Re: Contemporary frameworks to use for restful web services with SQL backend

[David Connors]

On Tue, 7 Jun 2016 at 10:09 Craig van Nieuwkerk  wrote:

> I agree with these points. It is slow enough to be unusable unless you are 
> *very
> *careful when designing the initial tables.
>

I am not sure what design is possible when you have one key and can select
by that key.

It is a hang over from v1 of Azure when the use case was everyone is going
to write the next Facepages or whatever.

Meanwhile in 2016, Azure SQL is well worth a look.

Yes, it costs more than 4 cents.

David.
-- 
David Connors
da...@connors.com | @davidconnors | LinkedIn | +61 417 189 363

Re: Contemporary frameworks to use for restful web services with SQL backend

[Greg Keogh]

>
> And here is a list of caveats for table storage:
>
Depending which side of the mirror you're looking through, many of your
caveats may be considered blessings, especially the "no enforced schema".
The absence of the features you listed is what makes the ATS API so
mercifully simple and useful in *certain scenarios*. Pick the right tool
for the job.

As a technical FYI aside: Over the last few weekends I converted a SQL Db
with 20 tables ranging from a dozen to 6 rows into Azure Tables. Almost
all of the work was done by T4 template generated code. I put the schema of
the tables and their joins into an Excel sheet and the T4 templates read it
to generate all the CRUD classes. I effectively wrote a weird mutated EF
for Azure tables (maybe there could be market for that?!). The generated
code even simulates joins so you can "deep load" an entity if you want. It
was just a technical exercise, but it's actually working and performing so
well that I think I'm going to drop the original SQL DB.

I would never have dared try that experiment on an app database requiring
the concurrency and high-performance that RDBs deliver.

*GK*

Re: Contemporary frameworks to use for restful web services with SQL backend

[Craig van Nieuwkerk]

I agree with these points. It is slow enough to be unusable unless you
are *very
*careful when designing the initial tables.

On Tue, Jun 7, 2016 at 9:46 AM, David Connors  wrote:

> On Mon, 6 Jun 2016 at 23:00 Greg Keogh  wrote:
>
>> I forgot to mention ... don't forget Azure Table Storage! I've been
>> really loving it recently and using it where a SQL Db would be overkill.
>> The API is dead simple, vast capacity, cheap, and build and runtime
>> dependencies are trivial -- *GregK*
>>
>
> Here is a list of good things about table storage:
>
>-
>
> And here is a list of caveats for table storage:
>
>
>- No support for complex queries.
>- Indexes only exist as clustered indexes on the primary key.
>- No support for computed aggregates.
>- No support for joins.
>- No support for server-side stored procedures.
>- No ACLs support so security trimming must be done manually in the
>application logic.
>- No enforced schema or types. Tables may vary shape on a row-by-row
>basis.
>- No support for transactions.
>
>  And slow.
>
> David.
>
>
> --
> David Connors
> da...@connors.com | @davidconnors | LinkedIn | +61 417 189 363
>

Re: Contemporary frameworks to use for restful web services with SQL backend

[Bec C]

Perfect for the government then lol

On Tue, Jun 7, 2016 at 9:46 AM, David Connors  wrote:

> On Mon, 6 Jun 2016 at 23:00 Greg Keogh  wrote:
>
>> I forgot to mention ... don't forget Azure Table Storage! I've been
>> really loving it recently and using it where a SQL Db would be overkill.
>> The API is dead simple, vast capacity, cheap, and build and runtime
>> dependencies are trivial -- *GregK*
>>
>
> Here is a list of good things about table storage:
>
>-
>
> And here is a list of caveats for table storage:
>
>
>- No support for complex queries.
>- Indexes only exist as clustered indexes on the primary key.
>- No support for computed aggregates.
>- No support for joins.
>- No support for server-side stored procedures.
>- No ACLs support so security trimming must be done manually in the
>application logic.
>- No enforced schema or types. Tables may vary shape on a row-by-row
>basis.
>- No support for transactions.
>
>  And slow.
>
> David.
>
>
> --
> David Connors
> da...@connors.com | @davidconnors | LinkedIn | +61 417 189 363
>

Re: Contemporary frameworks to use for restful web services with SQL backend

[David Connors]

On Mon, 6 Jun 2016 at 23:00 Greg Keogh  wrote:

> I forgot to mention ... don't forget Azure Table Storage! I've been really
> loving it recently and using it where a SQL Db would be overkill. The API
> is dead simple, vast capacity, cheap, and build and runtime dependencies
> are trivial -- *GregK*
>

Here is a list of good things about table storage:

   -

And here is a list of caveats for table storage:


   - No support for complex queries.
   - Indexes only exist as clustered indexes on the primary key.
   - No support for computed aggregates.
   - No support for joins.
   - No support for server-side stored procedures.
   - No ACLs support so security trimming must be done manually in the
   application logic.
   - No enforced schema or types. Tables may vary shape on a row-by-row
   basis.
   - No support for transactions.

