Still churning out new videos and immediately responding to comments from 3-year old videos :-) You're a credit to the community! Thanks for the videos and keep up the good work.
I have watched a few videos about calling API's. And I originally skipped this one because of the length, and I was so anxious to get started. After taking the time to watch it, I regret skipping over it. This video was so informative, and Tim really has a way of explaining everything very thoroughly. I am now a fan, and will be watching as many of your videos as possible. Thank you for taking the time to create these videos.
As a newbie to coding in general i appreciate the advice on the comic model. Just specifying the properties you need is golden nuggets. I’m always like ‘give me all the things magical internet box’ and I’ll figure out what I need, whilst my program grinds to a halt. Thank you Tim Corey for knowing what I need before I do.
I've been confused about API and integrating with C#, watched various videos about this subject and was still lost, your explanation has made it more clear. Thanks for your tutorials - looking forward to the continued courses.
I wondered how to connect to a web API for a long time. I sought out for the resolution for a long time and I couldn't understand anything until I've watched this video. Thank you a lot, sir.
Thank you, Tim for pouring down all the information ( as much as you could ) from your heart and not holding anything back!!!! I'm feeling lucky to got stumbled upon this video amongst plethora of content out there!!!! Looking forward to learn new things about programming/coding/web development!! THANK YOU SIR!
0:00 - Intro 1:00 - Demo application walk-through 4:09 - Setting up API calling: WebApi.Client and Newtonsoft.json NuGet references 6:02 - Setting up API calling: HttpClient 13:48 - Setting up API calling: API calls 19:14 - Setting up API calling: Reading and working with json data 28:18 - Loading image in WPF (form a website) 35:29 - Adding events in WPF application: wiring up action buttons 39:40 - Note on information Cashing 42:55 - Sunrise-sunset API: Nested json objects, API calls, WPF events, displaying information 51:56 - Loading other WPF forms from MainWindow 53:38 - Summary and concluding remarks
I am probably a crappy starting up programmer who rarely subscribes to channels and rarely ever likes videos. For you I make an exception, this video was super helpful and this kind of content is rarely ever free. Thank you and God Bless the beard.
Tim, Great tutorial. I would recommend anyone watching this to watch it all the way through. This really simplified everything I seen online. Too many people were making this really complicated but you solved that. I was originally looking for a tutorial on just getting and using data from a REST Api, after that was going to review getting images from that Api and displaying them in the app and then cycling from page to page. Tim I would recommend a different title on this video though which is why I went down the rabbit trail looking at other videos first. "C# WPF XAML REST API Tutorial - Examples, Best Practices, Memory Management, and Pitfalls" Though I have been programming for 20 years I am new to C# and I know ASP.NET uses C# and there is a difference between WPF XAML and Forms - hence my I suggest adding in those other 2 to the title. I subscribed and look forward to lots more videos.
I don’t really comment often but I just want to say thank you so much. You have been a really big help on a side project I’m working on and you explained everything so well!
Did this in generics because of knowledge from your other video about generics. Thank you, always happy to take a challenge when you suggest something extra.
ohhh thank you soo much! i made a weather program with a console app. it did run succsessfully, but i didn't understand how the properties worked. this video helped me understand it! :)
Tim, I need to tankyou, your classes are great, you have one of the bests teaching aproach I've ever seen. Keep this way, you are helping a lot of people. Tanks again, god bless!!
Trying to cover authentication is tough because everyone does it differently. Usually the API documents how to do that. As for caching, I'll be covering that in a future video.
Thanks for this wonderful video, i had to use 1.25 speed :D . I added a buffer to store existing calls results ,a spinner to show Ajax call in progress and a button to read out ALT text :D BTW, this Comics are kinda fun to read
Thank you! I was just making similar things in my project, trying to figure out the best practices. GET is cool, but I also need to POST things and I guess I have found them with title: Posting Sales Data to an API - A TimCo Retail Manager Video. Also looking forward watching all the Role management videos, cause I also implemented the default web api authorization using /Token. So far I was just doing manual service calls with Postman, to make users, roles, and adding roles to users :D
Firstly, i would like to say thank you for everything you are doing on here. you are a legend. Secondly, can you explain why you have chosen xaml over windows form, could the same outcome be achieved in both?
Thank you Sir. Can you please do a video on serialization and deserialization in C# may be considering a wpf datagrid serialized into XML. I found many examples, but when you explain it will be complete for sure
Great video! I did think though that you were going to look at API calls through a wrapper. Ie, calling a library written in C from C#. Maybe a future subject 😉👍
This video covered exactly what I've been trying to figure out. Every thing I got from SO was basically the same code snippet a million times and wasn't helpful.
Since i got stuck with this problem, it might be helpful to other beginners : if you are using an API that requests a simple token identification, pass the token as a header, not in the uri, as such: APIClient.DefaultRequestHeaders.Add("Authorization", "YourTokenHere");
Thanks Tim for amazing videos only thing I would mention is that if you could please zoom visual studio so that it fits my mobile screen that would be amazing.. Most of your videos I watch are on mobile..much appreciated and keep up with the good work . Thank you
Trying to accommodate mobile viewing is tough, since there is so much to show. I've tested out doing something like that and it always ends up distracting.
Hey tim, are you planning on doing a video about hosting a mock of an api with predetermined responses? If not, do you have any video / guide you might recommend?
Yet another one of your videos that addresses something I am working on, your channel is great man thank you so much! I've seen a lot of conflicting information about HttpClient and using 1 instance of it for the life time of the app just because it implements IDisposable. I completely understand that using one instance of HttpClient in a console, windows forms, wpf, etc is fine, but what about in web mvc projects. Isnt it slightly different because if you have a static var holding the instance of HttpClient isnt that shared across everyone using your web app/site, also what is the best way to hold that once instance var for mvc? I should point out that the reason why I found your video is because I have a web app that Im building that uses a few different apis, and Im wondering how to use HttpClient instances that are kept for the lifetime of the app when Im using mvc5 and if that really is the best practice for each of the external api's Im using as each one would need a separate HttpClient as the base url address would be different
So they've made the HttpClient a lot better in .NET Core. Check out this video on it: th-cam.com/video/cwgck1k0YKU/w-d-xo.html Basically, you use the HttpClientFactory to create clients for you (or recycle them - it doesn't matter to you which it chooses to use). That way they are safely created and disposed without overloading the system or exhausting the ports.
