Is it possible to autogenerate an API with Microsoft Azure? - api

I would like to host a Database and an API-Backend within Azure. But I want to do that without implementing code because I just want to run typical read/write actions.
Is it possible to generate an API for an existent Azure SQL Database? All "Creating API"-Examples I find in the Azure Documentation use ASP.Net or NodeJS. So is autogeneration possible with Azure?

As far as I am aware, there is no functionality to automatically provide an API interface over Sql Azure. The REST api that Azure provides is to manage the database, not to access that data.
You can use an Azure web-app to host your WebAPI auto-generated code. In Visual Studio, you can use Entity Framework database first approach to generate the API trivially. You will need to compile and publish it to a web app to get your API going.
You can find a pretty exhaustive tutorial at
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-in/documentation/articles/web-sites-dotnet-rest-service-aspnet-api-sql-database/
(skip the MVC section altogether and just use WebAPI and EF)

Related

Using .Net Core Identity and OIDC with Multiple .Net Core Web API

I need to build an application where the front-end (ReactJs) is totally decoupled from the back-end, which is built using Asp.Net Core v5 (or higher) Web API.
Users will log in to the application using both OIDC with Azure Active Directory and local database login.
For performance reasons, I'd like to split some APIs into different projects and eventually install them on different servers.
I'm wondering if the [authorize] attribute I will put on the endpoints will work as usual even if they are running in different environments.
Please note that they could be different servers or different AWS Lambda functions, but in both cases, they can be considered different executables.
Is it something possible or I'm going in the wrong direction?
Please note that they could be different servers or different AWS
Lambda functions, but in both cases, they can be considered different
executables.
Is it something possible or I'm going in the wrong direction?
Thank you # Camilo Terevinto, Posting your suggestion as an answer to help other community members .
"It's completely possible (and common), as long as all APIs (and possibly Lambdas, depending on how they're used) authenticate against the same Azure Active Directory instance.
And we can set up ASP. NET Core Identity with both local login and AAD without any issues . Just ensure that our tokens always have the necessary scopes (to call other APIs in our system)"
For more information please refer the below links:
SO THREAD : How to use both Azure AD authentication and Identity on ASP.NET Core
Blog: Token Based Authentication using ASP. NET Web API 2, Owin, and Identity

Azure Functions - ASP.NET Webforms app deployment

I can't find an example code for publishing ASP.NET Webforms websites to Azure Functions. Months ago I tried to replicate the C# example but I ended up with only being able to use the precompiled batch function type.
I want to publish VB.NET web apps - any framework version, using Web Deploy...
Here are some important concepts you should know about Azure Web App and Azure Function:
Azure Web App:
Azure Web App is a sand box. The only way an Azure web app can be accessed via the internet is through the only two already-exposed HTTP (80) and HTTPS (443) TCP ports.
For Nodejs App deployed to Azure, Azure will create a named pipe for your server to listen, and pass the request from 443 port(as you use https) to the named pipe.
Azure Function:
Azure Functions is a solution for easily running small pieces of code, or "functions," in the cloud. You can write just the code you need for the problem at hand, without worrying about a whole application or the infrastructure to run it. Functions can make development even more productive, and you can use your development language of choice, such as C#, F#, Node.js, Python or PHP. Pay only for the time your code runs and trust Azure to scale as needed. Azure Functions lets you develop serverless applications on Microsoft Azure.
Api apps and Web apps are pretty much the same deal. Logic Apps and Functions are the same in a sense that they allow you to do something as a response to event or on a schedule, but Functions are a way to run code (or existing app) and Logic Apps are more like a workflow constructor, where you take existing actions and chain them (so no coding, or almost no)
Deploy:
Use ftp to deploy your web form to Azure Function. There will be no problems with the deployment, but the webpage will not display.
Note:
Although Azure Function and Azure Web App are very similar in many cases. But if you choose to deploy web form app, you will still find differences. Even if you can deploy your project to Azure Web App, it won’t display any webpages.

