I have a WCF application , with multiple WSDL webservices, hosted in IIS7 on Windows Server 2008 64Bit.
The application requires a singleton to be assigned with some configuration values once, when the first webservice method is invoked (no matter what is invoked first).
Edit: The backend of the system requires the use of this singleton approach.
I get the configuration assigned once, but the values become null again....
Here is the code (simplified):
public class SingletonSettings
{
private static readonly SingletonSettings _s;
public SingletonSettings Instance { get {return _s;} }
public object SomeValue { get; set; }
}
public abstract class AbstractWebservice
{
static AbstractWebservice()
{
WebserviceGlobalInitializer.Initialize();
}
}
//Just a webservice
public class Webservice1 : AbstractWebservice, ISomeServiceConctract1
{
public void DoStuff1();
}
//Just a webservice
public class Webservice2 : AbstractWebservice, ISomeServiceConctract2
{
public void DoStuff2();
}
internal class WebserviceGlobalInitializer
{
private static readonly object Lock = new object();
private static bool Initialized = false;
public static void Initialize()
{
lock (Lock)
{
if (!Initialized)
{
InitStuff();
Initialized = true;
}
}
}
private static void InitStuff()
{
string s = SingletonSettings.Instance.SomeValue = "just a ref";
}
}
WebserviceGlobalInitializer.InitStuff() gets invoked only once. Still SingletonSettings.SomeValue becomes null.....
The issue occurs randomly.
I have tried
1) Invoking WebserviceGlobalInitializer.Initialize() from a normal constructor in the base class.
2) Commenting out: Initialized = true; in hope that the settings would then be initialized every time (causing massive overhead, so it would not be a long term solution anyway)
Still the value becomes null.
Any ideas?
With process recycling, all state that is not in session state or application state will disappear into the black hole. This, eye-openingly, includes the static variables, one of which is the singleton instance.
My gut feeling is that the InstanceContextMode of singleton has been implemented as a variable in the ASP.NET Application state. To check this, I will be doing some reflectoring today and will update my answer.
UPDATE
NO IT DOESN'T!!! With process recycling, even if you set the WCF Instancing mode to Single, you lose all state you had with your singleton instance (e.g. counter, whatever) with process recycling.
After a few more days of searching i found the source of the problem. Aliostad's answer gave me a hint.
My webservice uses behavior configurations. One with authentication and one without.
The authentication/session handling is implemented in an IDispatchMessageInspector which is invoked before the webservice is loaded.
The problem occurred when an application that uses my webservice was online when the application pool was recycled. Then application would then a request to a webservice using the authenticated behavior.
The IDispatchMessageInspector implemention would then try to load the settings, but they have not yet been initialized from the static constructor in the webservice....
Thank you for the answers...
You can use the WCF runtime infrastructure to take care of this for you. Try adding the following attribute to the WebService class:
[ServiceBehavior(
ConcurrencyMode = ConcurrencyMode.Multiple,
InstanceContextMode = InstanceContextMode.Single)]
Related
I'm in the process of upgrading a Multitenant dotnet core solution which utilises the Autofac.Multitenant framework. I'm not having a lot of luck getting tenancy resolution working correctly. I've created a simple demonstration of the problem here: https://github.com/SaltyDH/AutofacMultitenancy1
This repo demonstrates registering a InstancePerTenant scoped dependency TestMultitenancyContext which is resolved in the Home Controller. Due to issues with using IHttpContextAccessor, I'm using a custom RequestMiddleware class to capture the current HttpContext object so that I can perform logic on the current HttpContext request object in the MultitenantIdentificationStrategy.
Finally, TestFixture provides a simple xUnit test which, at least on my machine returns "tenant1" for both tenants.
Is there something I've missed here or is this just not currently working?
UPDATE 10/6/2017: We released Autofac.AspNetCore.Multitenant to wrap up the solution to this in a more easy to consume package. I'll leave the original answer/explanation here for posterity, but if you're hitting this you can go grab that package and move on.
I think you're running into a timing issue.
If you pop open the debugger on the HttpContext in the middleware you can see that there's a RequestServicesFeature object on a property called ServiceProvidersFeature. That's what's responsible for creating the per-request scope. The scope gets created the first time it's accessed.