I second this hard, I've been jumping back and forth between which gql client library to use or whether to use a client library at all instead of the bare httpclient class.
Hi Tim, could you please briefly explain to me what's the difference between making the ApiHelper class static and then calling the InitializeClient() method vs. making a non-static class and registering it as Singleton service in the Startup.cs (as services.AddSingleton() ...) Thanks!
In this case, it was because we weren't using dependency injection (this is a .NET Framework project so it doesn't have DI built-in like ASP.NET Core projects do). If I had DI available and this were a "real" app, I would implement the class as a singleton, since it allows for constructors, interfaces, and more.
At 23:47 ReadAsAsync cannot be found, in fact, I can't find any extension methods. When I type in ReadAsAsync it says 'HttpContent' does not contain a defnition for ReadAsAsync. I've downloaded your code, and I can't find what I did wrong . EDIT: the mircosoft web api nuget package was not installed for some reason
Pretty much. I usually save the data to a small database (SQLite, MongoDB, etc.) and the images to disk in a temp folder. I also save the API call parameters or the entire call to the database too. When a call comes in for the exact same data, I go to my database instead. You just need to know how long to cache it for based upon the resource. For example, sunrise/sunset data doesn't change for the same exact data. I could keep that forever. Stock market data changes a LOT so I might only cache the data for 15 minutes (if it was an informational application) or not at all (if it was an investing application).
can u make video how to parallel use api or post/get requests imagine i need to registrate accounts but nor one by one how to registrate accounts for example in 10 tasks each of them have different proxy, coockie and exc. or can you give link with any example of it ty for ur staff
I'll put that on the list for a follow-up video. In the meantime, you could probably do a parallel.foreach like I demonstrated in my Advanced Async video.
Hi Tim - what made you want to use a static method for the instantiation of the ApiHelper.ApiClient instead of via constructor? What I typically do is create a customized httpClient in a class that inherits from HttpClient. This way I can use DI to bring it in. Any thoughts on this?
Excellent tutorial, now understood how it works, but was wondering if you requesting any files or PDF through API? what sort of properties would we use to display files instead of text?
Good video. I don't know why they have to make these packages so complicated. I'm trying to build a simple API client that sends a JSON payload with custom HTTP headers used for authentication and expects a JSON response on success or failure. It doesn't need to be asynchronous because I don't want the application doing anything else while the call is out or until the call times out. The JSON is being handled with Newtonsoft's Json.net. It just seems very difficult to find human readable documentation about system.net.http that shows how to do such a thing.
I think part of it is that you are expecting to do something that isn't simple. That list of requirements entails quite a few things. Dropping async isn't really possible/necessary since the web is, by default, asynchronous. This video shows you how to connect easily to an API and get the data you need.
@@IAmTimCorey Interestingly enough, after posting this comment I decided to try and decipher Microsoft's official docs on HttpClient and was able to get the skeleton functions up and running. It actually wasn't that difficult once I used my secret decoder ring to translate MS speak to plain English. Plus, I planned out exactly what my app was going to do before I wrote a single line of code, as you mentioned in one of your videos, so I knew which functions fit my requirements after a little bit of reading. BTW, I know your courses were made a while back but your videos have been instrumental in helping me get this app up and running. I'm a photographer, not a software developer so this has been one HUGE learning experience in the month since I started learning C#. Thanks for putting all these videos out there. I'm definitely considering purchasing your course, to say thank you.
Agreed, .NET's existing libraries are verbose and the documentation is hard to digest. From my personal l can highly recommend any of these free, open-source NuGet packages. These are all well maintained & make for a much better developer experience: 1. ServiceStack.Text( 1k GitHub stars, 7m Nuget downloads) - fast light and resilient. 2. RestSharp (6k GitHub stars, 23m Nuget Downloads) - Simple REST and HTTP API Client 3. Flurl (1.7k GitHub stars, 3m Nuget Downloads) - a fluent, portable, testable HTTP client library
Do you also have a video on how to make proper post calls using this same style? I would like to know what the proper way of posting data to a service that would send it to a database. You don't exactly want sensitive data being visible on the web. It would also be nice to look at this in the way of registering a user and logging in since it's a real life and practical example.
I do not yet but it is coming. The key is that I have to pick one API for uploading. In this case, I will make my own but what I do in that won't be the same as what you do with other APIs. As for sensitive data, if you POST data and you are using HTTPS, you are protected (or at least 99.9% protected).
Hi Tim! In your video you mention building a generic Api data processor. Have you made or are you planning on making a course on that subject? ...and thank you for your videos!!
Check out the TimCo Retail Manager series. Right now we are wiring a Blazor WebAssembly application to an API that has authentication with bearer tokens which include role authorizations. We also wired up a WPF project to the same API.
Hi Tim. Thanks for all the great content. This may be one for the back burner or a separate resources video related to consuming rest APIs. There seem to be a wide variety of tutorial videos that relate to consuming a single endpoint, but not really anything that I've been able to find in terms of completing an "object graph". For example, if there's a theroetical API with a single product endpoint that can be retrieved via simple id key and that product has a number of related lookup id's for other related objects with separate endpoints - what would the options be in retrieving those or keeping them either cached or in memory to improve the efficiency of requests? Many thanks
Tim, can you please do a tutorial that covers this with authentication? at least a couple of major methods? I know you decided not to cover it, but it'll complement this video nicely.
