WCF EF return as list - vb.net

Question

Hi I got the error when return EF as the list. Here are my codes.
WCF
Public Function GetMerchantList() As List(Of Merchant) Implements IMerchant.GetMerchantList
Dim ws As New aMerchantService.MerchantServiceClient
Dim General As New General
Dim kWSUrl As String = ""
Dim endpointAddress = ws.Endpoint.Address
Dim newEndpointAddress As New EndpointAddressBuilder(endpointAddress)
kWSUrl = General.ConvertWsURL("App")
newEndpointAddress.Uri = New Uri(kWSUrl & "MerchantService.svc")
ws = New aMerchantService.MerchantServiceClient("BasicHttpBinding_IMerchantService", newEndpointAddress.ToEndpointAddress())
Dim Data = ws.GetMerchantList()
Return Data
End Function
Merchant Class
Public Function GetMerchantList() As List(Of Merchant)
Dim Db As New TTMSEntities
Dim Data = (From p In Db.TT_MERCHANT Join r In Db.TT_BRANCH_SETTING On _
p.MERCHANT_BRANCH_INTERNAL_NUM Equals r.INTERNAL_NUM _
Select New Merchant With {.MerchantID = p.MERCHANT_ID,
.MerchantName = p.DESCRIPTION,
.BranchID = r.INTERNAL_NUM,
.BranchName = r.BRANCH_DESC})
If Data IsNot Nothing Then
Return Data.ToList
Else
Return Nothing
End If
End Function
The error is Error Value of type '1-dimensional array of
TTMS.App.WebSites.Data.Merchant' cannot be converted to
'System.Collections.Generic.List(Of TTMS.Web.WebSites.WCF.Merchant)'.
Please help. Thanks

Answer 1

It looks like you're using a service reference. By default, WCF will serialize generic lists as arrays. To override this behavior, when you go to add the service reference, click on the Advanced button at the bottom left corner. This will bring up the Service Reference Settings. Select System.Generics.List for the collection type (the default is System.Array):