Upgrading from .NET RIA Services to WCF RIA Services

November 30, 2009

I just had to go through the process of upgrading an app built with the RIA Services CTP code from a few months ago to the new WCF Ria Services beta that was released at PDC.

After the upgrade I was presented with a billion errors – I had one of those “OMG I wish I didn’t just do that” moments… but after some hunting around I found that the changes were not too bad.

Here is my report on what I did to get my project working.

In web project

I had a custom object being exposed via RIA Services, which meant I had to have a [Key] attribute on one of the properties. System.ComponentModel.DataAnnotations has been upgraded, but the reference in your project will have required specific version set. So remove the missing DLL and re-add it. Use the 3.6.0.0 version.

System.Web.DomainServices.Providers has been split in to two files – System.Web.DomainServices.LinqToSql and System.Web.DomainServices.EntityFramework. I’m using LinqToSqlClasses in my project, so I added the Linq version (and removed the old reference).

You’ll also have to update the name spaces in your DomainServices – Change “using System.Web.DomainServices.Linq;” to “using System.Web.DomainServices.Providers;”.

ServiceOperation has changed to Invoke.
Please note that it seems that in the VS2010 version of WCF Ria Services you can return entities from Invoke operations but not in the VS2008 version. Keep this in mind when you are designing your domain services – although you probably should use normal non Invoke style methods to return entities.

Also in your domain services on the server, “this.Context” has been changed to “this.DataContext”.

I had an enum that was exposed by a ServiceOperation (now Invoke) and it wasn’t being properly pushed out the client code. This appears to have been fixed, so I removed the .shared part of the file name to fix (it was doubling up on the client and getting a compiler error).

Silverlight Client

SubmitOperation is now in System.Windows.Ria namespace, not System.Windows.Ria.Data

If you are using RiaContext to get login information etc, then you’ll have to change RiaContextBase to WebContextBase.

IEditableCollection is gone… I use PagedCollectionViews mostly anyway (which use IEditableCollectionView) – IEditableCollection was in the SL3 Beta (but removed for RTW), and seemed to be included *again* in the older RIA Services stuff – but it’s gone again :)

ServiceContract() (which is in the auto generated files on the client) is now in System.ServiceModel.dll (so add it as a reference).

MergeOption has been changed to LoadBehavior with new options – KeepCurrent, MergeIntoCurrent and RefreshCurrent (much nicer!)

That’s all I had to do to get the app compiling, but at runtime I had a few problems with the RIA services requests getting 404. I fixed this by adding a temp domain service to the app – which updated the Web.Config for me…

It Added the following httpModule:

<add name="DomainServiceModule" type="System.Web.Ria.Services.DomainServiceHttpModule, System.Web.Ria, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35" />

It Added the following module:

<add name="DomainServiceModule" preCondition="managedHandler"
    type="System.Web.Ria.Services.DomainServiceHttpModule, System.Web.Ria, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35" />

It also added some WCF stuff right down the bottom of the file:

<system.serviceModel>
  <serviceHostingEnvironment aspNetCompatibilityEnabled="true" />
 </system.serviceModel>

Hope this helps you upgrade your projects!


New SDDN Site Live

November 26, 2009

The new Silverlight Designer and Developer Network site is live!

The site has information on upcoming meetings, any follow up code links from the presenters as well as general Silverlight community information.

It will also contain video of the events where possible – once we figure out some hosting (damn you Silverlight Live Streaming biting the bullet!).

The best part about the new site is that it now has RSS!! A long time coming I know – but go add it to your readers :)

Check it out at http://www.sddn.org.au.

Cheers,

Jordan.


.NET RIA Services Validation and Authentication Talk (Code)

November 26, 2009

Last month I did a presentation at SDDN in Melbourne on RIA Services and it’s in built authentication and validation features.

The code is posted here:

<Sample Code>

.NET Ria Services Authentication and Validation Demo Code

</Sample Code>

The talk started off by running through the UserDTO object – under Services/DomainObjects. This object is exposed through the UserRegistrationService under /Services.

Next you’ll want to familiarise with the LoginManager in the Silverlight project (under Model/LoginManager.cs).

I then added some custom validation to the UserDTO object.

Next I created a UserValitator.shared.cs file under Services/DomainObjects and applied a metadata attribute to UserDTO to connect the two. .shared.cs files will be automatically made available to Silverlight by RIA Services.

The login stuff is built using the standard ASP.NET membership SQL provider, and the built in RIA Services abilities around this.

Read through LoginManager.cs see how the forms authentication object is created, and how the system uses the AuthenciationDomainContext, which is created on the sever in Services/DomainObjects. AuthenticationDomainService on the server contains the goods to validate a user and also provides a User class, which you can extend.

There is also a UserRegistration context in LoginManager which allows you to create a new user. See UserRegistrationService.cs on the server (under Services/DomainObjects) to see how this works (by using the MembershipHelper class).

See the Web.config to note how the system is configured to use the SQL connection, and in the membership section note that it is configured to use this same SQL connection.
You’ll need to configure your SQL database as well – to create the ASP.NET membership tables… run aspnet_regsql.exe (in C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727) from an elevated prompt to start the wizard.

This should be enough to get you started.

BTW, there is some great doco on this in the .NET RIA Services PDF file…

Enjoy!


Silverlight Code Camp 30/31 Jan 2010 – Melbourne

November 24, 2009

The first Silverlight Code Camp is being held in Melbourne on the weekend of Jan 30 and 31 2010 in Melbourne!

Split in to two distinct tracks, Beginner and Advanced there will be something for everyone. Each track will contain 10 sessions split over the two days, for a massive total of 20 unique sessions all based on Silverlight!

For more information see http://sddn.org.au/news/silverlight-code-camp-30-31-jan-2010-melbourne/

See you there!