Great video. One question: What if a json response from an api contains an array? How do you map that to properties? For example: "weather": [ { "id": 804, "main": "Clouds", "description": "overcast clouds", "icon": "04n" } ]
In this specific example, you could have this property: public List Weather { get; set; } You can also paste the json into C# using the Paste Special option to see how the class structure would work.
hi Tim, you mentioned authentication, why not cover basic authentication, token-based, and the one that uses grant type = client_credentials (oauth 2.0), that would be awesome! thanks
@@IAmTimCorey ya man please do , i want to use for trello lets say api.trello.com/1/boards/?key=0123token=123name={name}' like i put my key i put my token then in the name what do i put when i put the name lets say like this -> its not working This is to create a board: api.trello.com/1/boards/?key=0123token=123name=yolo Then it says : Cannot GET /1/boards/?key developer.atlassian.com/cloud/trello/rest/api-group-boards/#api-boards-post Do i need to do something else before trying to put the name et.c
You can add this to your code if you're stuck. I'm not sure if this is the correct way but it works. replace bas64tokenhere with your base64 encoded username:password // ApiHelper.cs ApiClient.DefaultRequestHeaders.Accept.Clear(); ApiClient.DefaultRequestHeaders.Accept.Add(new MediaTypeWithQualityHeaderValue("application/json")); ApiClient.DefaultRequestHeaders.Authorization = new AuthenticationHeaderValue("Basic", "base64tokenhere");
One more thing: I had to add this line: System.Net.ServicePointManager.SecurityProtocol = SecurityProtocolType.Tls12; to the InitializeClient() of the ApiClient. If not I was getting a HttpRequestException: "The request was aborted: Could not create SSL/TLS secure channel."
Hi tim, another question: what do you think of the term "Full Stack Developer"? Do you consider yourself more "back-end" oriented, "front-end" oriented, or both?
I'm definitely a full stack developer. I can (and do) create user interfaces and I can/do create data access as well as everything in between. As far as what I feel about the term, I think it is fairly descriptive. Sure, usually people can do both but it is very common to specialize in one side or the other. The larger your company/team is, the more likely it is that you will specialize in one area. You get really good in that area and you may even let your other skills fade a bit (or you just don't keep up with the newest changes).
This is how i fixed my issue I hope it helps you. Added it to a List of my model like Tim said =) GLHF List championData = await response.Content.ReadAsAsync();
Hello Tim, I have the following question: In this video you have the controller that actually does the job. I saw however that on your TimCo retail series you have a controller that defines what should get post etc actually do.. I tried to extend your video here to get data from another api without success. The notions are not so clear yet (and I haven't finished your timCo retail series videos on API). So in its documentation (the pi i want to use) says for example: the end point url is blabla ( no free advertising :P). If you want to get a random fact from the endpoint go for GET /facts/random. I build exactly the request as you did here, and I expected that a url blabla/facts/random would do the trick. It does nothing though ( SunInfo = null). What am I missing? Were am I mistaken?
Try calling the API in Postman. Make sure it returns a value that you expect. Then make sure your model you are capturing it into is laid out correctly.
@@IAmTimCorey Do you have a video on handling an array of nested json data to a list in C#? Everything else worked like the sun info, but I cannot figure out how to convert the result to a List...
Hi Tim, does the values of LoadSunInformation update for each day? In addition does this tutorial include constantly updating information when the JSON or website file is update?
Hi Tim! Great video, I've been following you for a couple of months, is there any vid related with authentication? I'm creating my own app and i don't know yet what would be the best way to authenticate users.
Yep. You would have less to do. You would do the HttpClient initialization in dependency injection and pass that into the ApiHelper class. We do that in the TimCo Retail Manager series.
Hi Tim... thanks, this is a great video. However, for beginner as me, you speak slow but some times you don't mention step you do and I got totally lost. @49:54 you added using DemoLibrary; but was very difficult to catch... took me hours figured out with I couldn't run my code.
I'm sorry I lost you. It is a hard balance to maintain, providing enough content for the semi-advanced viewer while covering what the beginner needs. I'll try to makes sure I either cover things better or point you to places where they are covered if I can't cover it right then.
Hey, big fan! Do you have any videos on how to post to an API server? I'm able to get, but no matter what I do, I'm getting a 400 when I try to post. Not sure what's happening, and I've spent hours and hours debugging. Would love to see how you actually do it. Thanks!
Question for you Tim, at the point of 19 mins ish, you talk about using the 'using' statement to clean things up. I totally understand that. If I didn't want to use this method, could I create the response variable and when I"m done, just perform at response.Dispose(); at the end to accomplish the same thing? Thanks!
Good, but missed abit about REST apis different calls, like POST. I think the first hurdle people will have using it on real project is you will need to login to the REST service, so first call they need is POST and know how to format C# strings into JSON style data, and decode success response back. Some debugging tips about REST APIs, like using apps like Postman are invaluable too.
I did mention that briefly. I debated adding some type of authenticated call but the problem is that each API does things differently. Showing how to do one will not help you do another and might actually confuse the viewer. I do make post calls in the TimCo Retail Manager series (that are authenticated).
Thank you so much. This was a very helpful video for me as I'm building out a new app that heavily utilizes JSON data. I recreated your lesson here using Xamarin and it all works quite well. However, my next big challenge is to consume JSON data which is stock price data and so my JSON has many rows that contain "high" "low" "open" "close" data. In your "Processor" class, could you demonstrate the code you would use to cycle through and deserialize that JSON into a Collection/List that can then still be accessed on the front end? There are a lot of example floating around out there, but I can't find "the one" that actually works. Any advice is appreciated.
Not sure what you are looking to have demonstrated. If you have an array of objects coming back, just as for it as a List during deserialization and it will work.
This is gonna be so useful! Thank you so much! But what if the data I want to retrieve is in XML format? How would I do that? Is there a tutorial you would recommand? Thank you in advance!
It almost never is (and can usually be changed to json even if they offer XML). However, if you needed to handle XML, you would need to use the XML parser to convert it into usable data.
