I've read about configuring IHttpContextAccessor as services.AddSingleton scope, but I also read about it is working "async local", and I am also aware of the sophisticated working of async in ASP.Net, I mean for example if a controller action method is async, and it await for an async call, then it may continue with an other thread, but magically some thread bound things with maintained (like HttpContext)
My concrete use case: I have to inject a MyConverter class to my EF Core DbContext which uses it in OnModelCreating. However this model is cached by the DbContext, so any subsequent request, even it will have a brand new instance of DbContext will use this very same model so the very same MyConverter instance. (even it has configured services.AddTransient). This MyConverter has a constructor and an injected IHttpContextAccessor, so based on the very similar reasons, it effectively will be also a singleton for all DbContext/MyConverter usages.
Question
This particular HttpContextAccessor instance which is created in the very first request will serve all the subsequent requests in the Web app lifecycle. Will it work correctly? Is there any (concurrency) trap here?
(Do I suppose correctly that it does not really matter if we use a single or multiple HttpContextAccessor instances, because its implementation of getting HttpContext will use the correct way including async local thread switch traps etc to return with the correct HttpContext?)
Short answer: register as services.AddHttpContextAccessor() and then you can inject IHttpContextAccessor wherever you want and it'll work as long as you're using it in the request's execution context. For instance you can't read HTTP request headers for code that was not initiated by a HTTP request.
You're right that the IHttpContextAccessor should be registered as a singleton. Instead of doing it yourself, the recommendation is to use AddHttpContextAccessor() extension method. See source code here. It internally registers an HttpContextAccessor as a singleton.
The code for HttpContextAccessor can be found here, which I'm also pasting below:
public class HttpContextAccessor : IHttpContextAccessor
{
private static AsyncLocal<HttpContextHolder> _httpContextCurrent = new AsyncLocal<HttpContextHolder>();
public HttpContext HttpContext
{
get
{
return _httpContextCurrent.Value?.Context;
}
set
{
var holder = _httpContextCurrent.Value;
if (holder != null)
{
// Clear current HttpContext trapped in the AsyncLocals, as its done.
holder.Context = null;
}
if (value != null)
{
// Use an object indirection to hold the HttpContext in the AsyncLocal,
// so it can be cleared in all ExecutionContexts when its cleared.
_httpContextCurrent.Value = new HttpContextHolder { Context = value };
}
}
}
private class HttpContextHolder
{
public HttpContext Context;
}
}
Since the HttpContext getter property returns from an async local field, you always get the HttpContext local to the execution context.
The HttpContext field is set in HttpContextFactory.Create() only if IHttpContextAccessor was registered with the DI. Source.
And HttpContextFactory.Create() is invoked from [HostingApplication](https://github.com/aspnet/AspNetCore/blob/v2.2.5/src/Hosting/Hosting/src/Internal/HostingApplication.cs) where the context is setup.
I have a WebAPI service using SimpleInjector. I have this set up using AsyncScopedLifestyle for my scoped dependencies, and one of these dependencies is my Entity Framework DataContext. Many things in my service depend on the DataContext, and it is generally injected in to my MediatR handlers using constructor injection - this works well. Separately I have a few areas where I need to create an instance of an object given its type (as a string), so I have created a custom activator class (ResolvingActivator) that is configured with a reference to Container.GetInstance(Type):
In my container bootstrap code:
ResolvingActivator.Configure(container.GetInstance);
I can then create objects by using methods such as:
ResolvingActivator.CreateInstance<T>(typeName)
When I'm using WebAPI, the above is working perfectly.
A further part of the project is a legacy API that uses WCF. I have implemented this as a translation layer, where I translate old message formats to new message formats and then dispatch the messages to the Mediator; I then translate the responses (in new format) back to old format and return those to the caller. Because I need access to the Mediator in my WCF services, I'm injecting this in their constructors, and using the SimpleInjector.Integration.Wcf package to let SimpleInjector's supplied SimpleInjectorServiceHostFactory build instances of the services. I've also created a hybrid lifestyle, so I can use the same container for my both my WebAPI and WCF services:
container.Options.DefaultScopedLifestyle = Lifestyle.CreateHybrid(
new AsyncScopedLifestyle(),
new WcfOperationLifestyle());
This works well for some calls, but when a call ultimately calls my ResolvingActivator class, I get an ActivationException thrown, with the following message:
The DataContext is registered as 'Hybrid Async Scoped / WCF Operation' lifestyle, but the instance is requested outside the context of an active (Hybrid Async Scoped / WCF Operation) scope.