Azure WebApi vs Azure Mobile Service vs

I've programmed a lot in asp.net mvc web applications. Now I want to write cross-platform mobile applications with cordova for the frontend and azure for the backend.
I am in doubt whether to use azure mobile services or WebAPI, because I want the power and freedom of WebAPI, but the convenience of azure mobile services. I do not understand concepts such as authentication, push notifications, etc.
My main goal is to focus on the application logic, frontend and backend with a significant weight of that logic in the backend. For this I have great doubts.
1st. I see both good mechanisms in AMS and WebAPI for external authentication, but not to manage your own authentication. What is the best way to manage your own authentication? Is Azure Active Directory solution?
2nd My intention is to create a well-defined API methods that return the exact data (json), rather than a rest api queryable (odata).
Wich is te best for this, WebAPI or AMS?
3rd I have experience with SQL Server, its relationships and Entity framework, but I do not care to learn and use NoSQL technologies, which is better? (However, I'm not comfortable with I can not use many to many relationships in NoSql).
Thank you very much.
there is not a real general answer for that, so take these as advices.
At first, keep in mind that AMS and WebApi are not so far. An AMS project IS a WebApi project with some helpers inside to make you comfortable working with related services (push notification, table entities), but you will lose a bit of control on your application.
The choice depends on your needs
Azure Active Directory IS a solution, but there are a lot more. You can use your preferred framework. AMS has got a pretty integrated login with most known social network and azure active directory as well, and is very easy to set up.
I'd suggest AMS. It will be easier to setup and mantain.
AMS is just WebApi castrated. To get all these services easier for you, you cannot for example
Customize startup of your application
Use a dependency injection framework
Run background tasks
And other stuff like that.
Hope it helps!

Windows Azure - sql database with api

I have SOAP services with data. I want to download all data from that service and upload it to my own server and then use these data from my server (don't worry I have permission for that). I want to do it because now I don't have function from that service which I need.
I want to use Windows Azure for this and I think SQL Database scenario would be best. Now I have classes for previous SOAP service so I think EF Code first would help me with creating database and I upload data somehow. But what about API? How can I access my data from windows phone or tablet? Is azure database enought or I must create more? Is there any good article for that?
I think what you are saying, is that you are aggregating data from several sources and storing the information in your own database. And, you would like your database to be Azure Database. Then, you want to build an API to expose the data you retrieved.
If this is indeed your goal, then yes, Azure will do everything you need. I'd recommend checking out Web API in conjunction with your Azure deployment. I've used this scheme with some success over the past year.
Warning: You should know that Azure Database does not have an SLA which means that Microsoft does not guarantee any level of performance including transactions/second. This means that if your API has a high load, you could end up getting throttled heavily in an unpredictable way. I've been bitten by this before and ended up moving my data to Azure Table Storage instead.
Windows Azure gives you a few options to expose an API to your mobile clients:
You could build an API yourself with the ASP.NET Web API (and use SQL Azure as backend): Mobile-friendly REST service using ASP.NET Web API and SQL Database
You can use Windows Azure Mobile Services, this does all the heavy lifting of building a backend for you

Auto-generate an API Explorer for WCF services

If you have ever used the Flickr API, you'll be familiar with their API Explorer. It is an awesome tool, that allows you to view the documentation for each API method, and the killer feature, being the execution of that API method (with a form to populate any request parameters). It even picks up when you are logged in, and completes the authentication part on your behalf. Gowalla has a similar API Explorer that is also really good.
Are there are tools for WCF that will auto-generate such an API Explorer, free or commercial?
Currently, we use Fiddler to build the JSON requests, but I would like to publish these service contracts, and allow potential developers to play around with them via a web based API explorer.
I am aware of the WCF Web HTTP Service Help Page, which I am using (and is awesome), but it is the API Explorer part that I am interested in.
You may want to look at I/O Docs - an open-sourced interactive documentation system for RESTful web APIs that any API owner can use to deploy for their own documentation. It runs on Node.js and uses Redis as a data store.
https://github.com/mashery/iodocs
Example: developer.klout.com/iodocs, developer.rottentomatoes.com/iodocs
It uses JSON schema based files to define API endpoints, method and parameters. Based on these JSON files, it generates a client interface that developers can use to learn and explore your API. API calls can be executed directly from the documentation interface, producing formatted responses.
It's Open-sourced, so you can be assured of regular updates and improvements. In fact this past weekend, Brandon West from SendGrid (who use I/O docs to power their documentation), created and open sourced the UI to create/edit the JSON schema files for I/O Docs. So you don't have to manually create the JSON files anymore.
https://github.com/brandonmwest/iodoctor
Not exactly what you were looking for, but....
WCF provides something called the WCF Test Client, for this purpose.
If you install Visual Studio, you get it. For example, for VS2008, installed in the usual place, you can find the WCF Test Client (WcfTestClient.exe) in the following location:
C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 9.0\Common7\IDE\
Take a look at Apigee: http://apigee.com/