Loading System.ServiceModel configuration section using ConfigurationManager

Question

Using C# .NET 3.5 and WCF, I'm trying to write out some of the WCF configuration in a client application (the name of the server the client is connecting to).

The obvious way is to use ConfigurationManager to load the configuration section and write out the data I need.

var serviceModelSection = ConfigurationManager.GetSection("system.serviceModel");

Appears to always return null.

var serviceModelSection = ConfigurationManager.GetSection("appSettings");

Works perfectly.

The configuration section is present in the App.config but for some reason ConfigurationManager refuses to load the system.ServiceModel section.

I want to avoid manually loading the xxx.exe.config file and using XPath but if I have to resort to that I will. Just seems like a bit of a hack.

Any suggestions?

Solution 1

The <system.serviceModel> element is for a configuration section group, not a section. You'll need to use System.ServiceModel.Configuration.ServiceModelSectionGroup.GetSectionGroup() to get the whole group.

Solution 2

http://mostlytech.blogspot.com/2007/11/programmatically-enumerate-wcf.html

// Automagically find all client endpoints defined in app.config
ClientSection clientSection = 
    ConfigurationManager.GetSection("system.serviceModel/client") as ClientSection;

ChannelEndpointElementCollection endpointCollection =
    clientSection.ElementInformation.Properties[string.Empty].Value as     ChannelEndpointElementCollection;
List<string> endpointNames = new List<string>();
foreach (ChannelEndpointElement endpointElement in endpointCollection)
{
    endpointNames.Add(endpointElement.Name);
}
// use endpointNames somehow ...

Appears to work well.

Solution 3

This is what I was looking for thanks to @marxidad for the pointer.

    public static string GetServerName()
    {
        string serverName = "Unknown";

        Configuration appConfig = ConfigurationManager.OpenExeConfiguration(ConfigurationUserLevel.None);
        ServiceModelSectionGroup serviceModel = ServiceModelSectionGroup.GetSectionGroup(appConfig);
        BindingsSection bindings = serviceModel.Bindings;

        ChannelEndpointElementCollection endpoints = serviceModel.Client.Endpoints;

        for(int i=0; i<endpoints.Count; i++)
        {
            ChannelEndpointElement endpointElement = endpoints[i];
            if (endpointElement.Contract == "MyContractName")
            {
                serverName = endpointElement.Address.Host;
            }
        }

        return serverName;
    }

Solution 4

GetSectionGroup() does not support no parameters (under framework 3.5).

Instead use:

Configuration config = System.Configuration.ConfigurationManager.OpenExeConfiguration(ConfigurationUserLevel.None);
ServiceModelSectionGroup group = System.ServiceModel.Configuration.ServiceModelSectionGroup.GetSectionGroup(config);

Solution 5

Thanks to the other posters this is the function I developed to get the URI of a named endpoint. It also creates a listing of the endpoints in use and which actual config file was being used when debugging:

Private Function GetEndpointAddress(name As String) As String
    Debug.Print("--- GetEndpointAddress ---")
    Dim address As String = "Unknown"
    Dim appConfig As Configuration = ConfigurationManager.OpenExeConfiguration(ConfigurationUserLevel.None)
    Debug.Print("app.config: " & appConfig.FilePath)
    Dim serviceModel As ServiceModelSectionGroup = ServiceModelSectionGroup.GetSectionGroup(appConfig)
    Dim bindings As BindingsSection = serviceModel.Bindings
    Dim endpoints As ChannelEndpointElementCollection = serviceModel.Client.Endpoints
    For i As Integer = 0 To endpoints.Count - 1
        Dim endpoint As ChannelEndpointElement = endpoints(i)
        Debug.Print("Endpoint: " & endpoint.Name & " - " & endpoint.Address.ToString)
        If endpoint.Name = name Then
            address = endpoint.Address.ToString
        End If
    Next
    Debug.Print("--- GetEndpointAddress ---")
    Return address
End Function

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Comments

[joedotnot]

the confusing line for endpointCollection = clientSection.ElementInformation.Properties[string.Empty].Va‌​lue as ChannelEndpointElementCollection; should be simplified to clientSection.Endpoints;