 And slow.

David.


-- 
David Connors
da...@connors.com | @davidconnors | LinkedIn | +61 417 189 363

Re: Contemporary frameworks to use for restful web services with SQL backend

[Greg Keogh]

>
> Greg, am I correct in thinking azure table storage is only a cheaper
> option when the number of reads is light? Preet mentions he will need
> reporting and depending on how heavy those are hit azure table storage
> could get expensive.
>

Hmmm! I'm not sure as my demands have only reached the scale of "small
office app". I have not investigated if the transfer costs can be
significant over the storage costs when you push it hard. If anyone has
actually pushed Azure Tables to industrial levels of usage, please let us
know how it went -- *GK*

Re: Contemporary frameworks to use for restful web services with SQL backend

[Bec C]

Greg, am I correct in thinking azure table storage is only a cheaper option
when the number of reads is light? Preet mentions he will need reporting
and depending on how heavy those are hit azure table storage could get
expensive.

On Mon, Jun 6, 2016 at 10:59 PM, Greg Keogh  wrote:

> For the DB I suspect the latest entity framework will be sufficient but am
 open to ideas about other technologies that might not have been present
 when I last worked with it 5 years ago.

 This service will only be used in house, but might be housed in the
 cloud and security is a very high consideration.

>>>
> I forgot to mention ... don't forget Azure Table Storage! I've been really
> loving it recently and using it where a SQL Db would be overkill. The API
> is dead simple, vast capacity, cheap, and build and runtime dependencies
> are trivial -- *GregK*
>
>

Re: Contemporary frameworks to use for restful web services with SQL backend

[Greg Keogh]

>
> For the DB I suspect the latest entity framework will be sufficient but am
>>> open to ideas about other technologies that might not have been present
>>> when I last worked with it 5 years ago.
>>>
>>> This service will only be used in house, but might be housed in the
>>> cloud and security is a very high consideration.
>>>
>>
I forgot to mention ... don't forget Azure Table Storage! I've been really
loving it recently and using it where a SQL Db would be overkill. The API
is dead simple, vast capacity, cheap, and build and runtime dependencies
are trivial -- *GregK*

Re: Contemporary frameworks to use for restful web services with SQL backend

[Greg Keogh]

>
> It's seems to me that a restful one would be the simplest in terms of
> usage for all the clients (various tools and programs within the
> organisation).
>
> Personally I find them easier to work with when coding to them as clients,
> and I'll be writing the first client for this service too.
>

I thought that the basic idea of SOAP was great and enjoyed using it in
ASMX and the WCF basicHttp services for years. Using XML and a contract is
fundamentally simple and sensible idea (except the payloads were shocking
to look at). The wsdl and scvutil utilities generated all the plumbing for
you and it was all strongly typed. This is still a good choice for strictly
.NET clients and services, if you're luck enough to have them.

But now the "dis-integration" of mobile devices of different brands has
driven us to REST and JSON, and once again someone's hobby work or thesis
has become yet another standard (you can't have too many standards!).
Luckily there are nice libraries for various mobile platforms to make
consuming REST services quite easy.

Try creating an ASP.NET Web API project and building up your REST API. Then
good luck discovering how all the "secret plumbing
"
works (as I call it). These things are miracle ingredients once you know
how to use them:

ActionFilterAttribute
ExceptionFilterAttribute
HttpParameterBinding
AddQueryStringMapping

*Greg*

Re: Contemporary frameworks to use for restful web services with SQL backend

[Preet Sangha]

Thank you. I'll be managing the DB and it's a simple time recording store
that will be reported on using BI/Excel tools so practically trivial.

In terms of data a simple SQL Server Express/Local DB will be more that
enough - so I think a hosted SQL instance will be sufficient. Having spent
4 years doing BI stuff - this is definitely not a warehouse (;-)




regards,
Preet, in Auckland NZ


On 7 June 2016 at 00:08, DotNet Dude  wrote:

