WebAPI v2.1 and beyond supports BSON (Binary JSON) out of the box, and even has a MediaTypeFormatter
included for it. This means you can post your entire message in binary format.
If you want to use it, you’ll need to set it in WebApiConfig
:
public static class WebApiConfig
{
public static void Register(HttpConfiguration config)
{
config.Formatters.Add(new BsonMediaTypeFormatter());
}
}
Now, you an use the same BsonMediaTypeFormatter
at the client side to serialize your request:
public async Task SendRequestAsync()
{
var client = new HttpClient
{
BaseAddress = new Uri("http://www.yourserviceaddress.com");
};
// Set the Accept header for BSON.
client.DefaultRequestHeaders.Accept.Clear();
client.DefaultRequestHeaders.Accept.Add(
new MediaTypeWithQualityHeaderValue("application/bson"));
var request = new SomePostRequest
{
Id = 20,
Content = new byte[] { 2, 5, 7, 10 }
};
// POST using the BSON formatter.
MediaTypeFormatter bsonFormatter = new BsonMediaTypeFormatter();
var result = await client.PostAsync("api/SomeData/Incoming", request, bsonFormatter);
result.EnsureSuccessStatusCode();
}
Or, you can use Json.NET to serialize your class to BSON. Then, specify you want to use “application/bson” as your “Content-Type”:
public async Task SendRequestAsync()
{
using (var stream = new MemoryStream())
using (var bson = new BsonWriter(stream))
{
var jsonSerializer = new JsonSerializer();
var request = new SomePostRequest
{
Id = 20,
Content = new byte[] { 2, 5, 7, 10 }
};
jsonSerializer.Serialize(bson, request);
var client = new HttpClient
{
BaseAddress = new Uri("http://www.yourservicelocation.com")
};
client.DefaultRequestHeaders.Accept.Clear();
client.DefaultRequestHeaders.Accept.Add(
new MediaTypeWithQualityHeaderValue("application/bson"));
var byteArrayContent = new ByteArrayContent(stream.ToArray());
byteArrayContent.Headers.ContentType = new MediaTypeHeaderValue("application/bson");
var result = await client.PostAsync(
"api/SomeData/Incoming", byteArrayContent);
result.EnsureSuccessStatusCode();
}
}