ASP.NET MVC Web API 4 REST Webservice: PUT/POST - ing a List of objects - rest

Question

Wondering if its possible and/or supported to put/post an entire object to REST Webservice, as opposed to just some name/value pairs ?
If so, can a List of objects be put/post-ed as well ?
I figured it may be possible, since a GET request is able to return a List of objects, I'd like to do the "reverse" operation with the updated objects (and not send them one at a time, or worse, in individual pieces via name/value pairs) ?
I understand this is a very basic question, but the approach I've taken so far was to just try and code the PUT and get it working (which works if the PUT function has no arguments, like:
public class AObjectController : ApiController
{
public List<int[]> Put()
{
List<int[]> ret = new List<int[]>();
ret.Add(new int[] {-1, 1111});
ret.Add(new int[] {-2, 2222});
return ret;
}
If I specify a single object, or list of objects, I get exceptions:
public List<int[]> Put(AObject object) **CASE 1**
public List<int[]> Put(List<AObject> objects) **CASE 2**
{
List<int[]> ret = new List<int[]>();
ret.Add(new int[] { -1, 1111 });
ret.Add(new int[] { -2, 2222 });
return ret;
}
CASE 1: public List(int[]) Put(AObject object)
CASE 2: public List(int[]) Put(List(AObject) objects)
Heres the code on the client side that is making the call:
public int writeAll(List<T> data)
{
_sendBuffer =
JsonConvert.SerializeObject(
tabletData,
new JsonSerializerSettings { TypeNameHandling = TypeNameHandling.All }
);
byte[] b = StringHelper.GetBytes(_sendBuffer);
string url = ContructUrlRequest(null, null);
WebRequest request = WebRequest.Create(url);
request.Method = "PUT";
request.ContentType = "application/json";
request.ContentLength = b.Length;
request.Credentials = CredentialCache.DefaultCredentials;
((HttpWebRequest)request).UserAgent = "...";
//((HttpWebRequest)request).AutomaticDecompression = DecompressionMethods.GZip | DecompressionMethods.Deflate;
using (Stream requestStream = request.GetRequestStream())
{
requestStream.Write(b, 0, b.Length);
requestStream.Flush();
requestStream.Close();
}
WebResponse response = request.GetResponse();
if (response == null)
{
return -1;
}
StreamReader sr = new StreamReader(response.GetResponseStream()); ;
_recieveBuffer = sr.ReadToEnd();
List<int[]> _resultData = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<List<int[]>>(
_recieveBuffer,
new JsonSerializerSettings { TypeNameHandling = TypeNameHandling.All }
);
return data.Count;
}
Thank you.

Answer 1

Used the serialization write code from server on my client side and it worked
public int writeAll(List<AObject> aObjects)
{
string url = ContructUrlRequest(null, null);
WebRequest request = WebRequest.Create(url);
request.Method = WebRequestMethods.Http.Put;
request.ContentType = "application/json; charset=utf-8";
request.Credentials = CredentialCache.DefaultCredentials;
((HttpWebRequest)request).UserAgent = "going insane";
JsonSerializerSettings serializerSettings = new JsonSerializerSettings();
serializerSettings.TypeNameHandling = TypeNameHandling.Objects | TypeNameHandling.Arrays;
serializerSettings.Converters.Add(new IsoDateTimeConverter());
JsonSerializer serializer = JsonSerializer.Create(serializerSettings);
using (Stream requestStream = request.GetRequestStream())
{
using (StreamWriter streamWriter = new StreamWriter(requestStream, new UTF8Encoding(false, true)))
{
using (JsonTextWriter jsonTextWriter = new JsonTextWriter(streamWriter))
{
serializer.Serialize(jsonTextWriter, aObjects);
}
}
}
WebResponse response = request.GetResponse();
if (response == null)
{
Log.Info(FIDB.TAG_WSBUFFER, "WSBuffer.writeAll: response = NULL");
return -1;
}
StreamReader sr = new StreamReader(response.GetResponseStream());
_recieveBuffer = sr.ReadToEnd();
_resultData = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<List<int[]>>(
_recieveBuffer,
new JsonSerializerSettings { TypeNameHandling = TypeNameHandling.All }
);
return tabletData.Count;
}