creating WCF ChannelFactory<T>

Question

I'm trying to convert an existing .NET Remoting application to WCF. Both server and client share common interface and all objects are server-activated objects.

In WCF world, this would be similar to creating per-call service and using ChannelFactory<T> to create a proxy. I'm struggling a bit with how to properly create ChannelFactory<T> for an ASP.NET client.

For performance reasons, I want to cache ChannelFactory<T> objects and just create channel every time I call the service. In .NET remoting days, there used to be RemotingConfiguration.GetRegisteredWellknownClientTypes() method to get a collection of client objects that I could then cache. It appears, in WCF world there is no such thing, although I was able to get a collection of endpoints from config file.

Now here is what I think will work. I can create something like this:

public static ProxyHelper
{
    static Dictionary<Type, object> lookup = new Dictionary<string, object>();  

    static public T GetChannel<T>()
    {
        Type type = typeof(T);
        ChannelFactory<T> factory;

        if (!lookup.ContainsKey(type))
        {
            factory = new ChannelFactory<T>();
            lookup.Add(type, factory);
        }
        else
        {
            factory = (ChannelFactory<T>)lookup[type];
        }

        T proxy = factory.CreateChannel();   
        ((IClientChannel)proxy).Open();

        return proxy;
    }    
}

I think the above code will work, but I'm a bit worried about multiple threads trying to add new ChannelFactory<T> objects if it's not in the lookup. Since I'm using .NET 4.0, I was thinking about using ConcurrentDictionary and use GetOrAdd() method or use TryGetValue() method first to check if ChannelFactory<T> exists and it does not exist, then use GetOrAdd() method. Not sure about performance though of ConcurrentDictionary.TryGetValue() and ConcurrentDictionary.GetOrAdd() method.

Another minor question is whether I need to call ChannelFactory.Close() method on channel factory objects after ASP.NET application ends or can I just let .NET framework dispose the channel factory objects on its own. The proxy channel will always be closed after calling service method by using ((IChannel)proxy).Close() method.

Answer 1

Yes, if you want to create something like this - a static class to hold all those ChannelFactory<T> instances - you definitely have to make sure this class is 100% thread-safe and cannot stumble when accessed concurrently. I haven't used .NET 4's features much yet, so I cannot comment on those specifically - but I would definitely recommend to make this as safe as possible.

As for your second (minor) question: the ChannelFactory itself is a static class - so you cannot really call a .Close() method on it. If you meant to ask whether or not to call the .Close() method on the actual IChannel, then again: yes, try your best to be a good citizen and close those channels if you ever can. If you miss one, .NET will take care of it - but don't just toss your unused channels on the floor and go on - clean up after yourself! :-)

Answer 2

Here's a helper class that I use to handle channel factories:

public class ChannelFactoryManager : IDisposable
{
    private static Dictionary<Type, ChannelFactory> _factories = new Dictionary<Type,ChannelFactory>();
    private static readonly object _syncRoot = new object();

    public virtual T CreateChannel<T>() where T : class
    {
        return CreateChannel<T>("*", null);
    }

    public virtual T CreateChannel<T>(string endpointConfigurationName) where T : class
    {
        return CreateChannel<T>(endpointConfigurationName, null);
    }

    public virtual T CreateChannel<T>(string endpointConfigurationName, string endpointAddress) where T : class
    {
        T local = GetFactory<T>(endpointConfigurationName, endpointAddress).CreateChannel();
        ((IClientChannel)local).Faulted += ChannelFaulted;
        return local;
    }

    protected virtual ChannelFactory<T> GetFactory<T>(string endpointConfigurationName, string endpointAddress) where T : class
    {
        lock (_syncRoot)
        {
            ChannelFactory factory;
            if (!_factories.TryGetValue(typeof(T), out factory))
            {
                factory = CreateFactoryInstance<T>(endpointConfigurationName, endpointAddress);
                _factories.Add(typeof(T), factory);
            }
            return (factory as ChannelFactory<T>);
        }
    }

    private ChannelFactory CreateFactoryInstance<T>(string endpointConfigurationName, string endpointAddress)
    {
        ChannelFactory factory = null;
        if (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(endpointAddress))
        {
            factory = new ChannelFactory<T>(endpointConfigurationName, new EndpointAddress(endpointAddress));
        }
        else
        {
            factory = new ChannelFactory<T>(endpointConfigurationName);
        }
        factory.Faulted += FactoryFaulted;
        factory.Open();
        return factory;
    }

    private void ChannelFaulted(object sender, EventArgs e)
    {
        IClientChannel channel = (IClientChannel)sender;
        try
        {
            channel.Close();
        }
        catch
        {
            channel.Abort();
        }
        throw new ApplicationException("Exc_ChannelFailure");
    }

