We are running a few Stateless Reliable Services and are having performance issues with service-to-service communication using the reverse proxy (http://localhost:19081/{app}/{svc}/bleh). Without getting into the details there, we are looking into using remoting as described here: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/service-fabric/service-fabric-reliable-services-communication-remoting
However, I am having a hard time figuring out how I would expose the API methods in the service type class, as they currently exist in our controllers. The controllers, via dependency injection, get the repository instances needed, etc..., so I'm spinning my wheels on how to get this accomplished without some sort of redundant instances or circular dependency.
I'm sitting here staring at this on "PersonService.cs":
internal sealed class PersonService: StatelessService, IPersonService
{
public PersonService(StatelessServiceContext context)
: base(context)
{ }
...
public PersonResponse GetPersonFromDb()
{
//lost here :(
}
Where my controller, which works fine, has:
public PersonController(IPersonRepository personRepository)
{
_personRepository = personRepository;
}
...
public IActionResult GetPerson()
{
var personResponse = _dbRepository.GetPerson();
return new ObjectResult(personResponse);
}
D:
Can't you pass the repository to your service, similar to this?
public PersonService(StatelessServiceContext context, IPersonRepository personRepository)
: base(context)
{
_personRepository = personRepository;
}
public PersonResponse GetPersonFromDb()
{
var personResponse = _personRepository.GetPerson();
return personResponse;
}
Related
I am trying to implement proxy design pattern for caching services as below.
public interface IProductService
{
int ProcessOrder(int orderId);
}
public class ProductService : IProductService
{
public int ProcessOrder(int orderId)
{
// implementation
}
}
public class CachedProductService : IProductService
{
private IProductService _realService;
public CachedProductService(IProductService realService)
{
_realService = realService;
}
public int ProcessOrder(int orderId)
{
if (exists-in-cache)
return from cache
else
return _realService.ProcessOrder(orderId);
}
}
How do I to use IoC container (Unity/Autofac) to create real service and cached service objects as I can register IProductService to ProductService or CachedProductService but CachedProductService in turn requires a IProductService object (ProductService) during creation.
I am trying to arrive at something like this:
The application will target IProductService and request IoC container for an instance and depending on the configuration of the application (if cache is enabled/disabled), the application will be provided with ProductService or CachedProductService instance.
Any ideas? Thanks.
Without a container your graph would look like this:
new CachedProductService(
new ProductService());
Here's an example using Simple Injector:
container.Register<IProductService, ProductService>();
// Add caching conditionally based on a config switch
if (ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["usecaching"] == "true")
container.RegisterDecorator<IProductService, CachedProductService>();
I'm trying to get the following scenario using autofac but I'm not sure how my code will be built to get this up & running.
I have a repository class, this repository class needs to get a project key (string) on initialization (constructor). I want to instantiate this repository in initialization of my "Initialize" method provided to my by Web Api, because the project key will be available in my route.
so instead of calling "new ProductRepository(projectKey)", I want to use Autofac. Can someone point me in the right direction? I didn't find any way to send in specific data to the container in web api, since the container/builder is only available in the appStart.
Should I make the container available as a singleton so that I can approach it, or is this bad practice?
in your initialization code:
var builder = new ContainerBuilder();
builder.RegisterApiControllers(Assembly.GetExecutingAssembly());
var container = builder.Build();
var resolver = new AutofacWebApiDependencyResolver(container);
config.DependencyResolver = resolver;
in your controller:
public class MyController : ApiController
{
public MyController(IComponentContext container)
{
var key = new NamedParameter("projectKey", "keyFromRoute");
var repository = container.Resolve<ProductRepository>(key);
}
}
That should do it.
There is a nuget package that provides a DependencyResolver for WebApi that integrates with AutoFac. Create the DependencyResolver, assign it to the config, register your controllers in the autofac container.
I'm making some assumptions because you didn't provide your code, but I think you have something like this:
public class ProductRepository
{
public ProductRepository(DbContext dbContext, int projectKey)
{
}
}
public class SomeController : Controller
{
private readonly Func<int, ProductRepository> _repoFactory;
public SomeController(Func<int, ProductRepository> repoFactory)
{
_repoFactory = repoFactory;
}
public void DoStuff(int projectKey)
{
var repo = _repoFactory(projectKey);
repo.DoStuff();
}
}
public class RepositoryModule : Module
{
public override Load(ContainerBuilder builder)
{
builder.RegisterType<ProductRepository>();
}
}
I have read as many of the posts on Stackoverflow as I can find with regards the use of a Unit of Work pattern within
an ASP.Net MVC 3 application which includes a Business Layer. However, I still have a couple of questions with
regards this topic and would greatly appreciate any feedback people can give me.
