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Creating A Web API Project In Visual Studio 2019

Introduction

In this article I’m trying to explain, creating API with GET, POST, PUT, and DELETE. These are basic CRUD operations that we need while creating APIs. Also, I'll explain how to connect the database using the Scaffold DB context and create a model to process the API request and response.

Please refer to the below link to Creating A WEB API Project In Visual Studio 2019 - ASP.NET Core and Swagger.

The basic things we need to understand before start writing web APIs,

  • Database
  • HTTP Methods
  • Router
  • HTTP Status Code
  • Model

WebAPI acts as a middleware between the client side and the server side. For example, When the user hits a button, it will call an API from the client side to get user details. Now API will process the request and get the data from the database based on logic.

Web API

Database

The database is a collection of data in an organized way so that users can easily access, manage, and update.

HTTP Methods

  • Get: To get data from a database, we use the Get Method.
  • Post: To insert data to a database in the form of a payload in the request body to create/update.
  • Put: It is similar to Post, mainly meant for updates.
  • Delete: To delete data from the database.

Router

In the Web API controller, we have different types of action methods[get, post, put, delete ] the router takes this incoming request and routes this request to the appropriate action method in the API controller.

WEB API supports two types of routing

  1. Convention-based Routing -It should have at least one route template using that template it identifies the controller and action method to execute.
  2. Attribute Routing -We can define routing directly at the Controller or action level using route attributesRoute[()].

In this article, we are using attribute routing to define the route of an action method.

Example

[Route("api/User/GetUserById")]

Here User is Controller Name and GetUserById is an API name.

HTTP Status Code

These most commonly used status codes are listed here,

  • 200 OK: When the request successfully returned the response.
  • 201 Created: When record inserted to database successfully.
  • 202 Accepted: When a request is accepted for processing.
  • 204 No content: When response returned with no content.
  • 400 BadRequest: When there is a problem with a request sent from the client side.
  • 401 Unauthorized: When authentication or authorization fails.
  • 500 Internal Server Error: When the server doesn't fulfill the request[ exceptions or errors in API code].

Model

Model is a class that has a set of properties with getters and setters, that represent the data to process the API request.

Let's start with coding,

Create a Model Folder and Model class file as shown below.

Right-click on project => Add=> NewFolder [Folder Name: Model]

Right-click on Folder => Add=> New File [File name: Controller Name ]

Add New Item

Models

Sample Model

GetUserModel is a model name.

public class GetUserModel
{
     public int UserID { get; set; }
     public string Name { get; set; }
     public string Address { get; set; }
     public string Email { get;  set; }
     public string PhoneNumber { get; set; }
     public bool IsActive { get; set; }
}

Scaffold-DbContext Command

Select menu Tools -> NuGet Package Manager -> Package Manager Console and run the following command.

PM> Scaffold-DbContext "Server=(LocalDb)\MSSQLLocalDB;Initial Catalog=DemoDatabase;Integrated Security=True;" Microsoft.EntityFrameworkCore.SqlServer -OutputDir DataModel

Here I'm trying to connect to the local database.

Server=.\SQLExpress; refers to the local SQLEXPRESS database server.

Database= DemoDatabase

Specifies the database name " DemoDatabase" for which we are going to create classes.

Trusted_Connection=True

Specifies the Windows authentication. It will use Windows credentials to connect to the SQL Server.

Microsoft.EntityFrameworkCore.SqlServer

It is the provider's name. We use a provider for the SQL Server, so it is Microsoft.EntityFrameworkCore.SqlServer.

OutputDir

The parameter specifies the directory where we want to generate all the classes which is the Models folder in this case.

The below Image shows Folder DataModel => DemoDatabaseContext.cs is the DbContext file. Users. cs file is the table model. Database as only one table.

Demodatabase

Let's start creating the API.

Try-Catch block

Always add a try-catch block if API fails in the middle of the process you can return BadRequest with exception details.

DbContext

DemoDatabaseContext db = new DemoDatabaseContext();

DemoDatabaseContext is the database context name. DemoDatabaseContext is used to access database tables.

[Route("api/[controllerName]")]

We have this outside controller class. This means we are setting the path: API/User

Linq (Language Integrated Query)

It is used to get data from a database based on conditions. In the below example, we are trying to get user details using userId.

var user = db.Set<Users>().Where(w => w.Id == id);

Get API

// Gets user details by user ID.
public UserDetails GetUserDetails(int userId)
{
    // Implementation goes here
}

APIName

GetUserById

[Route("API/[GetUserById]")]

For every API we have routing. Each name should be unique. API path:API/User/GetUserById

Post API / Put API

Both post and put are done in the same API.

Delete API

In this, we are just setting IsActive to false.

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Threading.Tasks;
using Microsoft.AspNetCore.Http;
using Microsoft.AspNetCore.Mvc;
using WebAPIDemoProject.DataModel;
using static WebAPIDemoProject.Models.UserModel;
namespace WebAPIDemoProject.Controllers {
    [Route("api/[controller]")]
    [ApiController]
    public class UserController: ControllerBase {
        DemoDatabaseContext db = new DemoDatabaseContext();
        // GET: api/GetUserById
        [HttpGet]
        [Route("GetUserById")]
        public ActionResult GetUserById(int id) {
            try {
                var user = db.Set < Users > ().Where(w => w.Id == id).Select(c => new GetUserModel {
                    UserID = c.Id,
                        Name = c.Name,
                        Address = c.Address,
                        Email = c.Email,
                        PhoneNumber = c.PhoneNumber
                });
                return Ok(user);
            } catch (Exception ex) {
                return BadRequest(ex.StackTrace);
            }
        }
        // We can write both Post and Put(update) in same API
        // POST: api/PostUser
        [HttpPost]
        [Route("PostUser")]
        public ActionResult PostUser(GetUserModel userModel) {
            try {
                var userIsExist = db.Set < Users > ().FirstOrDefault(w => w.Id == userModel.UserID);
                //Update block
                if (userIsExist != null) {
                    userIsExist.Name = userModel.Name;
                    userIsExist.PhoneNumber = userModel.PhoneNumber;
                    userIsExist.Email = userModel.Email;
                    userIsExist.Address = userModel.Address;
                    db.SaveChanges();
                } else // User not exist creaing new user
                {
                    var user = new Users();
                    // user.Id =;  auto increament in Database
                    user.Name = userModel.Name;
                    user.PhoneNumber = userModel.PhoneNumber;
                    user.Email = userModel.Email;
                    user.Address = userModel.Address;
                    user.IsActive = user.IsActive;
                    db.Users.Add(user);
                    db.SaveChanges();
                }
                return Ok();
            } catch (Exception ex) {
                return BadRequest(ex.StackTrace);
            }
        }
        // DELETE: api/DeleteUserById
        [HttpDelete()]
        [Route("DeleteUserById")]
        public ActionResult DeleteUser(int id) {
            try {
                var user = db.Set < Users > ().FirstOrDefault(w => w.Id == id);
                if (user != null) {
                    user.IsActive = false;
                    db.SaveChanges();
                    return Ok();
                } else {
                    return Ok("User not Exist");
                }
            } catch (Exception ex) {
                return BadRequest(ex.StackTrace);
            }
        }
    }
}

Swagger

When you run the code you will see swagger as shown below. [Please follow the previous article to set up the swagger. The link was shared in the beginning.

Swagger

Summary

We learned how to write APIs in .NET Core using an entity framework. AI also explained HTTP Methods & routing briefly. I hope this article was useful, andnow you have a better understanding of the Web API concept.


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