Enable gzip/deflate compression - servicestack

I'm using ServiceStack (version 3.9.44.0) as a Windows Service (so I'm not using IIS) and I use both its abilities both as an API and for serving web pages.
However, I haven't been able to find how exactly I should enable compression when the client supports it.
I imagined that ServiceStack would transparently compress data if the client's request included the Accept-Encoding:gzip,deflate header, but I'm not seeing any corresponding Content-Encoding:gzip in the returned responses.
So I have a couple of related questions:
In the context of using ServiceStack as a standalone service (without IIS), how do I enable compression for the responses when the browser accepts it.
In the context of a C# client, how do similarly I ensure that communication between the client/server is compressed.
If I'm missing something, any help would be welcome.
Thank you.

If you want to enable compression globally across your API, another option is to do this:
Add this override to your AppHost:
public override IServiceRunner<TRequest> CreateServiceRunner<TRequest>(ActionContext actionContext)
{
return new MyServiceRunner<TRequest>(this, actionContext);
}
Then implement that class like this:
public class MyServiceRunner<TRequest> : ServiceRunner<TRequest>
{
public MyServiceRunner(IAppHost appHost, ActionContext actionContext) : base(appHost, actionContext)
{
}
public override void OnBeforeExecute(IRequestContext requestContext, TRequest request)
{
base.OnBeforeExecute(requestContext, request);
}
public override object OnAfterExecute(IRequestContext requestContext, object response)
{
if ((response != null) && !(response is CompressedResult))
response = requestContext.ToOptimizedResult(response);
return base.OnAfterExecute(requestContext, response);
}
public override object HandleException(IRequestContext requestContext, TRequest request, Exception ex)
{
return base.HandleException(requestContext, request, ex);
}
}
OnAfterExecute will be called and give you the chance to change the response. Here, I am compressing anything that is not null and not already compressed (in case I'm using ToOptimizedResultUsingCache somewhere). You can be more selective if you need to but in my case, I'm all POCO objects with json.
References
ServiceStack New Api

For those interested, a partial answer to my own question, you can use the extension method ToOptimizedResult() or, if you are using caching ToOptimizedResultUsingCache().
For instance, returning a compressed result:
public class ArticleService : Service
{
public object Get(Articles request) {
return base.RequestContext.ToOptimizedResult(
new List<Articles> {
new Article {Ref = "SILVER01", Description = "Silver watch"},
new Article {Ref = "GOLD1547", Description = "Gold Bracelet"}
});
}
}
References
CachedServices.cs example
CompressedResult.cs
Google Group question on Compression in ServiceStack

Related

How to change request headers in .NETCore2 implementations

For testing purposes I need to alter the Authorization header of an incoming HttpRequest - from Basic to Bearer (the processing is done in a ServiceStack plugin which acts during the PreRequestFilters phase).
This used to work in ServiceStack 4.5.x version (.NET Framework 4.6.2) but fails once I've upgraded the code to 5.0.2 and NETCore2.
Looking into the source code I see the NETCore implementation uses NetCoreRequest class for request implementation and NetCoreHeadersCollection class to implement the headers collection.
Unfortunately there's no way to alter the headers in the above mentioned collection, this is what I see in source code:
public override void Add(string name, string value) => throw new NotSupportedException();
public override void Clear() => throw new NotSupportedException();
public override void Remove(string name) => throw new NotSupportedException();
public override void Set(string key, string value) => throw new NotSupportedException();
Is there another way of altering the request headers before they hit the request filters and the service in NETCore implementation?
Thanks,
Emil Petrisor
You can access .NET Core's Request/Response header collections with:
PreRequestFilters.Add((httpReq, httpRes) => {
if (httpReq.OriginalRequest is HttpRequest coreReq)
{
coreReq.Headers[HttpHeaders.Authorization] = ...;
}
if (httpRes.OriginalResponse is HttpResponse coreRes)
{
var authHeader = coreRes.Headers[HttpHeaders.Authorization];
}
});

