WCF

Windows Communication Foundation

By:- Madan singh chauhan

Email:- [email protected]

Introduction of Distributed Programming

Introduction of Remoting and Web services
Introduction of WCF
Discussion about SOA & WCF
When you should use it.
What software you need to create a WCF service
Advantages & Disadvantages of WCF
Architecture of .Net 3.0 & WCF
Programming with WCF

Services (Service Execution Boundaries, WCF & Location Transparencies)

Contracts (Service, Data, Fault and Message)
Addresses (TCP, HTTP, IPC, MSMQ and P2P)
Hosting (IIS, VS2005, Web.Config, Self, Self * Base Addresses, Advanced, ServiceHost<T> and WAS)
Bindings
End Points

Example of WCF & Implementations

Introduction of Distributed Programming

Software has been different generations :

The first generation i.e. late 1980s Object oriented programming

(OOPS) gave a new shape to computer programming.
It introduced concepts like :
- Polymorphism
- Encapsulation
- Inheritance etc.

The second generation started in mid 1990s and marks the introduction of OS
with GUI and this demanded for developing software with extensive reusability.
It introduced new concepts like :
- Location transperance
- Tight coupling etc.

The third generation is called internet era started in the early 2000s. It aimed at
developing distributed applications. It took the software development towards a
service oriented direction.

Introduction of Remoting

Remoting is .a technology that allows programs and

software components to interact across application
domains, processes, and machine boundaries. This
enables your applications to take advantage of remote
resources in a networked environment.
In .NET remoting, the remote object is implemented in a
class that derives from
System.MarshalByRefObject,which provides the core
foundation for enabling remote access of objects across
application

When a client calls the remote method, the proxy receives the call, encodes the
message using an appropriate formatter, then sends the call over the channel to
the server process. A listening channel on the server appdomain picks up the
request and forwards it to the server remoting system, which locates and
invokes the methods on the requested object. Once the execution is completed,
the process is reversed and the results are returned back to the client.

Creating Remoting Services

namespace RemoteClassLibServer
{
class RemoteServer
{
[STAThread]
static void Main(string[] args)
{
RemotingConfiguration.Configure( "RemoteClassLibServer.exe.config");
Console.WriteLine("Press return to Exit"); Console.ReadLine();
}
}
}
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<configuration>
<system.runtime.remoting>
<application name="RemoteClassLibServer">
<service>
<wellknown mode="SingleCall" type="RemoteClassLib.MyRemoteObject,RemoteClassLib"
objectUri="MyRemoteObject">
</wellknown>
</service>
<channels>
<channel ref="tcp server" port="9000"/> \
</channels>
</application>
</system.runtime.remoting>
</configuration>

Introduction of Web services

Communication between applications using web services is platform

independent and programming independent . The application that consumes
the web services, simply access it, without needing to know how this web
service has actually been implemented and created.

Web services serialize objects through XML contained in the SOAP messages
and can thus only handle items that can be fully expressed in XML

ASP.NET based Web services can only be accessed over HTTP

Difference between ASP.NET Web Services and . NET Remoting

1. Protocol :
- Web services can be accessed only over HTTP
- Remoting Can be accessed over any protocol (including TCP, HTTP, SMTP and so on)
2. State Management :
- Web services work in a stateless environment.
- Remoting Provide support for both stateful and stateless environments through Singleton
and Single Call objects.
3. Interoperability :
- Web services support interoperability across platforms, and are ideal for heterogeneous
environments.
-. NET remoting requires the client be built using .NET, enforcing homogenous environment.
4. Reliability Highly
- Web service reliable due to the fact that Web services are always hosted in IIS.
- Can also take advantage of IIS for fault isolation. If IIS is not used, application needs to
provide plumbing for ensuring the reliability of the application.
5. Ease-of-Programming :
- Web service Easy-to-create and deploy.
- Remoting Complex to program.

Introduction of WCF

WCF is a set of .NET technologies (Web services ,.Net Remoting and

enterprises services) for building and running connected systems.