I am developing an ASP.Net MVC 3 Web application which uses EF 4.1. I will be using both the Repository and
Unit of Work Patterns with this project similar to how they are used in this great tutorial
The difference in my project is that I need to also include a Business Layer (separate project in my solution) in order to
carry out the various business rules for the application. The tutorial mentioned above does not have a Business layer, and
therefore creates an instance of the Unit of Work class from the controller
public class CourseController : Controller
{
private UnitOfWork unitOfWork = new UnitOfWork();
However, my question is, where should I create the instance of the Unit of Work class if I have a Business Layer?
I personally think it should be created in my controller and then injected into the Business Layer like so:
public class PeopleController : Controller
{
private readonly IUnitOfWork _UoW;
private IPersonService _personService;
public PeopleController()
{
_UoW = new UnitOfWork();
_personService = new PersonService(_UoW);
}
public PeopleController(IUnitOfWork UoW, IPersonService personService)
{
_UoW = UoW;
_personService = personService;
}
public ActionResult Edit(int id)
{
Person person = _personService.Edit(id);
return View(person);
}
public class UnitOfWork : IUnitOfWork, IDisposable
{
private BlogEntities _context = new BlogEntities();
private PersonRepository personRepository = null;
public IPersonRepository PersonRepository
{
get
{
if (this.personRepository == null)
{
this.personRepository = new PersonRepository(_context);
}
return personRepository;
}
}
public void Save()
{
_context.SaveChanges();
}
public class PersonService : IPersonService
{
private readonly IUnitOfWork _UoW;
public PersonService(IUnitOfWork UoW)
{
_UoW = UoW;
}
public Person Edit(int id)
{
Person person = _UoW.PersonRepository.GetPersonByID(id);
return person;
}
public class PersonRepository : IPersonRepository
{
private readonly BlogEntities _context;
public PersonRepository(BlogEntities context)
{
_context = context;
}
public Person GetPersonByID(int ID)
{
return _context.People.Where(p => p.ID == ID).Single();
}
I have read others saying that the Unit of Work instantiation should not be in the Controller, but created in the Service Layer
instead. The reason why I am not so sure about this approach is because my Controller may have to use several different
Service Layers in one business transaction, and if the Unit of Work instance was created inside each Service, it would result in several
Unit of Work instances being created, which defeats the purpose, ie, one Unit of Work per business transaction.
Maybe what I have explained above is wrong, but if so, I would greatly appreciate if someone could put me right.
Thanks again for your help.
I think you have a couple of changes to make:.
Allow your DI container to inject a UnitOfWork instance into your Service classes in their constructors, and leave it out of your Controller altogether.
If your DI container supports it (Ninject does, for example), configure your UnitOfWork to be managed on a per-request basis; this way your services will be handed a distinct UnitOfWork for each request, and you're all done. Or...
If your DI container does not support per-request lifetimes, configure it to manage the UnitOfWork as a singleton, so every Service class gets the same instance. Then update your UnitOfWork to store its Entities object in a data store which stores objects on a per-request basis, for example in HttpContext.Current.Items, as described here.
Edit 1
Regarding where the UnitOfWork should be injected; I'd say the Service layer is the correct place. If you imagine your system as a series of layers where the outer layers deal with user interactions and the lower layers deal with data storage, each layer should become less concerned with users and more concerned with data storage. UnitOfWork is a concept from one of the 'lower-level' layers and Controller is from a higher-level layer; your Service layer fits between them. It therefore makes sense to put the UnitOfWork into the Service class rather than the Controller.