Passing user and auditing information in calls to Reliable Services in Service Fabric transport

How can I pass along auditing information between clients and services in an easy way without having to add that information as arguments for all service methods? Can I use message headers to set this data for a call?
Is there a way to allow service to pass that along downstream also, i.e., if ServiceA calls ServiceB that calls ServiceC, could the same auditing information be send to first A, then in A's call to B and then in B's call to C?
There is actually a concept of headers that are passed between client and service if you are using fabric transport for remoting. If you are using Http transport then you have headers there just as you would with any http request.
Note, below proposal is not the easiest solution, but it solves the issue once it is in place and it is easy to use then, but if you are looking for easy in the overall code base this might not be the way to go. If that is the case then I suggest you simply add some common audit info parameter to all your service methods. The big caveat there is of course when some developer forgets to add it or it is not set properly when calling down stream services. It's all about trade-offs, as alway in code :).
Down the rabbit hole
In fabric transport there are two classes that are involved in the communication: an instance of a IServiceRemotingClient on the client side, and an instance of IServiceRemotingListener on the service side. In each request from the client the messgae body and ServiceRemotingMessageHeaders are sent. Out of the box these headers include information of which interface (i.e. which service) and which method are being called (and that's also how the underlying receiver knows how to unpack that byte array that is the body). For calls to Actors, which goes through the ActorService, additional Actor information is also included in those headers.
The tricky part is hooking into that exchange and actually setting and then reading additional headers. Please bear with me here, it's a number of classes involved in this behind the curtains that we need to understand.
The service side
When you setup the IServiceRemotingListener for your service (example for a Stateless service) you usually use a convenience extension method, like so:
protected override IEnumerable<ServiceInstanceListener> CreateServiceInstanceListeners()
{
yield return new ServiceInstanceListener(context =>
this.CreateServiceRemotingListener(this.Context));
}
(Another way to do it would be to implement your own listener, but that's not really what we wan't to do here, we just wan't to add things on top of the existing infrastructure. See below for that approach.)
This is where we can provide our own listener instead, similar to what that extention method does behind the curtains. Let's first look at what that extention method does. It goes looking for a specific attribute on assembly level on your service project: ServiceRemotingProviderAttribute. That one is abstract, but the one that you can use, and which you will get a default instance of, if none is provided, is FabricTransportServiceRemotingProviderAttribute. Set it in AssemblyInfo.cs (or any other file, it's an assembly attribute):
[assembly: FabricTransportServiceRemotingProvider()]
This attribute has two interesting overridable methods:
public override IServiceRemotingListener CreateServiceRemotingListener(
ServiceContext serviceContext, IService serviceImplementation)
public override IServiceRemotingClientFactory CreateServiceRemotingClientFactory(
IServiceRemotingCallbackClient callbackClient)
These two methods are responsible for creating the the listener and the client factory. That means that it is also inspected by the client side of the transaction. That is why it is an attribute on assembly level for the service assembly, the client side can also pick it up together with the IService derived interface for the client we want to communicate with.
The CreateServiceRemotingListener ends up creating an instance FabricTransportServiceRemotingListener, however in this implementation we cannot set our own specific IServiceRemotingMessageHandler. If you create your own sub class of FabricTransportServiceRemotingProviderAttribute and override that then you can actually make it create an instance of FabricTransportServiceRemotingListener that takes in a dispatcher in the constructor:
public class AuditableFabricTransportServiceRemotingProviderAttribute :
FabricTransportServiceRemotingProviderAttribute
{
public override IServiceRemotingListener CreateServiceRemotingListener(
ServiceContext serviceContext, IService serviceImplementation)
{
var messageHandler = new AuditableServiceRemotingDispatcher(
serviceContext, serviceImplementation);
return (IServiceRemotingListener)new FabricTransportServiceRemotingListener(
serviceContext: serviceContext,
messageHandler: messageHandler);
}
}
The AuditableServiceRemotingDispatcher is where the magic happens. It is our own ServiceRemotingDispatcher subclass. Override the RequestResponseAsync (ignore HandleOneWay, it is not supported by service remoting, it throws an NotImplementedException if called), like this:
