C# SOAP Complex Type Argument

Question

I am working on a SOAP Client in C#, consuming a service I've exposed in PHP using NuSoap. My web service is working great from a consumption standpoint, but the trouble I'm running into has to do with passing a complex type as an argument.

Working with a complex type returned by a method is no trouble, but I can't seem to figure out how to actually manipulate my complex type in C#.

Unless someone actually requests it, I'll spare the lengthy WSDL for now. But the complex type I'm trying to work with is a list of another complex type. What I need to do in my C# app is add and remove items from the list, but I can't seem to figure out how.

Could anyone point me in the right direction? More information can be provided upon request.

Answer 1

So, this is how I read this:

//instantiate proxy

var commandList = getCommands(authToken);

//build an array of new commands

var commands = new [] { new Command { id = "SomeID", command = "SomeCommand" } /*, etc.*/ } };

//assign commands to your list

commandList.Commands = commands;

//do something with the commandList object

If you are generating the proxy in Visual Studio, there is an option to turn the arrays into strongly typed List objects (Add Service Reference -> Advanced -> Collection type: System.Collections.Generic.List). This way you can just call commandList.Add().

Also, I don't know why the name of the type that is returned from getCommands() is List.

Answer 2

Are you unsure how to actually use the C# SOAP client which has been generated for you?

Something like this should work...

// Edit an existing file command.
using (var client = new mysiteServicePortTypeClient()) {
    string auth = client.doAuth("user", "pass");
    List l = client.getCommands(auth); // get all of the Command[] arrays
    Command file = l.files[0]; // edit the first Command in the "files" array (will crash if Length == 0, of course
    file.command = "new command"; // since the Command is in the array, this property change will stick
    client.submitResults(auth, l); // send back the same arrays we received, with one altered Command instance
}

[Edit] As Nicholas infers in his answer, your SOAP service definition should avoid using common type names such as "List" because it will conflict with System.Collections.Generic.List<T>.