passing collection or array type input parameter wcf service

Question

I have written a WCf Service which has a Collection type input body parameter and another parameter as query string as following:

[WebInvoke(Method = "PUT", UriTemplate = "users/role/{userID}",BodyStyle=WebMessageBodyStyle.WrappedRequest)]
[OperationContract]
public bool AssignUserRole(int userID,Collection<int> roleIDs)
{
    //do something
    return restult;
}

Now when I am trying to pass this parameter I am getting de serializing error. I have tried following format:

<AssignUserRole xmlns="http://tempuri.org/">
 <roleIDs>
  <roleID>7</roleID>
 </roleIDs>
</AssignUserRole>

<AssignUserRole xmlns="http://tempuri.org/">
 <ArrayOfroleID>
  <roleID>7</roleID>
 </ArrayOfroleID>
</AssignUserRole>

<AssignUserRole xmlns="http://tempuri.org/">
 <ArrayOfint> 
  <int>7</int>
 </ArrayOfint>
</AssignUserRole>

Can some one help me how can I pass this Array(Collection type Body parameter)?

Thanks.

Answer 1

The correct format would be this:

<AssignUserRole xmlns="http://tempuri.org/">
  <roleIDs xmlns:a="http://schemas.microsoft.com/2003/10/Serialization/Arrays">     
    <a:int>7</a:int>
    <a:int>8</a:int>
  </roleIDs>
</AssignUserRole>

One easy way to find out what the expected format is for a certain operation is to use a WCF client with the same contract, send a message with it and look at the operation using Fiddler. The program below does that.

public class StackOverflow_6339286
{
    [ServiceContract]
    public interface ITest
    {
        [WebInvoke(Method = "PUT", UriTemplate = "users/role/{userID}", BodyStyle = WebMessageBodyStyle.WrappedRequest)]
        [OperationContract]
        bool AssignUserRole(string userID, Collection<int> roleIDs);
    }
    public class Service : ITest
    {
        public bool AssignUserRole(string userID, Collection<int> roleIDs)
        {
            return true;
        }
    }
    public static void Test()
    {
        string baseAddress = "http://" + Environment.MachineName + ":8000/Service";
        WebServiceHost host = new WebServiceHost(typeof(Service), new Uri(baseAddress));
        host.Open();
        Console.WriteLine("Host opened");

        WebChannelFactory<ITest> factory = new WebChannelFactory<ITest>(new Uri(baseAddress));
        ITest proxy = factory.CreateChannel();

        proxy.AssignUserRole("1234", new Collection<int> { 1, 2, 3, 4 });

        ((IClientChannel)proxy).Close();
        factory.Close();

        Console.Write("Press ENTER to close the host");
        Console.ReadLine();
        host.Close();
    }
}

Also notice that there's a problem in your UriTemplate: the path variable {userId} cannot be of type int (it must be a string). This is fixed in the sample code above.

One more thing: if you don't want to use the default namespace for collections / arrays, you can use a [CollectionDataContract] class to change it. If instead of using Collection you used the class below, then the first body you tried should work:

[CollectionDataContract(Namespace = "http://tempuri.org/", ItemName = "roleID")]
public class MyCollection : Collection<int> { }