It appears that the order goes roughly like this:
The WebHostBuilder adds a startup filter to enable request services to be added to the pipeline.
The startup filter, AutoRequestServicesStartupFilter, adds middleware to the very beginning of the pipeline to trigger the creation of request services.
The middleware that gets added, RequestServicesContainerMiddleware, basically just invokes the RequestServices property from the ServiceProvidersFeature to trigger creation of the per-request lifetime scope. However, in its constructor is where it gets the IServiceScopeFactory that it uses to create the request scope, which isn't so great because it'll be created from the root container before a tenant can be established.
All that yields a situation where the per-request scope has already been determined to be for the default tenant and you can't really change it.
To work around this, you need to set up request services yourself such that they account for multitenancy.
It sounds worse than it is.
First, we need a reference to the application container. We need the ability to resolve something from application-level services rather than request services. I did that by adding a static property to your Startup class and keeping the container there.
public static IContainer ApplicationContainer { get; private set; }
Next, we're going to change your middleware to look more like the RequestServicesContainerMiddleware. You need to set the HttpContext first so your tenant ID strategy works. After that, you can get an IServiceScopeFactory and follow the same pattern they do in RequestServicesContainerMiddleware.
public class RequestMiddleware
{
private static readonly AsyncLocal<HttpContext> _context = new AsyncLocal<HttpContext>();
private readonly RequestDelegate _next;
public RequestMiddleware(RequestDelegate next)
{
this._next = next;
}
public static HttpContext Context => _context.Value;
public async Task Invoke(HttpContext context)
{
_context.Value = context;
var existingFeature = context.Features.Get<IServiceProvidersFeature>();
using (var feature = new RequestServicesFeature(Startup.ApplicationContainer.Resolve<IServiceScopeFactory>()))
{
try
{
context.Features.Set<IServiceProvidersFeature>(feature);
await this._next.Invoke(context);
}
finally
{
context.Features.Set(existingFeature);
_context.Value = null;
}
}
}
}
Now you need a startup filter to get your middleware in there. You need a startup filter because otherwise the RequestServicesContainerMiddleware will run too early in the pipeline and things will already start resolving from the wrong tenant scope.
public class RequestStartupFilter : IStartupFilter
{
public Action<IApplicationBuilder> Configure(Action<IApplicationBuilder> next)
{
return builder =>
{
builder.UseMiddleware<RequestMiddleware>();
next(builder);
};
}
}
Add the startup filter to the very start of the services collection. You need your startup filter to run before AutoRequestServicesStartupFilter.
The ConfigureServices ends up looking like this:
public IServiceProvider ConfigureServices(IServiceCollection services)
{
services.Insert(0, new ServiceDescriptor(typeof(IStartupFilter), typeof(RequestStartupFilter), ServiceLifetime.Transient));
services.AddMvc();
var builder = new ContainerBuilder();
builder.RegisterType<TestMultitenancyContext>().InstancePerTenant();
builder.Populate(services);
var container = new MultitenantContainer(new MultitenantIdentificationStrategy(), builder.Build());
ApplicationContainer = container;
return new AutofacServiceProvider(container);
}
Note the Insert call in there to jam your service registration at the top, before their startup filter.
The new order of operations will be:
At app startup...
Your startup filter will add your custom request services middleware to the pipeline.
The AutoRequestServicesStartupFilter will add the RequestServicesContainerMiddleware to the pipeline.
During a request...
Your custom request middleware will set up request services based on the inbound request information.
The RequestServicesContainerMiddleware will see that request services are already set up and will do nothing.
When services are resolved, the request service scope will already be the tenant scope as set up by your custom request middleware and the correct thing will show up.
I tested this locally by switching the tenant ID to come from querystring rather than host name (so I didn't have to set up hosts file entries and all that jazz) and I was able to switch tenant by switching querystring parameters.
