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asp.netwinformsweb-serviceswebformsasmx

Adding a Single Web Service to an Existing ASP.NET Application

I've written an ASP.NET website along with a companion WinForms desktop application, which is used to maintain the site.

The desktop application needs to create a user. However, this is awkward because I would need to ensure all the membership settings are exactly the same as they are in my website's web.config file.

It would be easier if my desktop application could "call into" the website somehow and tell it to create a user. It seems like a web service would be a good option for this. However, Visual Studio doesn't have an option to add an ASMX file. And if I create a separate, web service application, then that application would have the same problem my desktop application has.

Is there a way to add a single web service to an existing ASP.NET application? Any links? Thanks.

Solution

  • Visual Studio doesn't have an option to add an ASMX file

    In the Web application project, or the WinForms project? I assume you mean that you cannot add a Web Reference from within your WinForms project; adding an .asmx file to the WinForms project is not necessary. The Web application project should have the .asmx file, which is called by the WinForms project using a web reference.

    In the WinForms project you can consume a web service by right-clicking References in the Solution Explorer, then choosing Add Service Reference... (in Visual Studio 2008; other versions may say Add Web Reference...). Then just enter the web address (which may be local in your case, e.g. localhost/foo.asmx) of the web service (.asmx).

    See the section "To call an XML Web service synchronously" in this MSDN article: Calling XML Web Services from Windows Forms.

    As an alternative, this MS KB article shows how to use the WSDL tool to generate a class that can consume a *.asmx URL. (The article uses VB, but you can switch the parameter to CS to generate C#.)

    Update

    To add an .asmx file to your Web project, right-click the project in Visual Studio, select Add -> New Item... -> Web Service. If there is not a "Web Service" item any where in the template browser dialog that comes up, then you are missing the template or you're looking in the wrong place.