Hi, could not find an answer on the internet, so maybe you will help me. I heard that there is a new way of calling an API without NuGet packages. It already works without Newtonsoft but ReadAsAsync only exists in the NuGet package. If you know the answer, can you point me in the right direction?
Okay done. If somebody has the same question, I did it using System.Text.Json and this helped me: www.pmichaels.net/2020/02/22/my-object-wont-deserialise-using-system-text-json/
Hi, thank you, your videos are very helpful. I have a question, how should I name my properties in the case when filed in JSON called "solar_noon" or "civil_twilight_end"? Should I name them like Solar_noon or Civil_twilight_end. Is there some solution that let you name properties in CamelCase?
I typically just match the names. That is simplest. However, you can use attributes to identify what the JSON name is and then use a more C#-like property name.
I REALLY appreciate that you don't make your free videos just a nagging ad for your paid content. Maybe even a little too much so. Hence... I would like to know what are the major differences between your paid content vs your free channel content? (Structure and consumption)
I appreciate the kind words. My goal is to make learning C# easier. That isn't a cover for my real goal of making money. While making money pays the bills and I'm extremely grateful for people who pay for my content, that truly is a means to fund my overall efforts to help developers. As for the differences between the paid and the free, I try to keep those to a minimum. I give the same effort in a free video as I do in a paid course. The difference is that a paid course is a series that puts all of the pieces together. Think of the paid courses as a complete roadmap from point A to point B whereas the free videos are stops along the way sometimes. With the free content, you need to identify the path from A to B yourself and then figure out which stops you need to hit. With the paid courses, you get the path and all of the stops. For instance, I just released a course titled Upgrading to .NET Core from Start to Finish. In order to show you the complete way (or as complete as I can), I took the source code from my C# Application from Start to Finish and the two add-on courses. That gave me a real-world example application with four different major project types to upgrade (Class Library, WinForms, WPF, and ASP.NET MVC). I upgraded all four project types, showed how to deal with the bugs that arose from moving to .NET Core, then I walked you through implementing the new .NET Core features into the upgraded apps, how to refactor the apps to use those features (even when it was messy and difficult), and showed how to deploy the applications three different ways. I try to teach you everything you need to know to do the job in the real world. I have worked in the real world for two decades. I know the difference between a clean, neat tutorial and what really happens when you try to use that technique in a production environment (hint: it doesn't work well because the real world is messy). I try to teach you in a way that prepares you to actually get the job done. Does that help?
Still churning out new videos and immediately responding to comments from 3-year old videos :-) You're a credit to the community! Thanks for the videos and keep up the good work.
You are welcome.
I have watched a few videos about calling API's. And I originally skipped this one because of the length, and I was so anxious to get started. After taking the time to watch it, I regret skipping over it. This video was so informative, and Tim really has a way of explaining everything very thoroughly. I am now a fan, and will be watching as many of your videos as possible. Thank you for taking the time to create these videos.
Thanks for watching and trusting Tim to help expand your skills
As a newbie to coding in general i appreciate the advice on the comic model. Just specifying the properties you need is golden nuggets. I’m always like ‘give me all the things magical internet box’ and I’ll figure out what I need, whilst my program grinds to a halt. Thank you Tim Corey for knowing what I need before I do.
I am glad it was so helpful.
I've been confused about API and integrating with C#, watched various videos about this subject and was still lost, your explanation has made it more clear. Thanks for your tutorials - looking forward to the continued courses.
I am so glad I was able to clear up the confusion for you.
Luckily I found this video. You're the only one who can describe these techniques in an organized way. I just subscribed to your channel too.
Thanks and welcome aboard.
I just started my first ever api project at work. This video really saved me. Very clear. Tremendously helpful.
Great!
I wondered how to connect to a web API for a long time. I sought out for the resolution for a long time and I couldn't understand anything until I've watched this video. Thank you a lot, sir.
Glad I could help!
I wish I could "like" this video more than once. You are a great teacher.
Thank you!
@@IAmTimCorey Do you have and videos on WINUI?
Thank you, Tim for pouring down all the information ( as much as you could ) from your heart and not holding anything back!!!!
I'm feeling lucky to got stumbled upon this video amongst plethora of content out there!!!! Looking forward to learn new things about programming/coding/web development!! THANK YOU SIR!
You are most welcome. Thanks for watching.
0:00 - Intro
1:00 - Demo application walk-through
4:09 - Setting up API calling: WebApi.Client and Newtonsoft.json NuGet references
6:02 - Setting up API calling: HttpClient
13:48 - Setting up API calling: API calls
19:14 - Setting up API calling: Reading and working with json data
28:18 - Loading image in WPF (form a website)
35:29 - Adding events in WPF application: wiring up action buttons
39:40 - Note on information Cashing
42:55 - Sunrise-sunset API: Nested json objects, API calls, WPF events, displaying information
51:56 - Loading other WPF forms from MainWindow
53:38 - Summary and concluding remarks
Thanks again. You are helping the entire community with these. Much appreciated
J
I am probably a crappy starting up programmer who rarely subscribes to channels and rarely ever likes videos. For you I make an exception, this video was super helpful and this kind of content is rarely ever free. Thank you and God Bless the beard.
You are most welcome.
Great video, one of the best on TH-cam when it comes to C#
Thanks!
Tim, Great tutorial. I would recommend anyone watching this to watch it all the way through. This really simplified everything I seen online. Too many people were making this really complicated but you solved that. I was originally looking for a tutorial on just getting and using data from a REST Api, after that was going to review getting images from that Api and displaying them in the app and then cycling from page to page. Tim I would recommend a different title on this video though which is why I went down the rabbit trail looking at other videos first. "C# WPF XAML REST API Tutorial - Examples, Best Practices, Memory Management, and Pitfalls" Though I have been programming for 20 years I am new to C# and I know ASP.NET uses C# and there is a difference between WPF XAML and Forms - hence my I suggest adding in those other 2 to the title. I subscribed and look forward to lots more videos.