Now, you may be able to simplify this a bit. For example, you may be able to get away without a startup filter by doing something directly to the web host builder in the Program class. You may be able to register your startup filter right with the ContainerBuilder before calling builder.Populate and skip that Insert call. You may be able to store the IServiceProvider in the Startup class property if you don't like having Autofac spread through the system. You may be able to get away without a static container property if you create the middleware instance and pass the container in as a constructor parameter yourself. Unfortunately, I already spent a loooot of time trying to figure out the workaround so I'm going to have to leave "optimize it" as an exercise for the reader.
Again, sorry this wasn't clear. I've filed an issue on your behalf to get the docs updated and maybe figure out a better way to do this that's a little more straightforward.
I have an alternate solution, related to work I've done on a pending PR on the Autofac DI extension. The solution there can't be used exactly, because it depends on classes that are (rightly) internal. It can be adapted by providing shims that reproduce the functionality in those classes. Since they are compact, this doesn't require the addition of a lot of code. Until the functionality is fixed, this is the solution I'm using.
The other aspect of the solution is to eschew the custom middleware and instead make the ITenantIdentificationStrategy a service that can take any dependency required to do what it needs to.
Fixing the DI
The "DI" side of the problem is that the Autofac DI extension uses resolution to supply IServiceProvider and IServiceScopeFactory implementations. This is possible, because under the hood these are IComponentContext and ILifetimeScope (which are themselves different interfaces for the same thing). In most cases this works fine, but ASP.NET Core proceeds by resolving a singleton IServiceScopeFactory very early in the application cycle. In a multi-tenant scenario this resolution will return the ILifetimeScope for either the first tenant requested, or for the "default" tenant, and that will be the root scope (as far as MS DI is concerned) for the application lifetime. (See the PR for further discussion.)
The classes below implement an alternate behavior: instead of resolving the DI interfaces, it builds (news-up) the initially-requested ones from the IContainer directly. With the initial IServiceScopeFactory based directly on IContainer, further scope requests will resolve correctly.
public class ContainerServiceProvider : IServiceProvider, ISupportRequiredService
{
private readonly IContainer container;
public ContainerServiceProvider(IContainer container)
{
this.container = container;
}
public object GetRequiredService(Type serviceType)
{
if (TryGetContainer(serviceType, out object containerSvc)) return containerSvc;
else return container.Resolve(serviceType);
}
public object GetService(Type serviceType)
{
if (TryGetContainer(serviceType, out object containerSvc)) return containerSvc;
else return container.ResolveOptional(serviceType);
}
bool TryGetContainer(Type serviceType, out object containerSvc)
{
if (serviceType == typeof(IServiceProvider)) { containerSvc = this; return true; }
if (serviceType == typeof(IServiceScopeFactory)) { containerSvc = new ContainerServiceScopeFactory(container); return true; }
else { containerSvc = null; return false; }
}
}
// uses IContainer, but could use copy of AutofacServiceScopeFactory
internal class ContainerServiceScopeFactory : IServiceScopeFactory
{
private IContainer container;
public ContainerServiceScopeFactory(IContainer container)
{
this.container = container;
}
public IServiceScope CreateScope()
{
return new BecauseAutofacsIsInternalServiceScope(container.BeginLifetimeScope());
}
}
// direct copy of AutofacServiceScope
internal class BecauseAutofacsIsInternalServiceScope : IServiceScope
{
private readonly ILifetimeScope _lifetimeScope;
/// <summary>
/// Initializes a new instance of the <see cref="AutofacServiceScope"/> class.
/// </summary>
/// <param name="lifetimeScope">
/// The lifetime scope from which services should be resolved for this service scope.
/// </param>
public BecauseAutofacsIsInternalServiceScope(ILifetimeScope lifetimeScope)
{
this._lifetimeScope = lifetimeScope;
this.ServiceProvider = this._lifetimeScope.Resolve<IServiceProvider>();
}
/// <summary>
/// Gets an <see cref="IServiceProvider" /> corresponding to this service scope.
/// </summary>
/// <value>
/// An <see cref="IServiceProvider" /> that can be used to resolve dependencies from the scope.
/// </value>
public IServiceProvider ServiceProvider { get; }
/// <summary>
/// Disposes of the lifetime scope and resolved disposable services.
