What is the best way to return multiple values from a WCF service

Question

What is the best way to return multiple values from a WCF service?

Answer 1

First of all, this must be a duplicate.

Just create a class with properties for the values. Make the class a [DataContract] and the properties [DataMember]. Return an isntance of that class. Works on all clients.

Answer 2

In a separate object, e.g.:

public class DTO
{
   public string Data1 { get; set;}
   public string Data2 { get; set;}
}

and you then return an instance of DTO from the method.

Answer 3

Either wrap them in a separate class that will be decorated with [DataContract] and return it from your method or use out parameters in your method call.