I am glad you enjoyed the video.
I don’t really comment often but I just want to say thank you so much. You have been a really big help on a side project I’m working on and you explained everything so well!
I'm so glad!
Did this in generics because of knowledge from your other video about generics. Thank you, always happy to take a challenge when you suggest something extra.
Excellent!
Thank you! I really appreciate how you have given back to the c# community.
You are welcome.
That's an amazing and hard to find sort of tutorial on youtube, thank you!
You are welcome.
I just got an assignment for a job where I had to do exactly this and it helped me alot. Thank you!
Awesome!
Thank you for this video, it cleared a lot of confusing stuff about using API's up for me.
Keep up the good work!!
Greetings from Austria
Great!
ohhh thank you soo much! i made a weather program with a console app. it did run succsessfully, but i didn't understand how the properties worked. this video helped me understand it! :)
I am glad it was helpful.
Thanks for the video.
The sunrise-sunset security certificate expired 7 days ago. I have dropped the s from htpps and everything works.
Thanks for sharing.
Great Video Tim, I always wait for your new videos, can you make a video on Serialization and Deserialization, Thanks
I'll upgrade the priority of that on my suggestion list.
Thanks Tim, these concepts helped me in an interview
Awesome!
Tim, I need to tankyou, your classes are great, you have one of the bests teaching aproach I've ever seen. Keep this way, you are helping a lot of people. Tanks again, god bless!!
I am glad you are enjoying the videos.
Great tutorial as usual from you Tim, gj! Keep it coming..
Thank you!
thank you very much Tim you are helping people a lot
with your amazingly explained tutorials!
Glad you think so!
Thank you Tim once again for great content ! Super helpful, now I just need to practice making calls to other APIs so that it sticks. :)
You are welcome.
Huge thanks man, was a bit disappointed you didn't explained how to caching and authenticate using OAuth2
Trying to cover authentication is tough because everyone does it differently. Usually the API documents how to do that. As for caching, I'll be covering that in a future video.
Thanks for this wonderful video, i had to use 1.25 speed :D . I added a buffer to store existing calls results ,a spinner to show Ajax call in progress and a button to read out ALT text :D BTW, this Comics are kinda fun to read
You are welcome.
Omg just what i needed. Love you
Excellent!
Thank you!
I was just making similar things in my project, trying to figure out the best practices. GET is cool, but I also need to POST things and I guess I have found them with title: Posting Sales Data to an API - A TimCo Retail Manager Video.
Also looking forward watching all the Role management videos, cause I also implemented the default web api authorization using /Token. So far I was just doing manual service calls with Postman, to make users, roles, and adding roles to users :D
I'm glad you are finding the resources you need to accomplish your mission.
Firstly, i would like to say thank you for everything you are doing on here. you are a legend.
Secondly, can you explain why you have chosen xaml over windows form, could the same outcome be achieved in both?
The same can be achieved with WinForms, yes. WPF is a more modern UI platform, which is why I default to it.
Thank you Sir. Can you please do a video on serialization and deserialization in C# may be considering a wpf datagrid serialized into XML. I found
many examples, but when you explain it will be complete for sure
It is on the suggestion list.
Been waiting for this, Like forever.
Well, I'm glad it finally came for you.
Great video! I did think though that you were going to look at API calls through a wrapper. Ie, calling a library written in C from C#. Maybe a future subject 😉👍
Ah, I see. I'll add that to the suggestion list.
This video covered exactly what I've been trying to figure out. Every thing I got from SO was basically the same code snippet a million times and wasn't helpful.
I'm glad the video was so helpful.
Thank you Tim. This was very informative and helped a lot.
You are welcome.
Since i got stuck with this problem, it might be helpful to other beginners : if you are using an API that requests a simple token identification, pass the token as a header, not in the uri, as such:
APIClient.DefaultRequestHeaders.Add("Authorization", "YourTokenHere");
Correct. We actually just covered this today in the TimCo Retail Manager course video.
@@IAmTimCorey yop, just watched it! a few hours too late for me :D
whats with refresh token?
Thanks Tim,have a nice day!
You are welcome.
Love your classes, best wishes from Argentina AR
Awesome! Thank you!
We love you tim Corey
Thank you.
Thanks Tim for amazing videos only thing I would mention is that if you could please zoom visual studio so that it fits my mobile screen that would be amazing.. Most of your videos I watch are on mobile..much appreciated and keep up with the good work . Thank you
Trying to accommodate mobile viewing is tough, since there is so much to show. I've tested out doing something like that and it always ends up distracting.
As always, excellent video!
Thanks!
Hey tim, are you planning on doing a video about hosting a mock of an api with predetermined responses?
If not, do you have any video / guide you might recommend?
It isn't on the schedule but I can add it to the suggestion list. I don't have any current recommendations on that topic.
Yet another one of your videos that addresses something I am working on, your channel is great man thank you so much!
I've seen a lot of conflicting information about HttpClient and using 1 instance of it for the life time of the app just because it implements IDisposable. I completely understand that using one instance of HttpClient in a console, windows forms, wpf, etc is fine, but what about in web mvc projects. Isnt it slightly different because if you have a static var holding the instance of HttpClient isnt that shared across everyone using your web app/site, also what is the best way to hold that once instance var for mvc?
I should point out that the reason why I found your video is because I have a web app that Im building that uses a few different apis, and Im wondering how to use HttpClient instances that are kept for the lifetime of the app when Im using mvc5 and if that really is the best practice for each of the external api's Im using as each one would need a separate HttpClient as the base url address would be different
So they've made the HttpClient a lot better in .NET Core. Check out this video on it: th-cam.com/video/cwgck1k0YKU/w-d-xo.html
Basically, you use the HttpClientFactory to create clients for you (or recycle them - it doesn't matter to you which it chooses to use). That way they are safely created and disposed without overloading the system or exhausting the ports.
