Chapter 1, Configuration and Routing, covers the various configuration options and ways to set up routing using the ServiceStack framework. We will also learn how to set up your solution and projects in a way that promotes testability and reuse and how to get the most out of ServiceStack's built-in IoC functionality.

Chapter 2, Services and Data Transfer Objects, says that these concepts (services and data transfer objects) are at the core of building web services with ServiceStack. This chapter teaches you techniques to produce clean, testable web services and gives examples of some common usages. You will also be shown how to use request/response filters for advanced request processing and integration.

Chapter 3, Testing and Logging, shows the integration of logging via ServiceStack LogManager, integration with popular testing frameworks as well as patterns for continuous integration.

Chapter 4, Object Relational Mapping (OrmLite), covers some of the functionality OrmLite provides while using practical patterns to keep your code clean and maintainable. OrmLite is a lightweight object relational mapping framework that focuses on simplicity and performance.

Chapter 5, HTML and Form Data, shows the different tools that the ServiceStack framework gives developers to handle HTML generation and specific interactions on web pages.

Chapter 6, Filters and Validators, shows the versatility of ServiceStack filters for different uses, including integration, as well as validators to assist with HTML forms or API error messages.

Chapter 7, Security and Authentication, shows ServiceStack OAuth and other built-in security functionality as well as how to deal with custom authentication and integration with commonly used frameworks/systems.

Chapter 8, Working with Redis, teaches you how to get the most out of the Redis client provided and ServiceStack integration as well as setting up Redis and using it in different environments.

Chapter 9, Integrating with Other Technologies, covers integration with popular and common frameworks and technologies to highlight ServiceStack's power when used in conjunction with existing systems. The chapter also covers how to handle introducing ServiceStack into an established ASP.NET MVC and WebForms project.

Appendix A, Getting Started, takes you through creating a ServiceStack solution, walking you through the different parts. This will be useful for readers who don't have access to use the ServiceStack Visual Studio extension, ServiceStackVS.

Appendix B, Testing Locally, is a short guide on how to use Fiddler2 to route traffic of a different domain to IIS Express. Depending on your environment restrictions, this might help debug OAuth providers. This isn't needed to complete the recipes in this book.

While most examples simply require Visual Studio 2013 Community Edition or better, some recipes do use other technologies to illustrate integration with specific functionality within the ServiceStack framework. The following is a list of software required to use all the examples:

If you are a .NET developer who is looking for a simpler way to build services, this is the book for you. It will show you how to write fast, maintainable APIs that are a pleasure to use and maintain, starting from the database to the client and everything in between.

In this book, you will find several headings that appear frequently (Getting ready, How to do it, How it works, There's more, and See also).

To give clear instructions on how to complete a recipe, we use these sections as follows:

In this book, you will find a number of text styles that distinguish between different kinds of information. Here are some examples of these styles and an explanation of their meaning.

Code words in text, database table names, folder names, filenames, file extensions, pathnames, dummy URLs, user input, and Twitter handles are shown as follows: "ServiceStack includes ServiceStack.OrmLite, which is much faster than Microsoft's own Entity Framework and most other ORMs."

A block of code is set as follows:

[Route("/hello/{Name}","GET")]
public class GreetingRequest
{
  public string Name { get; set; }
}

When we wish to draw your attention to a particular part of a code block, the relevant lines or items are set in bold:

  public IEnumerable<Message> Where(Expression<Func<Message, bool>> expression)
  {
    using (var db = DbConnectionFactory.OpenDbConnection())
    {
      return db.Select(expression);
    }
  }

Any command-line input or output is written as follows:

c:\projects>curl http://myserver/hello/world
Hello, world!

New terms and important words are shown in bold. Words that you see on the screen, for example, in menus or dialog boxes, appear in the text like this: " To get started, create an empty ASP.NET solution in Visual Studio. We'll name it HelloWorldService."

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To send us general feedback, simply e-mail <[email protected]>, and mention the book's title in the subject of your message.

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