Wcf – Reuse types in current assembly for WCF Proxies

wcf

VS WCF integration has nice option "Reuse types in refrenced assemblies". The problem is that I need the same but for the current assembly. Some of the types are already defined in my assembly and I need to reuse them.

Usage scenario:

I have assembly, and have TypeA here.
I add Service Reference ot it, and one of the methods returns type that is fully compatible with TypeA(properties, name).
Add Service Reference generates proxy, but it recreate new TypeA within.

On the step 3 I need proxy that will return TypeA. Not new TypeA.

Best Answer

If I understand what you want to do, then it's an scenario I commonly run into, and well, WCF does have a decent answer to: Just don't use SvcUtil / WS Service Reference wizards.

If you have most of the contract classes already defined in your client side (be that because you have a shared assembly or because you have equivalent classes defined on your project), you might as well just go to the next step and either import the complete service contract in code form or simply redefine it on the client side.

There's nothing that forces you to use svcutil and friends, just define your interface and either use the channel model directly (i.e. ChannelFactory<T> and friends) or, if you prefer to use proxy classes, just create your own ClientBase<T>-derived class. It's really very easy and it will save you trouble in the long run.

Related Solutions

C# – WCF Service Reference generates its own contract interface, won’t reuse mine

"Reuse types in referenced assemblies" only allows you to reuse Data Contracts, not Service Contracts. If you want to share Service Contracts, you don't need to use "Add Service Reference" at all. You can just use ChannelFactory directly.

// Supply the binding and address in code
Binding binding = new BasicHttpBinding();
EndpointAddress address = new EndpointAddress("http://tempuri.org/address");
IServiceContract channel = ChannelFactory<IServiceContract>.CreateChannel(binding, address);

// Or read them from the config file
ChannelFactory<IServiceContract> channelFactory = new ChannelFactory<IServiceContract>();
IServiceContract channel = channelFactory.CreateChannel();

The channel object will also implement ICommunicationObject, so you can cast it if you need to call methods like Open() or Close().

WCF common types not reused

Referencing the shared assembly before adding the service reference does not work

You would need to do this, or at least update the service reference after adding the reference.

Deleting and re-adding the service reference (or the shared assembly reference) did not help

and you shouldn't need to do this, but I would've tried it too.

In order for the 'reuse' to work both projects (client and service) need to be using the same version of the assembly. You're referencing the project, which is good - I've encountered this before when referencing the assembly directly because of different versions.

Here's some other things to try

Open 'Configuration Manager' for your solution - make sure that the shared assembly is configured to build.
Ensure you're using a project reference for both client and service - using the latest assembly on the client won't help if the service is using an older version.
Delete the project reference and build, and expect the build to fail - if it doesn't fail then you must be referencing something else.
Manually check that the latest 'shared assembly' is being included in the build in both service and client - check the bin folder, check the assembly version / build date.

If all else fails, the best way to force the same object on both sides is to remove the 'service reference' proxy altogether and use the ChannelFactory method. See Simpler Explanation of How to Make Call WCF Service without Adding Service Ref and VS2010 Advantages of Add Service Reference over direct ClientBase<>. This is my preferred WCF pattern because it removes the need to 'Update service reference...', and removes all that generated proxy code.

Best Answer

Related Solutions

C# – WCF Service Reference generates its own contract interface, won’t reuse mine

WCF common types not reused

Related Topic