> AFAIK not much has changed. I've been out of the area for a while too.
>
> Start with web api and only go to wcf if web api is insufficient which I
> doubt it will be.
>
> DB side can depend on many things as you know like if you have an existing
> db you need to use, who manages the db (dba?), amount of data, more reads
> or more writes, table structure, etc. Azure SQL or (unlikely) another Azure
> storage mechanism may be an options.
>
>
> On Monday, 6 June 2016, Preet Sangha  wrote:
>
>> I've been out of .net Web stuff for many years and now need to build a
>> webservice with a sql backend. I've seen many posts on here from you guys
>> going web stuff and wondered if you could point me in the right direction
>> please?
>>
>> If I wanted to build .net based web cased service, would I need to use
>> WCF? Or is ASP.NET sufficient? If the latter what ASP.NET technology
>> should I be researching?
>>
>> For the DB I suspect the latest entity framework will be sufficient but
>> am open to ideas about other technologies that might not have been present
>> when I last worked with it 5 years ago.
>>
>> This service will only be used in house, but might be housed in the cloud
>> and security is a very high consideration.
>>
>> regards,
>> Preet, in Auckland NZ
>>
>>

Re: Contemporary frameworks to use for restful web services with SQL backend

[DotNet Dude]

AFAIK not much has changed. I've been out of the area for a while too.

Start with web api and only go to wcf if web api is insufficient which I
doubt it will be.

DB side can depend on many things as you know like if you have an existing
db you need to use, who manages the db (dba?), amount of data, more reads
or more writes, table structure, etc. Azure SQL or (unlikely) another Azure
storage mechanism may be an options.

On Monday, 6 June 2016, Preet Sangha  wrote:

> I've been out of .net Web stuff for many years and now need to build a
> webservice with a sql backend. I've seen many posts on here from you guys
> going web stuff and wondered if you could point me in the right direction
> please?
>
> If I wanted to build .net based web cased service, would I need to use
> WCF? Or is ASP.NET sufficient? If the latter what ASP.NET technology
> should I be researching?
>
> For the DB I suspect the latest entity framework will be sufficient but am
> open to ideas about other technologies that might not have been present
> when I last worked with it 5 years ago.
>
> This service will only be used in house, but might be housed in the cloud
> and security is a very high consideration.
>
> regards,
> Preet, in Auckland NZ
>
>

Re: Contemporary frameworks to use for restful web services with SQL backend

[Preet Sangha]

It's seems to me that a restful one would be the simplest in terms of usage
for all the clients (various tools and programs within the organisation).

Personally I find them easier to work with when coding to them as clients,
and I'll be writing the first client for this service too.


regards,
Preet, in Auckland NZ


On 6 June 2016 at 23:46, Greg Keogh  wrote:

> Have you decided on the style you need: SOAP and XML, or RESTful? -- *GK*
>
> On 6 June 2016 at 21:20, Preet Sangha  wrote:
>
>> I've been out of .net Web stuff for many years and now need to build a
>> webservice with a sql backend. I've seen many posts on here from you guys
>> going web stuff and wondered if you could point me in the right direction
>> please?
>>
>> If I wanted to build .net based web cased service, would I need to use
>> WCF? Or is ASP.NET sufficient? If the latter what ASP.NET technology
>> should I be researching?
>>
>> For the DB I suspect the latest entity framework will be sufficient but
>> am open to ideas about other technologies that might not have been present
>> when I last worked with it 5 years ago.
>>
>> This service will only be used in house, but might be housed in the cloud
>> and security is a very high consideration.
>>
>> regards,
>> Preet, in Auckland NZ
>>
>>
>

Re: Contemporary frameworks to use for restful web services with SQL backend

[Greg Keogh]

Have you decided on the style you need: SOAP and XML, or RESTful? -- *GK*

On 6 June 2016 at 21:20, Preet Sangha  wrote:

> I've been out of .net Web stuff for many years and now need to build a
> webservice with a sql backend. I've seen many posts on here from you guys
> going web stuff and wondered if you could point me in the right direction
> please?
>
> If I wanted to build .net based web cased service, would I need to use
> WCF? Or is ASP.NET sufficient? If the latter what ASP.NET technology
> should I be researching?
>
> For the DB I suspect the latest entity framework will be sufficient but am
> open to ideas about other technologies that might not have been present
> when I last worked with it 5 years ago.
>
> This service will only be used in house, but might be housed in the cloud
> and security is a very high consideration.
>
> regards,
> Preet, in Auckland NZ
>
>

Contemporary frameworks to use for restful web services with SQL backend

[Preet Sangha]

I've been out of .net Web stuff for many years and now need to build a
webservice with a sql backend. I've seen many posts on here from you guys
going web stuff and wondered if you could point me in the right direction
please?

If I wanted to build .net based web cased service, would I need to use WCF?
Or is ASP.NET sufficient? If the latter what ASP.NET technology should I be
researching?

For the DB I suspect the latest entity framework will be sufficient but am
open to ideas about other technologies that might not have been present
when I last worked with it 5 years ago.

This service will only be used in house, but might be housed in the cloud
and security is a very high consideration.

regards,
Preet, in Auckland NZ