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Saturday 3 December 2011

Lesson 6: Introduction to WCF services.

In Silverlight, you cannot connect to a database directly. You can create visually appealing interfaces, handle events, make user controls , use all logic and .net framework , but you cannot connect directly to a database.

To access data, the Silverlight application needs to call a Web service, which supplies it with data.  The Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) provides you a way to access all your databases by writing all the data access logic within it, and your silverlight application can request data from this WCF service.

Before we create a WCF service, you need to keep in mind that the Web service and the Silverlight application are different applications , that merely exchange data. I am going to show you how to create your first WCF service .

There are only two topics which will be covered in this lesson.
1. Creating the WCF service.
2. Modifying the WCF service.
3. Publishing the WCF service
Step 1:  Creating the WCF service

1. Open Visual Studio -> New Project -> WCF -> WCF Service Application.
    Name it as MyDataService , and click OK.

 

2.  Open Solution explorer, present to the right of the screen and double click on IService1.cs
     You will find an Interface and a class there.  



3.  The methods in the interface have an attribute  [OperationContract] , which is used to specify that this method can be called from the Silverlight application.

4.  The class has an attribute [DataContract] , which indicates that this class object can be sent from the WCF service to the Silverlight application and vice versa. 

5. Only the members of the class which have [DataMember] attribute will be accessible in the silverlight application.

6.  The methods defined in the interface are implemented in the Service1.cs  file , which is obtained by expanding the Service1.svc  in the Solution Explorer.

7.  If you want to create your own class, with its data members, you need to give the [DataContract] attribute to that class also , and its members should be given [DataMember] attribute.


Step 2 : Modifying the WCF service

1. We will create a new method in the interface IService1.  Add the following code in it

     [OperationContract]
     int getStatus(string name);



2.  Now save this, and go to Service1.svc.cs .  We need to implement the new method defined in the interface. So add the following code there



3.  That all  :)   You have created your web service.  You can call this getStatus method, which takes a string as a parameter, and returns you the status as 1 if length is greater than 10 , and 0 if lesser.


How to actually use these WCF services will be covered in the next lesson. For a more detailed explanation and examples, check this video.


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