public class AuditableServiceRemotingDispatcher : ServiceRemotingDispatcher
{
public AuditableServiceRemotingDispatcher(ServiceContext serviceContext, IService service) :
base(serviceContext, service) { }
public override async Task<byte[]> RequestResponseAsync(
IServiceRemotingRequestContext requestContext,
ServiceRemotingMessageHeaders messageHeaders,
byte[] requestBodyBytes)
{
byte[] userHeader = null;
if (messageHeaders.TryGetHeaderValue("user-header", out auditHeader))
{
// Deserialize from byte[] and handle the header
}
else
{
// Throw exception?
}
byte[] result = null;
result = await base.RequestResponseAsync(requestContext, messageHeaders, requestBodyBytes);
return result;
}
}
Another, easier, but less flexible way, would be to directly create an instance of FabricTransportServiceRemotingListener with an instance of our custom dispatcher directly in the service:
protected override IEnumerable<ServiceInstanceListener> CreateServiceInstanceListeners()
{
yield return new ServiceInstanceListener(context =>
new FabricTransportServiceRemotingListener(this.Context, new AuditableServiceRemotingDispatcher(context, this)));
}
Why is this less flexible? Well, because using the attribute supports the client side as well, as we see below
The client side
Ok, so now we can read custom headers when receiving messages, how about setting those? Let's look at the other method of that attribute:
public override IServiceRemotingClientFactory CreateServiceRemotingClientFactory(IServiceRemotingCallbackClient callbackClient)
{
return (IServiceRemotingClientFactory)new FabricTransportServiceRemotingClientFactory(
callbackClient: callbackClient,
servicePartitionResolver: (IServicePartitionResolver)null,
traceId: (string)null);
}
Here we cannot just inject a specific handler or similar as for the service, we have to supply our own custom factory. In order not to have to reimplement the particulars of FabricTransportServiceRemotingClientFactory I simply encapsulate it in my own implementation of IServiceRemotingClientFactory:
public class AuditedFabricTransportServiceRemotingClientFactory : IServiceRemotingClientFactory, ICommunicationClientFactory<IServiceRemotingClient>
{
private readonly ICommunicationClientFactory<IServiceRemotingClient> _innerClientFactory;
public AuditedFabricTransportServiceRemotingClientFactory(ICommunicationClientFactory<IServiceRemotingClient> innerClientFactory)
{
_innerClientFactory = innerClientFactory;
_innerClientFactory.ClientConnected += OnClientConnected;
_innerClientFactory.ClientDisconnected += OnClientDisconnected;
}
private void OnClientConnected(object sender, CommunicationClientEventArgs<IServiceRemotingClient> e)
{
EventHandler<CommunicationClientEventArgs<IServiceRemotingClient>> clientConnected = this.ClientConnected;
if (clientConnected == null) return;
clientConnected((object)this, new CommunicationClientEventArgs<IServiceRemotingClient>()
{
Client = e.Client
});
}
private void OnClientDisconnected(object sender, CommunicationClientEventArgs<IServiceRemotingClient> e)
{
EventHandler<CommunicationClientEventArgs<IServiceRemotingClient>> clientDisconnected = this.ClientDisconnected;
if (clientDisconnected == null) return;
clientDisconnected((object)this, new CommunicationClientEventArgs<IServiceRemotingClient>()
{
Client = e.Client
});
}
public async Task<IServiceRemotingClient> GetClientAsync(
Uri serviceUri,
ServicePartitionKey partitionKey,
TargetReplicaSelector targetReplicaSelector,
string listenerName,
OperationRetrySettings retrySettings,
CancellationToken cancellationToken)
{
var client = await _innerClientFactory.GetClientAsync(
serviceUri,
partitionKey,
targetReplicaSelector,
listenerName,
retrySettings,
cancellationToken);
return new AuditedFabricTransportServiceRemotingClient(client);
}
public async Task<IServiceRemotingClient> GetClientAsync(
ResolvedServicePartition previousRsp,
TargetReplicaSelector targetReplicaSelector,
string listenerName,
OperationRetrySettings retrySettings,
CancellationToken cancellationToken)
{
var client = await _innerClientFactory.GetClientAsync(
previousRsp,
targetReplicaSelector,
listenerName,
retrySettings,
cancellationToken);
return new AuditedFabricTransportServiceRemotingClient(client);
}
public Task<OperationRetryControl> ReportOperationExceptionAsync(
IServiceRemotingClient client,
ExceptionInformation exceptionInformation,
OperationRetrySettings retrySettings,
CancellationToken cancellationToken)
{
return _innerClientFactory.ReportOperationExceptionAsync(
client,
exceptionInformation,
retrySettings,
cancellationToken);
}
public event EventHandler<CommunicationClientEventArgs<IServiceRemotingClient>> ClientConnected;
public event EventHandler<CommunicationClientEventArgs<IServiceRemotingClient>> ClientDisconnected;
}
This implementation simply passes along anything heavy lifting to the underlying factory, while returning it's own auditable client that similarily encapsulates a IServiceRemotingClient:
public class AuditedFabricTransportServiceRemotingClient : IServiceRemotingClient, ICommunicationClient
{
private readonly IServiceRemotingClient _innerClient;
public AuditedFabricTransportServiceRemotingClient(IServiceRemotingClient innerClient)
{
_innerClient = innerClient;
}
