You can get pretty close to this using schema inheritence (which maps to
class inheritence) instead of using interfaces. The short of it is that
the web service standards do not support interfaces, so the extension of
this is that the CLR web service tooling and infrastructure also has no way
to support your requirement at the moment.
I hope this helps
Dan Rogers
Microsoft Corporation
--------------------
Thread-Topic: webmethod returning interface or receiving an interface param
thread-index: AcTONicxHSMzv+4sQzeeqjry2/u8UA==
X-WBNR-Posting-Host: 81.193.248.227
From: "=?Utf-8?B?TFM=?=" <LS@discussions.microsoft.com>
References: <DF**********************************@microsoft.co m>
<#n**************@TK2MSFTNGP10.phx.gbl>
<83**********************************@microsoft.co m>
<#Y**************@TK2MSFTNGP10.phx.gbl>
Subject: Re: webmethod returning interface or receiving an interface param
Date: Fri, 19 Nov 2004 04:49:05 -0800
Lines: 122
Message-ID: <77**********************************@microsoft.co m>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain;
charset="Utf-8"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
X-Newsreader: Microsoft CDO for Windows 2000
Content-Class: urn:content-classes:message
Importance: normal
Priority: normal
X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V6.00.3790.0
Newsgroups: microsoft.public.dotnet.framework.webservices
NNTP-Posting-Host: TK2MSFTNGXA03.phx.gbl 10.40.1.29
Path:
cpmsftngxa10.phx.gbl!TK2MSFTNGXA06.phx.gbl!cpmsftn gxa06.phx.gbl!TK2MSFTNGP08
phx.gbl!TK2MSFTNGXA03.phx.gbl
Xref: cpmsftngxa10.phx.gbl
microsoft.public.dotnet.framework.webservices:7556
X-Tomcat-NG: microsoft.public.dotnet.framework.webservices
Hello
That's the conclusion. It's a limitation in the XML Serializer.
1. It compiles OK.
2. When starting the WebService application, it throws the exception.
Why we need to specify parameters and return objects as Interfaces ?
We have a complex and huge application, where some Assemblies are
replaceable dynamically . So we need to take full advantage of object
oriented features. That's why we need the Interfaces.
When accessing Assembly A thru A's Interface (defined in Assembly IA), from
Assembly B, this strategy works ok, as in any other OO language.
When exposing A thru a Web Service, we have the problem. The XML Serializer
is not capable of doing with an Interface, the very same it does with a
class. There is no reason for that. The only limitation is that microsoft
didn't see this, and didn't implement it.
The direct consequence, is one big problem.
Solution 1: Not take full advantage of OO features
Solution 2: Have a second definition of a property in the class
implementation
public Interface IEntity
{
IPhones phones {get; set; }
}
in the class that implements the interface
public class Entity: IEntity
{
[XmlIgnore]
IPhones IEntity.phones {get ..... ; set ...... ; } // Interface for
other Assemblies
public Phones phones {get ...... ; set ...... ; } // For the
WebService,... not very nice...
}
What we hope: VisualStudio.NET 2005 ===> please, look into this...
Best regards
LS
"Drew Marsh" wrote:
LS wrote:
"....interfaces have no real correlation in XML schema..."
In an interface you can declare public properties
If a class has public properties, the Serializer works ok. We were
expecting the same, using the interface....
Sure, but you're serializing the class, not the interface, in that case.
All the web method knows about here is the interface, it has no clue what
concrete types you're going to hand it and there's no way to decorate your
interface with XmlIncludeAttribute since it's only applicable to classes
(not interfaces). This is not even a web service limitation, it's an XML
serializer limitation. The web service is just trying to use the
XmlSerializer and ends up getting this exception:
[NotSupportedException: Cannot serialize interface TestWebService.IFoo.]
System.Xml.Serialization.TypeScope.ImportTypeDesc( Type type, Boolean
canBePrimitive, MemberInfo memberInfo) System.Xml.Serialization.TypeScope.GetTypeDesc(Typ e type, MemberInfo
source, Boolean directReference) System.Xml.Serialization.TypeScope.GetTypeDesc(Typ e type)
System.Xml.Serialization.XmlReflectionImporter.Imp ortMemberMapping(XmlReflec
tionMember xmlReflectionMember, String ns, XmlReflectionMember[]
xmlReflectionMembers)
System.Xml.Serialization.XmlReflectionImporter.Imp ortMembersMapping(XmlRefle
ctionMember[] xmlReflectionMembers, String ns, Boolean hasWrapperElement)
Next, the XML serializer won't even look at attributes on interfaces. For
example if you have something like:
public interface IFoo
{
[XmlAttribute("name")]
string Name { get; set; }
}
[XmlRoot("foo", Namespace="http://test.com/fooschema.xsd")]
[XmlType("FooA", Namespace="http://test.com/fooschema.xsd")]
public sealed class FooA : IFoo
{
private string name;
#region IFoo Members
public string Name
{
get
{
return this.name;
}
set
{
this.name = value;
}
}
#endregion
}
That class will serialize to:
<foo xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema"
xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
xmlns="http://test.com/fooschema.xsd"> <Name>Test Foo!</Name>
</foo>
Notice the <Name> as opposed to what I decorated the IFoo as? If it
obeyed IFoo's serialization attributes it would have looked like this (an
attribute instead):
<foo xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema"
xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
xmlns="http://test.com/fooschema.xsd" name="Test Foo!"/>
HTH,
Drew