As always, a fantastic tutorial. Learned a lot. Thank you. Could you do a similar tutorial on how to query GraphQL with C#?
I will add it to the list. Thanks for the suggestion.
I second this hard, I've been jumping back and forth between which gql client library to use or whether to use a client library at all instead of the bare httpclient class.
Would you happen to have a tutorial like this, but from the beginning, such as creating the boxes with "previous" "sun information" "next" etc?
This playlist should help: th-cam.com/play/PLLWMQd6PeGY3QEHCmCWaUKNhmFFdIDxE8.html
Amazing Guide, thank you man
You are welcome.
Hi Tim, could you please briefly explain to me what's the difference between making the ApiHelper class static and then calling the InitializeClient() method vs. making a non-static class and registering it as Singleton service in the Startup.cs (as services.AddSingleton() ...) Thanks!
In this case, it was because we weren't using dependency injection (this is a .NET Framework project so it doesn't have DI built-in like ASP.NET Core projects do). If I had DI available and this were a "real" app, I would implement the class as a singleton, since it allows for constructors, interfaces, and more.
@@IAmTimCorey Thanks for the explaination! Love your work
Your killing it ❤️
Thanks!
Thank you so much! This video was fun to watch :)
You are welcome.
Great video Tim!
Thanks!
Thank you so MUCH! This was awesome!
You are welcome.
At 23:47 ReadAsAsync cannot be found, in fact, I can't find any extension methods. When I type in ReadAsAsync it says 'HttpContent' does not contain a defnition for ReadAsAsync. I've downloaded your code, and I can't find what I did wrong . EDIT: the mircosoft web api nuget package was not installed for some reason
Glad you got it figured out.
Great video. how do you actually do caching??? you mentioned it was very easy to set up.
save the picture on disk then retain the uri to that file when asking for an already loaded picture (with a dictionnary probably?).
Pretty much. I usually save the data to a small database (SQLite, MongoDB, etc.) and the images to disk in a temp folder. I also save the API call parameters or the entire call to the database too. When a call comes in for the exact same data, I go to my database instead. You just need to know how long to cache it for based upon the resource. For example, sunrise/sunset data doesn't change for the same exact data. I could keep that forever. Stock market data changes a LOT so I might only cache the data for 15 minutes (if it was an informational application) or not at all (if it was an investing application).
So how do you know that you receive the exact same request? Will you check every request in DB first if it exists?
This is another great tutorial. May I ask if you can do a tutorial about POST method on API in C# Best Practices, Memory Management and Pitfalls
Great suggestion! ... added to the list.
can u make video how to parallel use api or post/get requests
imagine i need to registrate accounts but nor one by one
how to registrate accounts for example in 10 tasks each of them have different proxy, coockie and exc.
or can you give link with any example of it
ty for ur staff
I'll put that on the list for a follow-up video. In the meantime, you could probably do a parallel.foreach like I demonstrated in my Advanced Async video.
Hi Tim - what made you want to use a static method for the instantiation of the ApiHelper.ApiClient instead of via constructor? What I typically do is create a customized httpClient in a class that inherits from HttpClient. This way I can use DI to bring it in. Any thoughts on this?
Excellent tutorial, now understood how it works, but was wondering if you requesting any files or PDF through API? what sort of properties would we use to display files instead of text?
I don't have any videos on that yet but in general, you need to use a file stream and a file picker on the UI.
@@IAmTimCorey yeah I used stream and memory stream with byte array and retrieved the document. 👍👍👍
Great video Tim.
You are welcome.
Good video.
I don't know why they have to make these packages so complicated. I'm trying to build a simple API client that sends a JSON payload with custom HTTP headers used for authentication and expects a JSON response on success or failure. It doesn't need to be asynchronous because I don't want the application doing anything else while the call is out or until the call times out. The JSON is being handled with Newtonsoft's Json.net. It just seems very difficult to find human readable documentation about system.net.http that shows how to do such a thing.
I think part of it is that you are expecting to do something that isn't simple. That list of requirements entails quite a few things. Dropping async isn't really possible/necessary since the web is, by default, asynchronous. This video shows you how to connect easily to an API and get the data you need.
@@IAmTimCorey Interestingly enough, after posting this comment I decided to try and decipher Microsoft's official docs on HttpClient and was able to get the skeleton functions up and running. It actually wasn't that difficult once I used my secret decoder ring to translate MS speak to plain English. Plus, I planned out exactly what my app was going to do before I wrote a single line of code, as you mentioned in one of your videos, so I knew which functions fit my requirements after a little bit of reading.
BTW, I know your courses were made a while back but your videos have been instrumental in helping me get this app up and running. I'm a photographer, not a software developer so this has been one HUGE learning experience in the month since I started learning C#. Thanks for putting all these videos out there. I'm definitely considering purchasing your course, to say thank you.
Agreed, .NET's existing libraries are verbose and the documentation is hard to digest.
From my personal l can highly recommend any of these free, open-source NuGet packages. These are all well maintained & make for a much better developer experience:
1. ServiceStack.Text( 1k GitHub stars, 7m Nuget downloads) - fast light and resilient.
2. RestSharp (6k GitHub stars, 23m Nuget Downloads) - Simple REST and HTTP API Client
3. Flurl (1.7k GitHub stars, 3m Nuget Downloads) - a fluent, portable, testable HTTP client library
Do you also have a video on how to make proper post calls using this same style? I would like to know what the proper way of posting data to a service that would send it to a database. You don't exactly want sensitive data being visible on the web. It would also be nice to look at this in the way of registering a user and logging in since it's a real life and practical example.
I do not yet but it is coming. The key is that I have to pick one API for uploading. In this case, I will make my own but what I do in that won't be the same as what you do with other APIs. As for sensitive data, if you POST data and you are using HTTPS, you are protected (or at least 99.9% protected).