Edit 2
To elaborate on the UnitOfWork creation and it's relationship to HttpContext.Current.Items:
Your UnitOfWork would no longer hold a reference to an Entities object, that would be done through the HttpContext object, injected into the UnitOfWork behind an interface like this:
public interface IPerRequestDataStore : IDisposable
{
bool Contains(string key);
void Store<T>(string key, T value);
T Get<T>(string key);
}
The HttpContext object would then implement IPerRequestDataStore like this:
public class StaticHttpContextPerRequestDataStore : IPerRequestDataStore
{
public bool Contains(string key)
{
return HttpContext.Current.Items.Contains(key);
}
public void Store<T>(string key, T value)
{
HttpContext.Current.Items[key] = value;
}
public T Get<T>(string key)
{
if (!this.Contains(key))
{
return default(T);
}
return (T)HttpContext.Current.Items[key];
}
public void Dispose()
{
var disposables = HttpContext.Current.Items.Values.OfType<IDisposable>();
foreach (var disposable in disposables)
{
disposable.Dispose();
}
}
}
As an aside, I've called it StaticHttpContextPerRequestDataStore as it uses the static HttpContext.Current property; that's not ideal for unit testing (another topic altogether), but at least the name indicates the nature of its dependency.
Your UnitOfWork then passes the IPerRequestDataStore it's given to each of its Repository objects so they can access the Entities; this means that no matter how many UnitOfWork instances you create, you'll use the same Entities object throughout a request because it's stored and retrieved in the IPerRequestDataStore.
You'd have an abstract base Repository which would use its IPerRequestDataStore to lazy-load its Entities object like this:
public abstract class RepositoryBase : IDisposable
{
private readonly IPerRequestDataStore _dataStore;
private PersonRepository personRepository;
protected RepositoryBase(IPerRequestDataStore dataStore)
{
this._dataStore = dataStore;
}
protected BlogEntities Context
{
get
{
const string contextKey = "context";
if (!this._dataStore.Contains(contextKey))
{
this._dataStore.Store(contextKey, new BlogEntities());
}
return this._dataStore.Get<BlogEntities>(contextKey);
}
}
public void Dispose()
{
this._dataStore.Dispose();
}
}
Your PeopleRepository (for example) would look like this:
public class PeopleRepository : RepositoryBase, IPersonRepository
{
public PeopleRepository(IPerRequestDataStore dataStore)
: base(dataStore)
{
}
public Person FindById(int personId)
{
return this.Context.Persons.FirstOrDefault(p => p.PersonId == personId);
}
}
And finally, here's the creation of your PeopleController:
IPerRequestDataStore dataStore = new StaticHttpContextDataStore();
UnitOfWork unitOfWork = new UnitOfWork(dataStore);
PeopleService service = new PeopleService(unitOfWork);
PeopleController controller = new PeopleController(service);
One of the central concepts here is that objects have their dependencies injected into them via their constructors; this is generally accepted as good practice, and more easily allows you to compose objects from other objects.
I created a web application using ASP.Net MVC 3 and EF 4.1, and I am using the UnitOfWork pattern, but nothing is getting committed to the database. All this is quite new to me, and I don't know where to start to resolve this issue.
I based myself on this post to create my web application:
http://weblogs.asp.net/shijuvarghese/archive/2011/01/06/developing-web-apps-using-asp-net-mvc-3-razor-and-ef-code-first-part-1.aspx
The final code, which can be obtained here also has a service layer and the UnitOfWOrk is being injected into the services.
Instead of using the custom injector based on Unity 2 as they are in that project, I am using Unity.Mvc3.
Here is my IUnitOfWork class:
public interface IUnitOfWork
{
void Commit();
}
And here is my UnitOfWork class:
public class UnitOfWork : IUnitOfWork
{
private readonly IDatabaseFactory databaseFactory;
private MyProjectContext dataContext;
public UnitOfWork(IDatabaseFactory databaseFactory)
{
this.databaseFactory = databaseFactory;
}
protected MyProjectContext DataContext
{
get { return dataContext ?? (dataContext = databaseFactory.Get()); }
}
public void Commit()
{
DataContext.Commit();
}
}
And here is how one of my service class look like:
public class RegionService : IRegionService
{
private readonly IRegionRepository regionRepository;
private readonly IUnitOfWork unitOfWork;
public RegionService(IRegionRepository regionRepository, IUnitOfWork unitOfWork)
{
this.regionRepository = regionRepository;
this.unitOfWork = unitOfWork;
}
...
}
At start-up, my UnitOfWork component is being registered like this:
container.RegisterType<IUnitOfWork, UnitOfWork>();
Now, no matter whether I try to insert, update or delete, no request is being sent to the database. What am my missing here?
UPDATE:
Here is the content of DataContext.Commit():
public class MyProjectContext : DbContext
{
public DbSet<Region> Regions { get; set; }
public virtual void Commit()
{
base.SaveChanges();
}
}
And here is databaseFactory.Get():
public interface IDatabaseFactory : IDisposable
{
MyProjectContext Get();
}
UPDATE #2:
Using the debugger, I am noticing that my Region service and controller constructors are getting called once when performing only a select, but they are called twice when performing an update. Is this normal?