As I only receive this error when making WCF calls, I'm wondering if I have something wrong in my configuration. In a nutshell, this will work:
public class SomeClass
{
private readonly DataContext db;
public SomeClass(DataContext db)
{
this.db = db;
}
public bool SomeMethod() => this.db.Table.Any();
}
But this will not:
public class SomeClass
{
public bool SomeMethod()
{
// Code behind is calling container.GetInstance(typeof(DataContext))
var db = ResolvingActivator.CreateInstance<DataContext>();
return db.Table.Any();
}
}
Any ideas where I'm going wrong?
Edit: here is the stack trace from the ActivationException:
at SimpleInjector.Scope.GetScopelessInstance[TImplementation](ScopedRegistration`1 registration)
at SimpleInjector.Scope.GetInstance[TImplementation](ScopedRegistration`1 registration, Scope scope)
at SimpleInjector.Advanced.Internal.LazyScopedRegistration`1.GetInstance(Scope scope)
at lambda_method(Closure )
at SimpleInjector.InstanceProducer.GetInstance()
at SimpleInjector.Container.GetInstance(Type serviceType)
at Service.Core.ResolvingActivator.CreateInstance(Type type) in Service.Core\ResolvingActivator.cs:line 43
at Service.Core.ResolvingActivator.CreateInstance(String typeName) in Service.Core\ResolvingActivator.cs:line 35
at Service.Core.ResolvingActivator.CreateInstance[TService](String typeName) in Service.Core\ResolvingActivator.cs:line 69
With a full stack trace here: https://pastebin.com/0WkyHGKv
After close inspection of the stack trace, I can conclude what's going on: async.
The WcfOperationLifestyle under the covers depends on WCF's OperationContext.Current property, but this property has a thread-affinity and doesn't flow with async operations. This is something that has to be fixed in the integration library for Simple Injector; it simply doesn't support async at the moment.
Instead, wrap a decorator around your handlers that start and end a new async scope. This prevents you from having to use the WcfOperationLifestyle all together. Take a look at the ThreadScopedCommandHandlerProxy<T> implementation here to get an idea how to do this (but use AsyncScopedLifestyle instead).
How to access velocity context object in methodexception method in MethodExceptionEventHandler class?
You just have to make your handler implement the org.apache.velocity.util.ContextAware interface and implement its single method:
public void setContext( Context context );
which will be called prior to each invocation of the handler.
Do I HAVE to explicitly dispose of a db connection object using a dispose() method in my controller?
As the base Controller class already implements the IDisposable interface do I need to put a dispose() in my controller?
Or will the garbage collector do this for me anyway...what's the point if this is the case?
Use using statements
using(var connection = new SqlConnection())
{
...
}
It is equivalent to:
try
{
var connection = new SqlConnection()
...
}
finally
{
connection.Dispose()
}
Yes you should close it by using a "using" statement like Selman22 showed. The problem with waiting for the garbage collector to dispose of your connection after it falls out of scope is the garbage collector will only dispose of the connection when your application needs the memory. The garbage collector does not constantly clean up objects as they fall out of scope. If your application is not using a lot of memory, it could potentially be a while before that connection is closed.
I am researching Prism v2 by going thru the quickstarts. And I have created a WCF service with the following signature:
namespace HelloWorld.Silverlight.Web
{
[ServiceContract(Namespace = "http://helloworld.org/messaging")]
[AspNetCompatibilityRequirements(RequirementsMode =
AspNetCompatibilityRequirementsMode.Allowed)]
public class HelloWorldMessageService
{
private string message = "Hello from WCF";
[OperationContract]
public void UpdateMessage(string message)
{
this.message = message;
}
[OperationContract]
public string GetMessage()
{
return message;
}
}
}
When I add a service reference to this service in my silverlight project it generates an interface and a class:
[System.ServiceModel.ServiceContractAttribute
(Namespace="http://helloworld.org/messaging",
ConfigurationName="Web.Services.HelloWorldMessageService")]
public interface HelloWorldMessageService {
[System.ServiceModel.OperationContractAttribute
(AsyncPattern=true,
Action="http://helloworld.org/messaging/HelloWorldMessageService/UpdateMessage",
ReplyAction="http://helloworld.org/messaging/HelloWorldMessageService/UpdateMessageResponse")]
System.IAsyncResult BeginUpdateMessage(string message, System.AsyncCallback callback, object asyncState);
void EndUpdateMessage(System.IAsyncResult result);
[System.ServiceModel.OperationContractAttribute(AsyncPattern=true, Action="http://helloworld.org/messaging/HelloWorldMessageService/GetMessage", ReplyAction="http://helloworld.org/messaging/HelloWorldMessageService/GetMessageResponse")]
System.IAsyncResult BeginGetMessage(System.AsyncCallback callback, object asyncState);
string EndGetMessage(System.IAsyncResult result);
}
public partial class HelloWorldMessageServiceClient : System.ServiceModel.ClientBase<HelloWorld.Core.Web.Services.HelloWorldMessageService>, HelloWorld.Core.Web.Services.HelloWorldMessageService {
{
// implementation
}
I'm trying to decouple my application by passing around the interface instead of the concrete class. But I'm having difficulty finding examples of how to do this. When I try and call EndGetMessage and then update my UI I get an exception about updating the UI on the wrong thread. How can I update the UI from a background thread?
