by Alex Meyer-Gleaves
1 September 2009 - 7:47 PM
I am pleased to report that data contract generation is now available, and that the functionality has been extended to allow the selection of multiple source XSD or WSDL files. This feature is available in the V1 Beta 2 release, and as always, user feedback and bug reports are welcome.
Data contract generation was one of the features from WSCF.classic that got left behind while the work was done to support WCF in WSCF.blue. Since this was a very popular feature it was important to make sure it was available in WSCF.blue as part of the V1 release.
The generated data contract types are designed to work with the XmlSerializer. WSCF.blue uses the XmlSerializer because the DataContractSerializer is limited in regards to its support for many of the XSD constructs that often appear in contract-first WSDL. Regardless, I would like to add the ability to generate data contract types using the DataContractSerializer. Please let me know if this is a feature you would like to see implemented.
To generate data contracts start by selecting the required XSD or WSDL file in your project. You can select one or more files as required.
Right-click your selection and choose Generate Data Contract Code... from the context menu.
You will be presented with the Data Contract Code Generation Options dialog.
You can choose to create a separate file for each type or keep them all in a single file. The usual list of Code generation options are also available. Click Generate and enjoy your data contracts!