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Creating a web service without an ASMX file?

Answer 1

A:

Short answer is no. The ASMX is the entry point for any web service. There are alternatives if you use WCF, but that's not entirely the same thing.

Chris 2008-11-27 18:36:58

Sorry you didn't like the answer, but it IS the answer.

Chris 2008-11-27 21:46:48

Except for its not. You can put web services in a class library and wire them up with the web.config.

John Sheehan 2008-11-28 02:16:04

Except it is. I said the *short* answer is no. And you cannot host a regular web service without the .asmx file. The article to which you link surely describes a work around, but it is non-standard, and quite a verbose (as in, not short) solution.

Chris 2008-11-28 03:31:41

Actually, the article is quite short and easy to implement. I think the total amount of code not including white space is < 10 lines. How is that "long"? I also fail to see how it's non-standard. It does not make use of any hidden APIs, it invokes no warnings from Microsoft. It's quite simple and I am now using it quite successfully.

ryber 2010-01-11 15:53:37

Indeed Microsoft often has what I call the "non-programmer" way and programmer way of doing the same thing. Often the former involves GUI and/or drag-a-drop so they can market the technology to the masses as "easy to implement!" (like an empty, redundant ASMX file in the source tree). Of course the latter way is often not focused on as much. But for sure, don't mix it up with "non-standard" or think the pure programming way is wrong or complex.

John K 2010-05-26 12:44:45

Answer 2

+4 A:

Try something like this. I don't know if it will work though. I got this idea from ELMAH, which creates a handler for a page that doesn't physically exist and then serves it up from the assembly.

<configuration>
   <system.web>
      <httpHandlers>
         <add verb="*" path="*WebService.asmx" type="MyHandler.WebServiceHandler, MyHandler" />
      </httpHandlers>
   </system.web>
</configuration>

EDIT: I was close, see this article (in VB though): http://www.codeproject.com/KB/aspnet/wsinaclasslibrary.aspx

John Sheehan 2008-11-27 18:42:24

Perfect, been looking for this for a long time

ryber 2010-01-04 23:32:01

Answer 3

A:

Consider trying page methods (see this blog post). All you have to do is add the web method attribute to a static method in the aspx code behind. Then access the PageMethod object from your clientside code (javascript). No ASMX files needed. Hope this helps.

Darwyn 2008-11-28 06:12:22

Answer 4

A:

I know this is very old question, but it hasn't been answered properly, so here it is:

Every *.ASMX request is by default handled by System.Web.Services.Protocols.WebServiceHandlerFactory.

Looking into source code of this class in .NET reflector, it's possible to have webservice without ASMX file but you will need to call internal method CoreGetHandler through reflection.

Following method will take your webservice and return its IHttpHandler.

public IHttpHandler GetHttpHandlerForWebService(WebService webService, HttpContext context)
{
    var webServiceType = webService.GetType();
    var wshf = new System.Web.Services.Protocols.WebServiceHandlerFactory();
    var coreGetHandler = wshf.GetType().GetMethod("CoreGetHandler");
    var httpHandler = (IHttpHandler)coreGetHandler.Invoke(wshf, new object[] { webServiceType, context, context.Request, context.Response });
    return httpHandler;
}

Once you have your httphandler, it's just matter of calling

httpHandler.ProcessRequest(context)

Done. No ASMX and no web.config entries.

lubos hasko 2010-01-05 08:54:14

Can you explain where this code would go? Your client code needs to have an accessible URL. If there is no ASMX placeholder or httpHandler defined in web.config, what is the entrypoint URL?

Nelson 2010-10-29 14:59:12

This method (specifying an httpHandler in web.config) works well for the most part, but the `[System.Web.Script.Services.ScriptService]` attribute seems to be ignored. JSON sent to the server throws an exception (invalid format) and `MyService.asmx/js` or `MyService.asmx/jsdebug` return a 500 (in IE) or 401 authentication failed error. With a placeholder .asmx, these problems go away.

Nelson 2010-10-29 20:51:13

@nelson, if you have IIS in integrated mode, all http requests go through ASP.NET engine (even without web.config or asmx placeholder files). so basically what you need to do is to override one of the asp.net life-cycle methods such as `Init` and inject your httpHandler by calling `httpHandler.ProcessRequest(context)`. Obviously you will need to have variable `httpHandler` already set. that's why I provided method that will convert your webservice class into generic `IHttpHandler`.

lubos hasko 2010-10-29 23:34:32

Answer 5

A:

AJAX friendly version:

http://www.codeproject.com/KB/cpp/WebserviceAndJavaProxy.aspx

Luc 2010-02-11 10:01:15

(nothing against you, the link is now 404)

Luk 2010-08-03 12:21:08

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Creating a web service without an ASMX file?

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