    private void FactoryFaulted(object sender, EventArgs args)
    {
        ChannelFactory factory = (ChannelFactory)sender;
        try
        {
            factory.Close();
        }
        catch
        {
            factory.Abort();
        }
        Type[] genericArguments = factory.GetType().GetGenericArguments();
        if ((genericArguments != null) && (genericArguments.Length == 1))
        {
            Type key = genericArguments[0];
            if (_factories.ContainsKey(key))
            {
                _factories.Remove(key);
            }
        }
        throw new ApplicationException("Exc_ChannelFactoryFailure");
    }

    public void Dispose()
    {
        Dispose(true);
    }

    protected virtual void Dispose(bool disposing)
    {
        if (disposing)
        {
            lock (_syncRoot)
            {
                foreach (Type type in _factories.Keys)
                {
                    ChannelFactory factory = _factories[type];
                    try
                    {
                        factory.Close();
                        continue;
                    }
                    catch
                    {
                        factory.Abort();
                        continue;
                    }
                }
                _factories.Clear();
            }
        }
    }
}

Then I define a service invoker:

public interface IServiceInvoker
{
    R InvokeService<T, R>(Func<T, R> invokeHandler) where T: class;
}

and an implementation:

public class WCFServiceInvoker : IServiceInvoker
{
    private static ChannelFactoryManager _factoryManager = new ChannelFactoryManager();
    private static ClientSection _clientSection = ConfigurationManager.GetSection("system.serviceModel/client") as ClientSection;

    public R InvokeService<T, R>(Func<T, R> invokeHandler) where T : class
    {
        var endpointNameAddressPair = GetEndpointNameAddressPair(typeof(T));
        T arg = _factoryManager.CreateChannel<T>(endpointNameAddressPair.Key, endpointNameAddressPair.Value);
        ICommunicationObject obj2 = (ICommunicationObject)arg;
        try
        {
            return invokeHandler(arg);
        }
        finally
        {
            try
            {
                if (obj2.State != CommunicationState.Faulted)
                {
                    obj2.Close();
                }
            }
            catch
            {
                obj2.Abort();
            }
        }
    }

    private KeyValuePair<string, string> GetEndpointNameAddressPair(Type serviceContractType)
    {
        var configException = new ConfigurationErrorsException(string.Format("No client endpoint found for type {0}. Please add the section <client><endpoint name=\"myservice\" address=\"http://address/\" binding=\"basicHttpBinding\" contract=\"{0}\"/></client> in the config file.", serviceContractType));
        if (((_clientSection == null) || (_clientSection.Endpoints == null)) || (_clientSection.Endpoints.Count < 1))
        {
            throw configException;
        }
        foreach (ChannelEndpointElement element in _clientSection.Endpoints)
        {
            if (element.Contract == serviceContractType.ToString())
            {
                return new KeyValuePair<string, string>(element.Name, element.Address.AbsoluteUri);
            }
        }
        throw configException;
    }

}

Now every time you need to call a WCF service you could use this:

WCFServiceInvoker invoker = new WCFServiceInvoker();
SomeReturnType result = invoker.InvokeService<IMyServiceContract, SomeReturnType>(
    proxy => proxy.SomeMethod()
);

This assumes that you've defined a client endpoint for the IMyServiceContract service contract in the config file:

<client>
    <endpoint 
        name="myservice" 
        address="http://example.com/" 
        binding="basicHttpBinding" 
        contract="IMyServiceContract" />
</client>

Answer 3

I didn't like the calling construction:

WCFServiceInvoker invoker = new WCFServiceInvoker();
var result = invoker.InvokeService<IClaimsService, ICollection<string>>(proxy => proxy.GetStringClaims());

Also you cannot use the same channel twice.

I've created this solution:

using(var i = Connection<IClaimsService>.Instance)
{           
   var result = i.Channel.GetStringClaims();
}

Now you can reuse the same channel until the using statement calls the dispose.

The GetChannel method is basicly a ChannelFactory.CreateChannel() with some extra config's I'm using.

You could build some caching for the ChannelFactory's as the other solutions does.

Code for the Connnection class:

public static class Connection<T>
   {
      public static ChannelHolder Instance
      {
         get
         {
            return new ChannelHolder();
         }
      }

      public class ChannelHolder : IDisposable
      {
         public T Channel { get; set; }

         public ChannelHolder()
         {
            this.Channel = GetChannel();
         }

         public void Dispose()
         {
            IChannel connection = null;
            try
            {
               connection = (IChannel)Channel;
               connection.Close();
            }
            catch (Exception)
            {
               if (connection != null)
               {
                  connection.Abort();
               }
            }
         }
      }
}

Answer 4

@NelsonRothermel, yes I went down the road of not using a try catch in the ChannelFactoryManager ChannelFaulted event handler. So ChannelFaulted would become

 private void ChannelFaulted(object sender, EventArgs e)
    {
        IClientChannel channel = (IClientChannel)sender;            
        channel.Abort();
    }

Seems to allow the original exception to bubble up. Also chose not to use channel.close as it seems to throw an exception as the channel is in a faulted state already. FactoryFaulted event handler may have similar issues. Btw @Darin, good bit of code...