Service Description

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The Service Description sample demonstrates how a service can retrieve its service description information at runtime. The sample is based on the Getting Started Sample, with an additional service operation defined to return descriptive information about the service. The information that is returned lists the base addresses and endpoints for the service. The service provides this information using the OperationContext, ServiceHost, and ServiceDescription classes.

In this sample, the client is a console application (.exe) and the service is hosted by Internet Information Services (IIS).

This sample has a modified version of the calculator contract called IServiceDescriptionCalculator. The contract defines an additional service operation named GetServiceDescriptionInfo that returns a multi-line string to the client that describes the base address or addresses and service endpoint or endpoints for the service.

[ServiceContract(Namespace="http://Microsoft.ServiceModel.Samples")]
public interface IServiceDescriptionCalculator
{
    [OperationContract]
    int Add(int n1, int n2);
    [OperationContract]
    int Subtract(int n1, int n2);
    [OperationContract]
    int Multiply(int n1, int n2);
    [OperationContract]
    int Divide(int n1, int n2);
    [OperationContract]
    string GetServiceDescriptionInfo();
}

The implementation code for GetServiceDescriptionInfo uses the ServiceDescription to list the service endpoints. Because service endpoints can have relative addresses, it first lists the base addresses for the service. To get all of this information, the code obtains its operation context using Current. The ServiceHost and its ServiceDescription object are retrieved from the operation context. To list the base endpoints for the service, the code iterates through the service host's BaseAddresses collection. To list the service endpoints for the service, the code iterates through the service description's endpoints collection.

public string GetServiceDescriptionInfo()
{
    string info = "";
    OperationContext operationContext = OperationContext.Current;
    ServiceHost host = (ServiceHost)operationContext.Host;
    ServiceDescription desc = host.Description;
    // Enumerate the base addresses in the service host.
    info += "Base addresses:\n";
    foreach (Uri uri in host.BaseAddresses)
    {
        info += "    " + uri + "\n";
    }
    // Enumerate the service endpoints in the service description.
    info += "Service endpoints:\n";
    foreach (ServiceEndpoint endpoint in desc.Endpoints)
    {
        info += "    Address:  " + endpoint.Address + "\n";
        info += "    Binding:  " + endpoint.Binding.Name + "\n";
        info += "    Contract: " + endpoint.Contract.Name + "\n";
    }
     return info;
}

When you run the sample, you see the calculator operations and then the service information returned by the GetServiceDescriptionInfo operation. Press ENTER in the client window to shut down the client.

Add(15,3) = 18
Subtract(145,76) = 69
Multiply(9,81) = 729
Divide(22,7) = 3
GetServiceDescriptionInfo
Base addresses:
    http://<machine-name>/ServiceModelSamples/service.svc
    https://<machine-name>/ServiceModelSamples/service.svc
Service endpoints:
    Address:  http://<machine-name>/ServiceModelSamples/service.svc
    Binding:  WSHttpBinding
    Contract: IServiceDescriptionCalculator
    Address:  http://<machine-name>/ServiceModelSamples/service.svc/mex
    Binding:  MetadataExchangeHttpBinding
    Contract: IMetadataExchange

Press <ENTER> to terminate client.

To set up, build, and run the sample

1. Ensure that you have performed the One-Time Set Up Procedure for the Windows Communication Foundation Samples.

2. To build the C# or Visual Basic .NET edition of the solution, follow the instructions in Building the Windows Communication Foundation Samples.

3. To run the sample in a single- or cross-machine configuration, follow the instructions in Running the Windows Communication Foundation Samples.

© 2007 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.