~AuditedFabricTransportServiceRemotingClient()
{
if (this._innerClient == null) return;
var disposable = this._innerClient as IDisposable;
disposable?.Dispose();
}
Task<byte[]> IServiceRemotingClient.RequestResponseAsync(ServiceRemotingMessageHeaders messageHeaders, byte[] requestBody)
{
messageHeaders.SetUser(ServiceRequestContext.Current.User);
messageHeaders.SetCorrelationId(ServiceRequestContext.Current.CorrelationId);
return this._innerClient.RequestResponseAsync(messageHeaders, requestBody);
}
void IServiceRemotingClient.SendOneWay(ServiceRemotingMessageHeaders messageHeaders, byte[] requestBody)
{
messageHeaders.SetUser(ServiceRequestContext.Current.User);
messageHeaders.SetCorrelationId(ServiceRequestContext.Current.CorrelationId);
this._innerClient.SendOneWay(messageHeaders, requestBody);
}
public ResolvedServicePartition ResolvedServicePartition
{
get { return this._innerClient.ResolvedServicePartition; }
set { this._innerClient.ResolvedServicePartition = value; }
}
public string ListenerName
{
get { return this._innerClient.ListenerName; }
set { this._innerClient.ListenerName = value; }
}
public ResolvedServiceEndpoint Endpoint
{
get { return this._innerClient.Endpoint; }
set { this._innerClient.Endpoint = value; }
}
}
Now, in here is where we actually (and finally) set the audit name that we want to pass along to the service.
Call chains and service request context
One final piece of the puzzle, the ServiceRequestContext, which is a custom class that allows us to handle an ambient context for a service request call. This is relevant because it gives us an easy way to propagate that context information, like the user or a correlation id (or any other header information we want to pass between client and service), in a chain of calls. The implementation ServiceRequestContext looks like:
public sealed class ServiceRequestContext
{
private static readonly string ContextKey = Guid.NewGuid().ToString();
public ServiceRequestContext(Guid correlationId, string user)
{
this.CorrelationId = correlationId;
this.User = user;
}
public Guid CorrelationId { get; private set; }
public string User { get; private set; }
public static ServiceRequestContext Current
{
get { return (ServiceRequestContext)CallContext.LogicalGetData(ContextKey); }
internal set
{
if (value == null)
{
CallContext.FreeNamedDataSlot(ContextKey);
}
else
{
CallContext.LogicalSetData(ContextKey, value);
}
}
}
public static Task RunInRequestContext(Func<Task> action, Guid correlationId, string user)
{
Task<Task> task = null;
task = new Task<Task>(async () =>
{
Debug.Assert(ServiceRequestContext.Current == null);
ServiceRequestContext.Current = new ServiceRequestContext(correlationId, user);
try
{
await action();
}
finally
{
ServiceRequestContext.Current = null;
}
});
task.Start();
return task.Unwrap();
}
public static Task<TResult> RunInRequestContext<TResult>(Func<Task<TResult>> action, Guid correlationId, string user)
{
Task<Task<TResult>> task = null;
task = new Task<Task<TResult>>(async () =>
{
Debug.Assert(ServiceRequestContext.Current == null);
ServiceRequestContext.Current = new ServiceRequestContext(correlationId, user);
try
{
return await action();
}
finally
{
ServiceRequestContext.Current = null;
}
});
task.Start();
return task.Unwrap<TResult>();
}
}
This last part was much influenced by the SO answer by Stephen Cleary. It gives us an easy way to handle the ambient information down a hierarcy of calls, weather they are synchronous or asyncronous over Tasks. Now, with this we have a way of setting that information also in the Dispatcher on the service side:
public override Task<byte[]> RequestResponseAsync(
IServiceRemotingRequestContext requestContext,
ServiceRemotingMessageHeaders messageHeaders,
byte[] requestBody)
{
var user = messageHeaders.GetUser();
var correlationId = messageHeaders.GetCorrelationId();
return ServiceRequestContext.RunInRequestContext(async () =>
await base.RequestResponseAsync(
requestContext,
messageHeaders,
requestBody),
correlationId, user);
}
(GetUser() and GetCorrelationId() are just helper methods that gets and unpacks the headers set by the client)
Having this in place means that any new client created by the service for any aditional call will also have the sam headers set, so in the scenario ServiceA -> ServiceB -> ServiceC we will still have the same user set in the call from ServiceB to ServiceC.
what? that easy? yes ;)
From inside a service, for instance a Stateless OWIN web api, where you first capture the user information, you create an instance of ServiceProxyFactoryand wrap that call in a ServiceRequestContext:
var task = ServiceRequestContext.RunInRequestContext(async () =>
{
var serviceA = ServiceProxyFactory.CreateServiceProxy<IServiceA>(new Uri($"{FabricRuntime.GetActivationContext().ApplicationName}/ServiceA"));
await serviceA.DoStuffAsync(CancellationToken.None);
}, Guid.NewGuid(), user);
Ok, so to sum it up - you can hook into the service remoting to set your own headers. As we see above there is some work that needs to be done to get a mechanism for that in place, mainly creating your own subclasses of the underlying infrastructure. The upside is that once you have this in place, then you have a very easy way for auditing your service calls.