I tried but I get UnauthorizedAccessException : Invalid cross-thread access.
string messageresult = _service.EndGetMessage(result);
Application.Current.RootVisual.Dispatcher.BeginInvoke(() => this.Message = messageresult );
The exception is thrown by Application.Current.RootVisual.
Here is something I like doing... The service proxy is generated with an interface
HelloWorldClient : IHelloWorld
But the problem is that IHelloWorld does not include the Async versions of the method. So, I create an async interface:
public interface IHelloWorldAsync : IHelloWorld
{
void HelloWorldAsync(...);
event System.EventHandler<HelloWorldEventRgs> HelloWorldCompleted;
}
Then, you can tell the service proxy to implement the interface via partial:
public partial class HelloWorldClient : IHelloWorldAsync {}
Because the HelloWorldClient does, indeed, implement those async methods, this works.
Then, I can just use IHelloWorldAsync everywhere and tell the UnityContainer to use HelloWorldClient for IHelloWorldAsync interfaces.
Ok, I have been messing with this all day and the solution is really much more simple than that. I originally wanted to call the methods on the interface instead of the concreate class. The interface generated by proxy class generator only includes the BeginXXX and EndXXX methods and I was getting an exception when I called EndXXX.
Well, I just finished reading up on System.Threading.Dispatcher and I finally understand how to use it. Dispatcher is a member of any class that inherits from DispatcherObject, which the UI elements do. The Dispatcher operates on the UI thread, which for most WPF applications there is only 1 UI thread. There are exceptions, but I believe you have to do this explicitly so you'll know if you're doing it. Otherwise, you've only got a single UI thread. So it is safe to store a reference to a Dispatcher for use in non-UI classes.
In my case I'm using Prism and my Presenter needs to update the UI (not directly, but it is firing IPropertyChanged.PropertyChanged events). So what I have done is in my Bootstrapper when I set the shell to Application.Current.RootVisual I also store a reference to the Dispatcher like this:
public class Bootstrapper : UnityBootstrapper
{
protected override IModuleCatalog GetModuleCatalog()
{
// setup module catalog
}
protected override DependencyObject CreateShell()
{
// calling Resolve instead of directly initing allows use of dependency injection
Shell shell = Container.Resolve<Shell>();
Application.Current.RootVisual = shell;
Container.RegisterInstance<Dispatcher>(shell.Dispatcher);
return shell;
}
}
Then my presenter has a ctor which accepts IUnityContainer as an argument (using DI) then I can do the following:
_service.BeginGetMessage(new AsyncCallback(GetMessageAsyncComplete), null);
private void GetMessageAsyncComplete(IAsyncResult result)
{
string output = _service.EndGetMessage(result);
Dispatcher dispatcher = _container.Resolve<Dispatcher>();
dispatcher.BeginInvoke(() => this.Message = output);
}
This is sooooo much simpler. I just didn't understand it before.
Ok, so my real problem was how to decouple my dependency upon the proxy class created by my service reference. I was trying to do that by using the interface generated along with the proxy class. Which could have worked fine, but then I would have also had to reference the project which owned the service reference and so it wouldn't be truly decoupled. So here's what I ended up doing. It's a bit of a hack, but it seems to be working, so far.