Ok, I found the culprit. It has to do with how I was registering my database factory.
Instead of
container.RegisterType<IDatabaseFactory, DatabaseFactory>();
I needed
container.RegisterType<IDatabaseFactory, DatabaseFactory>(new HierarchicalLifetimeManager());
I found the information on this web site:
http://www.devtrends.co.uk/blog/introducing-the-unity.mvc3-nuget-package-to-reconcile-mvc3-unity-and-idisposable
That's an awfully complex implementation of Unit of Work. I actually prefer this one:
http://azurecoding.net/blogs/brownie/archive/2010/09/22/irepository-lt-t-gt-and-iunitofwork.aspx
Much simpler, and much more flexible. Although you do have to work out a few things for yourself.
May just be a typo but in UnitOfWork your private MyProjectContext is called dataContext (lowercase d)
But in your commit method your calling DataContext.Commit. Any chance that's actually calling a static method that you didn't intend to call? More likely a typo but thought I'd point it out.
+1 for an overly complex implementation of UnitOfWork.
I have a repository pattern i created on top of the ado.net entity framework. When i tried to implement StructureMap to decouple my objects, i kept getting StackOverflowException (infinite loop?). Here is what the pattern looks like:
IEntityRepository where TEntity : class
Defines basic CRUD members
MyEntityRepository : IEntityRepository
Implements CRUD members
IEntityService where TEntity : class
Defines CRUD members which return common types for each member.
MyEntityService : IEntityService
Uses the repository to retrieve data and return a common type as a result (IList, bool and etc)
The problem appears to be with my Service layer. More specifically with the constructors.
public PostService(IValidationDictionary validationDictionary)
: this(validationDictionary, new PostRepository())
{ }
public PostService(IValidationDictionary validationDictionary, IEntityRepository<Post> repository)
{
_validationDictionary = validationDictionary;
_repository = repository;
}
From the controller, i pass an object that implements IValidationDictionary. And i am explicitly calling the second constructor to initialize the repository.
This is what the controller constructors look like (the first one creates an instance of the validation object):
public PostController()
{
_service = new PostService(new ModelStateWrapper(this.ModelState));
}
public PostController(IEntityService<Post> service)
{
_service = service;
}
Everything works if i don't pass my IValidationDictionary object reference, in which case the first controller constructor would be removed and the service object would only have one constructor which accepts the repository interface as the parameter.
I appreciate any help with this :) Thanks.
It looks like the circular reference had to do with the fact that the service layer was dependent on the Controller's ModelState and the Controller dependent on the Service layer.
I had to rewrite my validation layer to get this to work. Here is what i did.
Define generic validator interface like below:
public interface IValidator<TEntity>
{
ValidationState Validate(TEntity entity);
}
We want to be able to return an instance of ValidationState which, obviously, defines the state of validation.
public class ValidationState
{
private readonly ValidationErrorCollection _errors;
public ValidationErrorCollection Errors
{
get
{
return _errors;
}
}
public bool IsValid
{
get
{
return Errors.Count == 0;
}
}
public ValidationState()
{
_errors = new ValidationErrorCollection();
}
}
Notice that we have an strongly typed error collection which we need to define as well. The collection is going to consist of ValidationError objects containing the property name of the entity we're validating and the error message associated with it. This just follows the standard ModelState interface.