WCF provides secure, reliable, and transacted messaging along with

interoperability

WCF applications can be developed in any language which can target

the .NET runtime

System.ServiceModel is the assembly that contains core functionality

for WCF.

A service is a Common Language Runtime (CLR) type that

encapsulates business functionality and exposes a set of methods that
can be accessed by remote clients.

When you should use it

When your business logic has to interact with a variety of client

applications.

When client apps, which are going to use your service, may be written
in Java or .Net.

You are targeting a distributed computing architecture.

What software you need to create a W

Visual studio 2005

.Net Framework 3.0

Microsoft Windows Software Development Kit (SDK)

Visual studio extensions for WCF and WPF

Advantages of WCF
Known Advantages:
Makes UI programming & distributed programming very easy.

Reduce complexity by allowing us to focus on single programming model rather

than learn multiple programming models.
Helps us talk to various applications written in various languages with ease
which means more probable revenues as various applications can start using
your core services with ease.
Helps us forget about interoperability between various underlying web service
technologies in the past, present and future.
With WCF, a single service can be defined and exposed over multiple endpoints
to support multiple protocols at the same time.

Discussion about SOA & WCF

1.

What is SOA

SOA is the practice of sequestering the core business functions into independent
services that dont change frequently. These services are glorified functions that are
called by one or more presentation programs. The presentation programs are volatile
bits of software that present data to, and accept data from, various users.
SOA is nothing more than separating changeable elements from unchangeable
elements.

1. Services in WCF
Description
The WCF applications expose the functionality through services. A Service is a Common Language
Runtime(CLR) type that encapsulate business functionality and exposes a set of methods that
can be accessed by remote clients.
A service contract is defined by applying the ServiceContractAttribute to a class or interface. When
applied to a class, the class becomes a service type. When applied to an interface, any class that
implements the interface becomes a service type. In either case, methods exposed by the class or
interface must be decorated with the OperationContractAttribute to be considered part of the
service
contract. Methods with this attribute are considered service operations.
A service type must be hosted before clients can invoke service operations.

a) Services' Execution Boundaries

WCF allows the client to communicate with the service across all execution boundaries.
On the same machine , the client can consume services in the same app domain,
across app domains in the same process, or across processes.

b) WCF & Location Transparency

WCF takes the remote programming model of instantiating and using a proxy and uses
it even in the most local case. Because all interactions are done via a proxy, requiring
the same configuration and hosting ,WCF maintains the same programming model for
the local and remote cases; thus it not only enables you to switch locations without
affecting the client, but also significantly simplifies the application programming
model.

2. Addresses
Description:
In WCF, every service is associated with a unique address. The address provides two
important elements: the location of the service and the transport protocol or transport
schema used to communicate with the service. The location portion of the address
indicates the name of the target machine, site, or network; a communication port, pipe,
or queue; and an optional specific path or URI.

a) TCP Addresses
Ex. net.tcp://localhost:8002/MyService.

b) HTTP Addresses
Ex. http://localhost:8001

c) IPC Addresses
Ex. net.pipe://localhost/MyPipe

d) MSMQ Addresses
Ex. net.msmq://localhost/MyService

e) Peer Network Addresses

Peer network addresses use net.p2p for transport, to indicate the use of the Windows
peer network transport. You must specify the peer network name as well as a unique
path and port.

3. Contracts
Description:
In WCF, all services expose contracts. The contract is a platform-neutral and standard
way of describing what the service does. WCF defines four types of contracts.

a) Service Contracts
Describe which operations the client can perform on the service.

b) Data Contracts
Define which data types are passed to and from the service. WCF defines implicit
contracts for built-in types such as int and string, but you can easily define explicit optin data contracts for custom types

c) Fault Contracts
Define which errors are raised by the service, and how the service handles and
propagates errors to its clients

d) Message Contracts
Allow the service to interact directly with messages. Message contracts can be typed or
untyped, and are useful in interoperability cases and when there is an existing message
format you have to comply with.