Hi Tim! In your video you mention building a generic Api data processor. Have you made or are you planning on making a course on that subject? ...and thank you for your videos!!
Hi Tim,
have you got a tut where is shown how to get data from API when having Authorization with tokens?
Check out the TimCo Retail Manager series. Right now we are wiring a Blazor WebAssembly application to an API that has authentication with bearer tokens which include role authorizations. We also wired up a WPF project to the same API.
LOVE THIS GUY
Thanks!
Hi Tim. Thanks for all the great content. This may be one for the back burner or a separate resources video related to consuming rest APIs. There seem to be a wide variety of tutorial videos that relate to consuming a single endpoint, but not really anything that I've been able to find in terms of completing an "object graph". For example, if there's a theroetical API with a single product endpoint that can be retrieved via simple id key and that product has a number of related lookup id's for other related objects with separate endpoints - what would the options be in retrieving those or keeping them either cached or in memory to improve the efficiency of requests? Many thanks
Thanks, I had added it to my list
Tim, can you please do a tutorial that covers this with authentication? at least a couple of major methods? I know you decided not to cover it, but it'll complement this video nicely.
Well, the TimCo Retail Manager series creates a WebAPI that it then calls from WPF with authentication and authorization. That is one example.
Thanks Corey Great work!
You are welcome.
Great video. One question: What if a json response from an api contains an array? How do you map that to properties?
For example:
"weather": [
{
"id": 804,
"main": "Clouds",
"description": "overcast clouds",
"icon": "04n"
}
]
In this specific example, you could have this property: public List Weather { get; set; }
You can also paste the json into C# using the Paste Special option to see how the class structure would work.
Super Tim, thank you for a great video
You are welcome.
hi Tim, you mentioned authentication, why not cover basic authentication, token-based, and the one that uses grant type = client_credentials (oauth 2.0), that would be awesome! thanks
I will add it to the list. Thanks for the suggestion.
Please!
@@IAmTimCorey ya man please do , i want to use for trello lets say
api.trello.com/1/boards/?key=0123token=123name={name}'
like i put my key i put my token then in the name what do i put when i put the name lets say like this -> its not working
This is to create a board:
api.trello.com/1/boards/?key=0123token=123name=yolo
Then it says :
Cannot GET /1/boards/?key
developer.atlassian.com/cloud/trello/rest/api-group-boards/#api-boards-post
Do i need to do something else before trying to put the name et.c
You can add this to your code if you're stuck. I'm not sure if this is the correct way but it works.
replace bas64tokenhere with your base64 encoded username:password
// ApiHelper.cs
ApiClient.DefaultRequestHeaders.Accept.Clear();
ApiClient.DefaultRequestHeaders.Accept.Add(new MediaTypeWithQualityHeaderValue("application/json"));
ApiClient.DefaultRequestHeaders.Authorization =
new AuthenticationHeaderValue("Basic", "base64tokenhere");
Hi Tim. Great video, really helpful for someone coming from JS and React. Do you have a video on how to access nested objects in a JSON response?
Not specifically, although when you parse the JSON into an object, it can handle nested objects.
9:25 Is there a reason you cleared the default accept headers before adding any? I don't think creating a new clients puts any defaults in there
A good practice. Just because something should be true doesn't mean it is.
One more thing: I had to add this line:
System.Net.ServicePointManager.SecurityProtocol = SecurityProtocolType.Tls12;
to the InitializeClient() of the ApiClient. If not I was getting a HttpRequestException: "The request was aborted: Could not create SSL/TLS secure channel."
The exception occurred in ComicProcessor.LoadComic(), probably because my environment is a bit different, VS2015, .NET Framwork 4.5.2
I got the same Error and was able to fix it with your fix. Thank you.
I'm glad you got it to work. Thanks for sharing.
Hi tim, another question: what do you think of the term "Full Stack Developer"? Do you consider yourself more "back-end" oriented, "front-end" oriented, or both?
I'm definitely a full stack developer. I can (and do) create user interfaces and I can/do create data access as well as everything in between. As far as what I feel about the term, I think it is fairly descriptive. Sure, usually people can do both but it is very common to specialize in one side or the other. The larger your company/team is, the more likely it is that you will specialize in one area. You get really good in that area and you may even let your other skills fade a bit (or you just don't keep up with the newest changes).
Thanks again Tim! Will try that now.
Could you please share your "try", I think I have same problem as you :)
"type": "champion",
"format": "standAloneComplex",
"version": "10.3.1",
"data": {
"ChampName1": {
"version": "10.3.1",
"id": "Aatrox",
"key": "266",
"name": "Aatrox",
"title": "the Darkin Blade",
"blurb": "Once honored defenders of Shurima against the Void, ...",
"info": {
"attack": 8,
..
},
"image": {
"full": "Aatrox.png",
..
},
"tags": [
"Fighter",
"Tank"
],
"partype": "Blood Well",
"stats": {
"hp": 580,
..
}
},
"ChampName2": {
"version": "10.3.1",
"id": "Ahri",
"key": "103",
...
},
"image": {
"full": "Ahri.png",
...
},
"tags": [
"Mage",
"Assassin"
],
"partype": "Mana",
"stats": {
"hp": 526,
....
}
},
This is how i fixed my issue I hope it helps you.
Added it to a List of my model like Tim said =) GLHF
List championData = await response.Content.ReadAsAsync();
Sounds good.
Hello Tim,
I have the following question:
In this video you have the controller that actually does the job.
I saw however that on your TimCo retail series you have a controller that defines what should get post etc actually do..
I tried to extend your video here to get data from another api without success. The notions are not so clear yet (and I haven't finished your timCo retail series videos on API).
So in its documentation (the pi i want to use) says for example: the end point url is blabla ( no free advertising :P). If you want to get a random fact from the endpoint go for GET /facts/random. I build exactly the request as you did here, and I expected that a url blabla/facts/random would do the trick. It does nothing though ( SunInfo = null). What am I missing? Were am I mistaken?