/// </summary>
public void Dispose()
{
this._lifetimeScope.Dispose();
}
}
Fixing Identification Strategy
As for making the identification-strategy a service, I would rework your implementation like so:
public class MultitenantIdentificationStrategy : ITenantIdentificationStrategy
{
public const string DefaultTenantId = null;
private readonly IHttpContextAccessor contextaccessor;
public MultitenantTenantIdentificationStrategy(IHttpContextAccessor contextaccessor)
{
this.contextaccessor = contextaccessor;
}
public bool TryIdentifyTenant(out object tenantId)
{
var context = contextaccessor.HttpContext;
// after this is unchanged
.
.
}
.
.
}
Use in Startup.ConfigureServices
This shows the fragment of how these last few pieces are registered and fed to MS DI for ASP.NET.
. . .
builder.RegisterType<MultitenantIdentificationStrategy>().AsImplementedInterfaces(); // tenant identification
// register do Autofac DI integration
builder.Populate(services);
var underlyingcontainer = builder.Build();
ApplicationContainer = new MultitenantContainer(underlyingcontainer.Resolve<ITenantIdentificationStrategy>(), underlyingContainer);
return new ContainerServiceProvider(ApplicationContainer);
If you find this solution workable, please give a thumbs up to DI PR 10--or PR 11, if after reviewing you think that is the better/more elegant solution. Either will save having to add the "shim" code above.
I'm setting a Property on Request.Properties inside a DelegatingHandler after I pluck some data out of a header on an incoming request to a Web API.
This all works fine. I can also access Request.Properties from within the controller as well as in my Action and Exception filters. However, I also need to access this data from outside of the controller (I call a business layer class from the controller). It is data I want to include in some logs in other places,
I can see HttpContext.Current from this class, and I can see the original header from here, so I guess I could pluck it out again, but since I have already done this and put it in the Properties it seems to make more sense to get it from there. However, I don't seem to have access to the Request.Properties from anywhere else.
If this isn't the right way to do this, how else would I pass around this per-request data so that it was accessible from anywhere on the stack in Web API?
I also need to access [Request.Properties] data from outside of the controller (I call a business layer class from the controller). It is data I want to include in some logs in other places... However, I don't seem to have access to the Request.Properties from anywhere else. If this isn't the right way to do this, how else would I pass around this per-request data so that it was accessible from anywhere on the stack in Web API?
You can get it from HttpContext.Current, though it is less than ideal. Keep in mind that if any other non-web applications consume the same business layer, then HttpContext.Current would be null. HttpContext.Current is only non-null when you are running in IIS, and an IIS thread is handling the execution of the request stack. If you ever plan to self-host the web api using OWIN without IIS, there will be no HttpContext.Current.
Personally, if the data really is important enough to be passed into the business layer to be logged, then I would just pass it to the business layer method:
public Task<HttpResponseMessage> SomeAction(SomeModel model) {
... other code
someBusinessLayerObject.SomeMethod(arg1, arg2, Request.Properties["myHeaderKey"]);
}
...If you need other values from Request.Properties, then you can just pass the whole dictionary to the methods that will end up using its values.
A third option if you are using an inversion of control container would be to add some kind of scoped object dependency class and put the data in there. Then constructor inject it into your business layer class:
public interface IHaveRequestData {
IDictionary<string, object> Properties { get; set; }
}
public class RequestData : IHaveRequestData {
public IDictionary<string, object> Properties { get; set; }
}
// ioc registration pseudocode
iocContainer.Register<IHaveRequestData, RequestData>(Lifetime
.WhateverYouNeedSoThatOneOfTheseGetsCreatedForEachWebRequest);
public class SomeController : ApiController {
private readonly IHaveRequestData RequestData;
public SomeController(IHaveRequestData requestData) {
RequestData = requestData;
}
public Task<HttpResponseMessage> SomeAction() {
// you may even be able to do this part in an action filter
RequestData.Properties = Request.Properties;
}
}
public class SomeBusinessLayerComponent {
private readonly IHaveRequestData RequestData;
private readonly ILog Log;
public SomeBusinessLayerComponent(IHaveRequestData requestData, ILog log) {
RequestData = requestData;
Log = log;
}
public Task SomeMethod() {
Log.Info(RequestData["myHeader"]);
}
}
I have a service class injected with Ninject 3.0. I have set it up so it's proxy is a class proxy rather than an interface proxy. The service has 2 methods, a first one returning broad result and a second one calling the first one and filtering it. I added a interceptor to cache the result of the first method.
