothing was written to db.. so it was never reached..
9- Yes, when i access the service SVC page i see the page and it worked fine.. I could access the metadata as well..
10- restarting the server, restarting IIS server, Recycling AppPool...etc..
I tried all of that and many other solutions and tricks.. same result when the app is on IIS.. the strange thing is, there is no error at server side.. and i only get TimeOut error (if i get it).. While If i tried the service on the IIS installed locally it works fine.. change the config file to point to the company IIS server,,, no luck!
Is there anything i am missing??? could be something simple but i just missed it..

WebReference vs ServiceReference

I have to following problem. In my application I used a service reference to a non-WCF service from some external company. I created a proxy class using svcutil.exe tool. Everything worked fine for about a year.
Yesterday however, clients reported that it's not possible to get any response from the service. I figured out that the error returned from the service was:
The formatter threw an exception while
trying to deserialize the message:
There was an error while trying to
deserialize parameter
http://serviceurl:someResponse. The
InnerException message was 'There was
an error deserializing the object of
type specificType
So, what I did I firstly updated the service reference and also generated the new proxy using svcutil.exe. The problem still occurs.
I resolve the problem by using either 1) wsdl.exe tool to generate proxy class 2) add web reference (which behind the scenes using wsdl.exe tool internally to create proxy).
My question is : Why everything worked fine for a quite long time even if I used a service reference? How can I checked whether has something changed in the web service? Any help would be appreciated.
Contact the company that provides the web service and find out what changed.

AddressFilter mismatch at the EndpointDispatcher

I have a WCF Web application that uses a WCF Class Library.
My project is a WCF Web project and I am self-hosting.
My problem is that all my web service methods hang with:
And "Unable to automatically step into the server...etc".
The error (not very helpful) returned is:
The operation has timed out
When I invoke the same method(s) using the WCF Test Client
I get the correct response and everything goes smoothly.
So, something must be wrong with my web application.
Following up on a similar post, I used the Service Trace Viewer.
I am getting the error:
The message with To
'http://localhost:8731/Design_Time_Addresses/Authentication/mex/mex'
cannot be processed at the receiver, due to an AddressFilter mismatch at the
EndpointDispatcher. Check that the sender and receiver's EndpointAddresses
agree.
After reading a related post, I tried adding:
[ServiceBehavior(AddressFilterMode=AddressFilterMode.Any)]
And recompiling my class library and updating my services to no avail... still hangs.
I have tried adding both my web service and my web project as startup projects but
I am still unable to step into the code. I also have all the appropriate DEBUG attributes
set in Web.config and App.config.
Any suggestions out there?
From my experience the mex/mex error occurs when I update a service reference in Visual Studio. I have come to the conclusion that this is just part of how Visual Studio figures out how to update the web service rere
Without knowing what your configuration looks like, it's hard to say what's wrong. However, why does your URL have /mex twice in it? Are you sure that's right?