DefaultInlineConstraintResolver Error in WebAPI 2

Question

I'm using Web API 2 and I'm getting the following error when I send a POST to my API method using IIS 7.5 on my local box.

The inline constraint resolver of type 'DefaultInlineConstraintResolver' was unable to resolve the following inline constraint: 'string'.

Line 21: GlobalConfiguration.Configuration.EnsureInitialized();

None of my APIs work using IIS. However, I'm able to run my API project in Visual Studio using IIS Express and successfully make a POST to my login API, but when I try and make a GET request to another API call, I get the constraint resolver error.

In order to troubleshoot this, I created a brand new Web API 2 project in Visual Studio and started importing the existing APIs into the new project one at a time and running them to ensure they work. Using IIS Express with this new project, I get the same exact results as I did with my existing API project.

What am I missing here? Even with a brand new project I'm not able to make GET requests without running into this constraint resolver issue.

Answer 1

The error means that somewhere in a Route, you specified something like

[Route("SomeRoute/{someparameter:string}")]

"string" is not needed as it is the assumed type if nothing else is specified.

As the error indicates, the DefaultInlineConstraintResolver that Web API ships with does not have an inline constraint called string. The default supported ones are the following:

// Type-specific constraints
{ "bool", typeof(BoolRouteConstraint) },
{ "datetime", typeof(DateTimeRouteConstraint) },
{ "decimal", typeof(DecimalRouteConstraint) },
{ "double", typeof(DoubleRouteConstraint) },
{ "float", typeof(FloatRouteConstraint) },
{ "guid", typeof(GuidRouteConstraint) },
{ "int", typeof(IntRouteConstraint) },
{ "long", typeof(LongRouteConstraint) },

// Length constraints
{ "minlength", typeof(MinLengthRouteConstraint) },
{ "maxlength", typeof(MaxLengthRouteConstraint) },
{ "length", typeof(LengthRouteConstraint) },

// Min/Max value constraints
{ "min", typeof(MinRouteConstraint) },
{ "max", typeof(MaxRouteConstraint) },
{ "range", typeof(RangeRouteConstraint) },

// Regex-based constraints
{ "alpha", typeof(AlphaRouteConstraint) },
{ "regex", typeof(RegexRouteConstraint) }