The interception works fine when I call the first method from outside the service.
The problem is that when the interceptor invokes the second method, it invokes it through the service itself and not through the proxy, resulting in my call to the first method from my service not being intercepted, therefor not cached.
How can I get this to work?
UPDATE: Added sample code
This is on the top of my head so sorry if anything doesn't seem to compile
Here is a sample the service class
public class Service : IService
{
[CacheMethodOutput]
public virtual object[] GetObjects(int x)
{
...
}
public virtual object GetObject(int x, int y)
{
return GetObjects(x).SingleOrDefault(o => o.y == y);
}
}
The CacheMethodOutputAttribute is a simple attribute class
Here is a sample binding (this is the way I make sure to have a class proxy instead of a interface proxy but actually leave the injected reference by interface)
// Binds by type instead of proxy to create a class proxy
Bind<Service>().ToSelf().InSingletonScope().Intercept().With<CacheAttributeInterceptor>()
Bind<IService>().ToMethod<Service>(r => r.Kernel.Get<Service>());
So when I call GetObjects from any class in which the IService is injected, the interceptor is triggered, but it's not triggered from the GetObject method of the Service itself.
The CacheAttributeInterceptor looks like this (but details of implementation is irrelevant):
public class CacheAttributeInterceptor : SimpleInterceptor
{
public ICacheManager CacheManager {get;set;}
public override void BeforeInvoke(IInvocation invocation)
{
if (Attributes.GetCustomAttribute(invocation.Request.Method, typeof(CacheMethodOutputAttribute) != null)
{
string key = GenerateKey(invocation.Request.Method.Name, invocation.Request.Method.Arguments);
object returnValue;
if (!CacheManager.TryGet(key, out returnValue))
{
invocation.Proceed();
returnValue = invocation.ReturnValue;
CacheManager.Add(key, returnValue);
}
else
invocation.ReturnValue = returnValue;
}
else
base.BeforeInvoke(invocation);
}
}
I found the solution / more detail on the problem.
If I remove the virtual modifier on the GetObject method, it will then not be intercepted anymore and when it will call GetObjects, the incerceptor will trigger.
All this got me thinking that if I want both method to be intercepted, I need to make the interceptor work deeply, if this is even possible.
I would like to use the following in my wcf service to log the user in the log message:
log4net.ThreadContext.Properties["user"] = this.currentUser.LoginName;
I have the service set up to run in InstanceContextMode.PerSession. In the initial call to the wcf service I am setting this ThreadContext property to the current user that is logged in but each subsequent call does not log this property.
I'm pretty sure that for each call to the service it's running the task on a different thread even though it's set to use PerSession. I assume it's using a thread pool to process the requests.
Is there a way to set this so that I don't have to do it in every wcf method?
I ran into the same problem and this is how I got it to work. You can use GlobalContext since it will be evaluated for each call anyway.
[ServiceBehavior(InstanceContextMode = InstanceContextMode.PerSession)]
public class MyService : IMyService
{
//static constructor
static MyService()
{
log4net.Config.XmlConfigurator.Configure();
log4net.GlobalContext.Properties["user"] = new UserLogHelper();
}
...
}
Then you have to define a simple class:
private class UserLogHelper
{
public override string ToString()
{
var instanceContext = OperationContext.Current.InstanceContext;
var myServiceInstance = instanceContext.GetServiceInstance() as MyService;
return myServiceInstance?.currentUser?.LoginName;
}
}
Log4net supports "calculated context values". By using this you could write a class like this:
public class UserNameContext
{
public override string ToString()
{
string userName = ...; // get the name of the current user
return userName;
}
}
If you add this to the global context you can access the property in your appenders (like you are used to). The 'ToString' method will be executed every time and thus you get the correct user name.
More on context values can be found in this great tutorial:
http://www.beefycode.com/post/Log4Net-Tutorial-pt-6-Log-Event-Context.aspx
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