public class ValidationErrorCollection : Collection<ValidationError>
{
public void Add(string property, string message)
{
Add(new ValidationError(property, message));
}
}
And here is what the ValidationError looks like:
public class ValidationError
{
private string _property;
private string _message;
public string Property
{
get
{
return _property;
}
private set
{
_property = value;
}
}
public string Message
{
get
{
return _message;
}
private set
{
_message = value;
}
}
public ValidationError(string property, string message)
{
Property = property;
Message = message;
}
}
The rest of this is StructureMap magic. We need to create validation service layer which will locate validation objects and validate our entity. I'd like to define an interface for this, since i want anyone using validation service to be completely unaware of the StructureMap presence. Besides, i think sprinkling ObjectFactory.GetInstance() anywhere besides the bootstrapper logic a bad idea. Keeping it centralized is a good way to insure good maintainability. Anyway, i use the decorator pattern here:
public interface IValidationService
{
ValidationState Validate<TEntity>(TEntity entity);
}
And we finally implement it:
public class ValidationService : IValidationService
{
#region IValidationService Members
public IValidator<TEntity> GetValidatorFor<TEntity>(TEntity entity)
{
return ObjectFactory.GetInstance<IValidator<TEntity>>();
}
public ValidationState Validate<TEntity>(TEntity entity)
{
IValidator<TEntity> validator = GetValidatorFor(entity);
if (validator == null)
{
throw new Exception("Cannot locate validator");
}
return validator.Validate(entity);
}
#endregion
}
I'm going to be using validation service in my controller. We could move it to the service layer and have StructureMap use property injection to inject an instance of controller's ModelState to the service layer, but i don't want the service layer to be coupled with ModelState. What if we decide to use another validation technique? This is why i'd rather put it in the controller. Here is what my controller looks like:
public class PostController : Controller
{
private IEntityService<Post> _service = null;
private IValidationService _validationService = null;
public PostController(IEntityService<Post> service, IValidationService validationService)
{
_service = service;
_validationService = validationService;
}
}
Here i am injecting my service layer and validaton service instances using StructureMap. So, we need to register both in StructureMap registry:
ForRequestedType<IValidationService>()
.TheDefaultIsConcreteType<ValidationService>();
ForRequestedType<IValidator<Post>>()
.TheDefaultIsConcreteType<PostValidator>();
That's it. I don't show how i implement my PostValidator, but it's simply implementing IValidator interface and defining validation logic in the Validate() method. All that's left to do is call your validation service instance to retrieve the validator, call the validate method on your entity and write any errors to ModelState.
[AcceptVerbs(HttpVerbs.Post)]
public ActionResult Create([Bind(Exclude = "PostId")] Post post)
{
ValidationState vst = _validationService.Validate<Post>(post);
if (!vst.IsValid)
{
foreach (ValidationError error in vst.Errors)
{
this.ModelState.AddModelError(error.Property, error.Message);
}
return View(post);
}
...
}
Hope i helped somebody out with this :)
I used a similar solution involving a generic implementor of IValidationDictionary uses a StringDictionary and then copied the errors from this back into the model state in the controller.
Interface for validationdictionary
public interface IValidationDictionary
{
bool IsValid{get;}
void AddError(string Key, string errorMessage);
StringDictionary errors { get; }
}
Implementation of validation dictionary with no reference to model state or anything else so structuremap can create it easily
public class ValidationDictionary : IValidationDictionary
{
private StringDictionary _errors = new StringDictionary();
#region IValidationDictionary Members
public void AddError(string key, string errorMessage)
{
_errors.Add(key, errorMessage);
}
public bool IsValid
{
get { return (_errors.Count == 0); }
}
public StringDictionary errors
{
get { return _errors; }
}
#endregion
}
Code in the controller to copy the errors from the dictionary into the model state. This would probably be best as an extension function of Controller.
protected void copyValidationDictionaryToModelState()
{
// this copies the errors into viewstate
foreach (DictionaryEntry error in _service.validationdictionary.errors)
{
ModelState.AddModelError((string)error.Key, (string)error.Value);
}
}
thus bootstrapping code is like this
public static void BootstrapStructureMap()
{
// Initialize the static ObjectFactory container
ObjectFactory.Initialize(x =>
{
x.For<IContactRepository>().Use<EntityContactManagerRepository>();
x.For<IValidationDictionary>().Use<ValidationDictionary>();
x.For<IContactManagerService>().Use<ContactManagerService>();
});
}
and code to create controllers is like this
public class IocControllerFactory : DefaultControllerFactory
{
protected override IController GetControllerInstance(RequestContext requestContext, Type controllerType)
{
return (Controller)ObjectFactory.GetInstance(controllerType);
}
}
Just a quick query on this. It's helped me out quite a lot so thanks for putting the answer up, but I wondered which namespace TEntity exists in? I see Colletion(TEntity) needs System.Collections.ObjectModel. My file compiles without anything further but I see your TEntity reference highlighted in Blue which suggests it has a class type, mine is Black in Visual Studio. Hope you can help. I'm pretty keen to get this working.
Have you found any way to seperate validation into the service layer at all? My gut tells me that validating in the Controller is a bit smelly but I've looked high and low to find a way to pass validation error messages back to the controller without tightly coupling the service layer to the controller and can't find anything. :(
Again, thanks for the great post!
Lloyd