4. Hosting
Description:
Every WCF service must be hosted in a Windows process called the host process. A
single host process can host multiple services, and the same service type can be
hosted in multiple host processes. The host can be provided by IIS, by the Widows
Activation Service (WAS) on Windows Vista, or by the developer as part of the
application.
So each .NET host process can have many app domains. Each app domain can have
zero or more service host instances. However, each service host instance is dedicated
to a particular service type. When you create a host instance, you are in effect
registering that service host instance with all the endpoints for that type on the host
machine that correspond to its base addresses. Each service host instance has zero or
more contexts.

a) IIS Hosting
Hosting in IIS is very similar to hosting a classic ASMX web service. You need to create
a virtual directory under IIS and supply a .svc file. The .svc file functions similar to an
.asmx file, and is used to identify the service code behind the file and class.
b) Using VS 2005
You can use Visual Studio 2005 to generate a boilerplate IIS-hosted service. From the
File menu, select New Website and then select WCF Service from the New Web Site
dialog box. This causes Visual Studio 2005 to create a new web site, service code, and
matching .svc file. You can also use the Add New Item dialog to add another service
later on.
c) Web.Config file
The web site config file (Web.Config) must list the types you want to expose as
services. You need to use fully qualified type names, including the assembly name.
<system.serviceModel> <services> <service name = "MyNamespace.MyService"> ...
</service> </services> </system.serviceModel>
d) Self Hosting
Self-hosting is the name for the technique used when the developer is responsible for
providing and managing the life cycle of the host process. Self-hosting is used both in
the case of wanting a process (or machine) boundary between the client and the
service, and when using the service in-procthat is, in the same process as the client.

e) Self Hosting & Base Addresses

You can launch a service host without providing any base address by omitting the base
addresses altogether.
f) Advanced Hosting Features
The ICommunicationObject interface supported by ServiceHost offers some advanced
features.
g) ServiceHost<T> Class
You can improve on the WCF-provided ServiceHost class by defining the
ServiceHost<T> class.
h) WAS Hosting
The Windows Activation Service (WAS) is a system service available with Windows
Vista. WAS is part of IIS7, but can be installed and configured separately. To use the
WAS for hosting your WCF service, you need to supply a .svc file, just as with IIS. The
main difference between IIS and WAS is that the WAS is not limited to HTTP and can be
used with any of the available WCF transports, ports, and queues.

5. Bindings
Description
WCF groups together a set of communication aspects in bindings. A binding is
merely a consistent, canned set of choices regarding the transport protocol,
message encoding, communication pattern, reliability, security, transaction
propagation, and interoperability. You can use the WCF-provided bindings as is, you
can tweak their properties, or you can write your own custom bindings from scratch.
A single service can support multiple bindings on separate addresses.
a)

Standard Bindings
WCF defines nine standard bindings:

Basic Binding

TCP Binding

P2P Binding

IPC Binding

WS Binding

Federated WS Binding

Duplex WS Binding

MSMQ Binding

MSMQ Integration Binding

A binding describes the protocols supported by a particular endpoint, specifically, the

following:
The transport protocol, which can be TCP, named pipes, HTTP, or MSMQ
The message encoding format, which determines whether messages are serialized
as binary or XML, for example
Other messaging protocols related to security and reliability protocols, plus any
other custom protocols that affect the contents of the serialized message

6. End Points

Every service is associated with an address that defines where the service is, a
binding that defines how to communicate with the service, and a contract that
defines what the service does. The endpoint is the fusion of the address,
contract, and binding (ABC)

Address :- The address is obviously the location of the service, such as

net.pipe://localhost/LocalTimeService

Binding:- The binding specifies security options, encoding options, and

transport options.

Contract:- the contract is the actual interface that the service implements.

Every endpoint must have all three elements, and the host exposes the endpoint.
Logically

Every service must expose at least one business endpoint and each endpoint
has exactly one contract. All endpoints on a service have unique addresses, and
a single service can expose multiple endpoints. These endpoints can use the
same or different bindings and can expose the same or different contracts. There
is absolutely no relationship between the various endpoints a service provides.

Example :<endpoint name ="LocalTimeService

address="net.pipe://localhost/LocalTimeService" binding="netNamedPipeBinding
contract="ILocalTime" />

Sample
WCF

Any queries or questions ?

Thank you