First here's my interface definition and an adapter class for the custom event handler args generated with my proxy:
using System.ComponentModel;
namespace HelloWorld.Interfaces.Services
{
public class GetMessageCompletedEventArgsAdapter : System.ComponentModel.AsyncCompletedEventArgs
{
private object[] results;
public GetMessageCompletedEventArgsAdapter(object[] results, System.Exception exception, bool cancelled, object userState) :
base(exception, cancelled, userState)
{
this.results = results;
}
public string Result
{
get
{
base.RaiseExceptionIfNecessary();
return ((string)(this.results[0]));
}
}
}
/// <summary>
/// Create a partial class file for the service reference (reference.cs) that assigns
/// this interface to the class - then you can use this reference instead of the
/// one that isn't working
/// </summary>
public interface IMessageServiceClient
{
event System.EventHandler<GetMessageCompletedEventArgsAdapter> GetMessageCompleted;
event System.EventHandler<AsyncCompletedEventArgs> UpdateMessageCompleted;
void GetMessageAsync();
void GetMessageAsync(object userState);
void UpdateMessageAsync(string message);
void UpdateMessageAsync(string message, object userState);
}
}
Then I just needed to create a partial class which extends the proxy class generated by the service reference:
using System;
using HelloWorld.Interfaces.Services;
using System.Collections.Generic;
namespace HelloWorld.Core.Web.Services
{
public partial class HelloWorldMessageServiceClient : IMessageServiceClient
{
#region IMessageServiceClient Members
private event EventHandler<GetMessageCompletedEventArgsAdapter> handler;
private Dictionary<EventHandler<GetMessageCompletedEventArgsAdapter>, EventHandler<GetMessageCompletedEventArgs>> handlerDictionary
= new Dictionary<EventHandler<GetMessageCompletedEventArgsAdapter>, EventHandler<GetMessageCompletedEventArgs>>();
/// <remarks>
/// This is an adapter event which allows us to apply the IMessageServiceClient
/// interface to our MessageServiceClient. This way we can decouple our modules
/// from the implementation
/// </remarks>
event EventHandler<GetMessageCompletedEventArgsAdapter> IMessageServiceClient.GetMessageCompleted
{
add
{
handler += value;
EventHandler<GetMessageCompletedEventArgs> linkedhandler = new EventHandler<GetMessageCompletedEventArgs>(HelloWorldMessageServiceClient_GetMessageCompleted);
this.GetMessageCompleted += linkedhandler;
handlerDictionary.Add(value, linkedhandler);
}
remove
{
handler -= value;
EventHandler<GetMessageCompletedEventArgs> linkedhandler = handlerDictionary[value];
this.GetMessageCompleted -= linkedhandler;
handlerDictionary.Remove(value);
}
}
void HelloWorldMessageServiceClient_GetMessageCompleted(object sender, GetMessageCompletedEventArgs e)
{
if (this.handler == null)
return;
this.handler(sender, new GetMessageCompletedEventArgsAdapter(new object[] { e.Result }, e.Error, e.Cancelled, e.UserState));
}
#endregion
}
}
This is an explicit implementation of the event handler so I can chain together the events. When user registers for my adapter event, I register for the actual event fired. When the event fires I fire my adapter event. So far this "Works On My Machine".
Passing around the interface (once you have instantiated the client) should be as simply as using HelloWorldMessageService instead of the HelloWorldMessageServiceClient class.
In order to update the UI you need to use the Dispatcher object. This lets you provide a delegate that is invoked in the context of the UI thread. See this blog post for some details.
You can make this much simpler still.
The reason the proxy works and your copy of the contract does not is because WCF generates the proxy with code that "Posts" the callback back on the calling thread rather than making the callback on the thread that is executing when the service call returns.
A much simplified, untested, partial implementation to give you the idea of how WCF proxies work looks something like:
{
var state = new
{
CallingThread = SynchronizationContext.Current,
Callback = yourCallback
EndYourMethod = // assign delegate
};
yourService.BeginYourMethod(yourParams, WcfCallback, state);
}
private void WcfCallback(IAsyncResult asyncResult)
{
// Read the result object data to get state
// Call EndYourMethod and block until the finished
state.Context.Post(state.YourCallback, endYourMethodResultValue);
}
The key is the storing of the syncronizationContext and calling the Post method. This will get the callback to occur on the same thread as Begin was called on. It will always work without involving the Dispatcher object provided you call Begin from your UI thread. If you don't then you are back to square one with using the Dispatcher, but the same problem will occur with a WCF proxy.
This link does a good job of explaining how to do this manually:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd744834(VS.95).aspx
Just revisiting old posts left unanswered where I finally found an answer. Here's a post I recently wrote that goes into detail about how I finally handled all this:
http://www.developmentalmadness.com/archive/2009/11/04/mvvm-with-prism-101-ndash-part-6-commands.aspx