Is it possible to make servicestack use an unbuffered response stream?

I want to send messages back to a client via a stream. I want the client to start processing these messages as soon as possible (before the server has completed the streaming on the server side).
I have implemented IStreamWriter and I have a service which returns the IStreamWriter implementation.
public class StreamingService : Service
{
public object Any(MyStreamRequest request)
{
return new MyStreamWriter(request);
}
}
Where MyStreamRequest is defined like this:
[DataContract]
public class StreamRequest : IReturn<Stream>
{
[DataMember]
public int HowManySecondsToProduceData { get; set; }
}
When I test my implementation in a self-hosted environment it works perfectly. However, when I host this in IIS, the get call from the client
var client = new ProtoBufServiceClient("");
Stream stream = client.Get(new StreamRequest { HowManySecondsToProduceData = 20};
does not return until the IStreamWriter.WriteTo call returns (20 seconds in the sample above). This prevents my client from processing the stream right away and will also cause failure in high volume cases. I do call responseStream.Flush() inside my IStreamWriter.WriteTo implementation.
Does anybody have any insight on why this does not work in the IIS scenario, but only for the self hosted case? What do I need to do differently?
It seems like a likely cause of this problem is that the servicestack response stream is set to use buffering. I cannot find a way to change this though. Is it possible?
You just need to disable ASP.Nets response buffering:
public class NoBufferAttribute : RequestFilterAttribute
{
public override void Execute( IHttpRequest req, IHttpResponse res, object requestDto )
{
var originalResponse = (System.Web.HttpResponse)res.OriginalResponse;
originalResponse.BufferOutput = false;
}
}
John
I found a solution myself: The solution to this problem is quite simple: Call IHttpResponse Flush() inside the IStreamWriter.WriteTo implementation when you want to send data to the client. You get the IHttpResponse by calling base.Response inside the Service implementation.

