WebService ASP.NET MVC 3 Send and Receive - asp.net-mvc-3

Question

I've been racking my brain for a couple of days now on how to approach a new requirement.
I have two websites. The first one lets the user fill out an application. The second website is an internal website use to manage the users applications. I need to develop a "web service" that sends the application data from website 1 to website 2 and return a response to website 2 of success or failure. I have never done a web service before and I'm a bit confused on where to start. I've been reading various examples online but they all seem to be just a starting point for building a webservice... no specific examples.
So for posting the data website 1, what would my controller method look like? Do I use Json to post the data to website 2? What would and example of that look like? Is there some form of redirect in the method that points to website 2?
So for posting the response back to website 2 what would that controller method look like? I assume I would use Json again to send the response back to website 1? Is there some form of redirect in the method that points back to website 1?

Answer 1

I would use JSON and POST the application to the web service.
First I am assuming the application data is contained in some type of object. Use JSON.Net to serialize the object into JSON. It will look something like the following code.
var application = new Application();
string serializedApplication = JsonConvert.Serialize(application);
Second is to POST the code your endpoint(webservice, mvc action). To this you'll need to make a HTTPRequest to the endpoint. The following code is what I use to make to POST the code.
public bool Post(string url, string body)
{
//Make the post
ServicePointManager.ServerCertificateValidationCallback = (sender, certificate, chain, errors) => true;
var bytes = Encoding.Default.GetBytes(body);
HttpWebRequest request = (HttpWebRequest)WebRequest.Create(url);
Stream stream = null;
try
{
request.KeepAlive = false;
request.ContentLength = bytes.Length;
request.ContentType = "application/x-www-form-urlencoded";
request.Timeout = -1;
request.Method = "POST";
stream = request.GetRequestStream();
stream.Write(bytes, 0, bytes.Length);
}
finally
{
if (stream != null)
{
stream.Flush();
stream.Close();
}
}
bool success = GetResponse(request);
return success;
}
public bool GetResponse(HttpWebRequest request)
{
bool success;
using (HttpWebResponse response = (HttpWebResponse)request.GetResponse())
{
using (Stream responseStream = response.GetResponseStream())
{
if (response.StatusCode != HttpStatusCode.OK && response.StatusCode != HttpStatusCode.Created)
{
throw new HttpException((int)response.StatusCode, response.StatusDescription);
}
var end = string.Empty;
using (StreamReader reader = new StreamReader(responseStream))
{
end = reader.ReadToEnd();
reader.Close();
success = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<bool>(end);
}
response.Close();
}
}
return success;
}
So now you have can POST JSON to an endpoint and receive a response the next step is to create the endpoint. The following code will get you started on an endpoint in mvc that will receive an application and process it.
[HttpPost]
public ActionResult SubmitApplication()
{
//Retrieve the POSTed payload
string body;
using (StreamReader reader = new StreamReader(Request.InputStream))
{
body = reader.ReadToEnd();
reader.Close();
}
var application = JsonConvert.Deserialize<Application>(body);
//Save the application
bool success = SaveApplication(application);
//Send the server a response of success or failure.
return Json(success);
}
The above code is a good start. Please note, I have not tested this code.

Answer 2

You have obviously more than one client for the data & operations. so a service is what you are looking for.
ASP.NET MVC is a good candidate for developing RESTful services. If you (and your Manager) are ready to use beta version, Then Checkout ASP.NET-Web API.
If you want to stay with a stable product, Go for MVC3. you may need to write some custom code to return the data in XML as well as JSON to server different kind of clients. There are some tutorials out there.
So create a Service (ASP.NET MVC / WCF Service) .You may then create 2 client apps, one for the external clients and another for the Internal users. Both of this apps can call methods in the Service to Create/ Read the user accounts / or whatever operation you want to do.
To make the apps more interactive and lively , you may conside including a wonderful thing called SiganalR, which helps you to get some real time data without continuosly polling the data base/ middle tier very in every n seconds !