How would I change a ServiceStack response DTO

I'm working on an API where I'd like to be able to customize the response structure based on a parameter from the client. Response filters seem like a good place to do this in order to avoid doing so in each service or action. The problem is that while I have access to the response DTO returned by the action, and could change its properties, I can't find how or where to replace the object entirely.
Naively replacing the object in the response filter did not work, but this help illustrate what I'm trying to do:
public class ChangeResponseAttribute : ResponseFilterAttribute
{
public override void Execute(IHttpRequest req, IHttpResponse res, object responseDto)
{
var overrideText = req.QueryString["override"];
if (!String.IsNullOrEmpty(overrideText))
responseDto = new { Message = overrideText };
}
}
[ChangeResponse]
public class TodosService : Service
{
public object Get(Todos request)
{
return new object[0];
}
}
It looks like another option would be to write the custom response directly & end the request, but that would bypass any other processing left to do by ServiceStack.
Is there a better place to do this than a response filter? Or do I need to bite the bullet and return the optimal DTO in each action?
You can't change the Response DTO in a filter, but yes one option is to write the response in the filter itself (see this answer for an example of how to do this).
The other option is to use a ServiceRunner and override the OnAfterExecute() custom hook which does let you modify the response returned, e.g:
public class MyServiceRunner<T> : ServiceRunner<T>
{
public override object OnAfterExecute(
IRequestContext requestContext, object response)
{
// Called just after any Action is executed
var overrideText = req.Get<IHttpRequest>().QueryString["override"];
return !string.IsNullOrEmpty(overrideText)
? new { Message = overrideText } : null;
}
}
To get ServiceStack to use it you need to override the CreateServiceRunner method in your AppHost, e.g:
public override IServiceRunner<TRequest> CreateServiceRunner<TRequest>(
ActionContext actionContext)
{
return new MyServiceRunner<TRequest>(this, actionContext);
}

Implementing System.Web.Http.WebHost.WebHostBufferPolicySelector.IHostBufferPolicySelector

I am trying to following this web blog on uploading large files using the Web Api class via Asp.Net Web Forms. If you look through the post you will notice that in order to avoid an out of memory because of buffering of larges files, they recommend overriding the IHostBufferPolicySelector interface. Where do I implement the interface? Do I do it in the Web Api class, in the Global.asax or am I completely off track and need to do the implementation somewhere else?
You don't need to implement this interface, I only listed it as a reference - that code is already part of Web API source (under System.Web.Http/Hosting/IHostBufferPolicySelector.cs)
What you need to do is override the base class System.Web.Http.WebHost.WebHostBufferPolicySelector
This is enough:
public class NoBufferPolicySelector : WebHostBufferPolicySelector
{
public override bool UseBufferedInputStream(object hostContext)
{
var context = hostContext as HttpContextBase;
if (context != null)
{
if (string.Equals(context.Request.RequestContext.RouteData.Values["controller"].ToString(), "uploading", StringComparison.InvariantCultureIgnoreCase))
return false;
}
return true;
}
public override bool UseBufferedOutputStream(HttpResponseMessage response)
{
return base.UseBufferedOutputStream(response);
}
}
and then registering your new class in either Global.asax or WebApiConfig.cs (whichever you prefer):
GlobalConfiguration.Configuration.Services.Replace(typeof(IHostBufferPolicySelector), new NoBufferPolicySelector());

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