Try calling the API in Postman. Make sure it returns a value that you expect. Then make sure your model you are capturing it into is laid out correctly.
Hello Sir,
Thank you for sharing video. Its very helpful.
You are welcome.
`Loaded` is kinda like `ComponentDidMount` in React, no? That's the way I related it in my head anyway... This is a great tutorial
Not sure. I'm not up on React.
@@IAmTimCorey Do you have a video on handling an array of nested json data to a list in C#? Everything else worked like the sun info, but I cannot figure out how to convert the result to a List...
thank you fro the demo. Good Job !
You are welcome.
Hi Tim, does the values of LoadSunInformation update for each day? In addition does this tutorial include constantly updating information when the JSON or website file is update?
Thanks for this really great video.
You are welcome.
Hi Tim! Great video, I've been following you for a couple of months, is there any vid related with authentication? I'm creating my own app and i don't know yet what would be the best way to authenticate users.
Take your pick - th-cam.com/users/IAmTimCoreysearch?query=auth
@@IAmTimCorey awesome, thanks bro. Keep it up
Thanks for help bro!!!
Happy to help
Thanks Tim. Wanted to check if you have any series for automating apis
Automating them? No, sorry.
The ReadAsAsync() function is no longer available what is the fix for this?
I had the same problem. You need to reference the ...WebApi.Client NuGet
Hi Tim, is it possible to apply/use the ApiHelper class on a ASP.NET MVC app? If so, how do I use the InitializeClient method?
Yep. You would have less to do. You would do the HttpClient initialization in dependency injection and pass that into the ApiHelper class. We do that in the TimCo Retail Manager series.
Hi Tim... thanks, this is a great video. However, for beginner as me, you speak slow but some times you don't mention step you do and I got totally lost. @49:54 you added using DemoLibrary; but was very difficult to catch... took me hours figured out with I couldn't run my code.
I'm sorry I lost you. It is a hard balance to maintain, providing enough content for the semi-advanced viewer while covering what the beginner needs. I'll try to makes sure I either cover things better or point you to places where they are covered if I can't cover it right then.
@@IAmTimCorey Do I have to use DemoLibrary?
Hey, big fan! Do you have any videos on how to post to an API server? I'm able to get, but no matter what I do, I'm getting a 400 when I try to post. Not sure what's happening, and I've spent hours and hours debugging. Would love to see how you actually do it. Thanks!
I've got one on the short list for upcoming videos that will work with how to call a WebAPI from a client (including posting data).
Question for you Tim, at the point of 19 mins ish, you talk about using the 'using' statement to clean things up. I totally understand that. If I didn't want to use this method, could I create the response variable and when I"m done, just perform at response.Dispose(); at the end to accomplish the same thing? Thanks!
Not quite. If you have an unhandled exception, the Dispose method would not be called.
Good, but missed abit about REST apis different calls, like POST. I think the first hurdle people will have using it on real project is you will need to login to the REST service, so first call they need is POST and know how to format C# strings into JSON style data, and decode success response back. Some debugging tips about REST APIs, like using apps like Postman are invaluable too.
I did mention that briefly. I debated adding some type of authenticated call but the problem is that each API does things differently. Showing how to do one will not help you do another and might actually confuse the viewer. I do make post calls in the TimCo Retail Manager series (that are authenticated).
Thank you so much. This was a very helpful video for me as I'm building out a new app that heavily utilizes JSON data. I recreated your lesson here using Xamarin and it all works quite well. However, my next big challenge is to consume JSON data which is stock price data and so my JSON has many rows that contain "high" "low" "open" "close" data. In your "Processor" class, could you demonstrate the code you would use to cycle through and deserialize that JSON into a Collection/List that can then still be accessed on the front end? There are a lot of example floating around out there, but I can't find "the one" that actually works. Any advice is appreciated.
Not sure what you are looking to have demonstrated. If you have an array of objects coming back, just as for it as a List during deserialization and it will work.
Did you make a video covering posting data to an API? Thank you.
Check out the TimCo Retail Manager. We do that and more in that series.
This is gonna be so useful! Thank you so much!
But what if the data I want to retrieve is in XML format? How would I do that? Is there a tutorial you would recommand? Thank you in advance!
It almost never is (and can usually be changed to json even if they offer XML). However, if you needed to handle XML, you would need to use the XML parser to convert it into usable data.
Hi, could not find an answer on the internet, so maybe you will help me. I heard that there is a new way of calling an API without NuGet packages. It already works without Newtonsoft but ReadAsAsync only exists in the NuGet package. If you know the answer, can you point me in the right direction?
Okay done. If somebody has the same question, I did it using System.Text.Json and this helped me: www.pmichaels.net/2020/02/22/my-object-wont-deserialise-using-system-text-json/
Once agin Tim good job. Thanks
You are welcome.
Great tutorial! :)
Thank you! Cheers!
Hi, thank you, your videos are very helpful. I have a question, how should I name my properties
in the case when filed in JSON called "solar_noon" or "civil_twilight_end"? Should I name them like Solar_noon or Civil_twilight_end.
Is there some solution that let you name properties in CamelCase?
I typically just match the names. That is simplest. However, you can use attributes to identify what the JSON name is and then use a more C#-like property name.
Thanks, Very much ,Tim
You are welcome.
I REALLY appreciate that you don't make your free videos just a nagging ad for your paid content. Maybe even a little too much so.
Hence... I would like to know what are the major differences between your paid content vs your free channel content? (Structure and consumption)
I appreciate the kind words. My goal is to make learning C# easier. That isn't a cover for my real goal of making money. While making money pays the bills and I'm extremely grateful for people who pay for my content, that truly is a means to fund my overall efforts to help developers. As for the differences between the paid and the free, I try to keep those to a minimum. I give the same effort in a free video as I do in a paid course. The difference is that a paid course is a series that puts all of the pieces together. Think of the paid courses as a complete roadmap from point A to point B whereas the free videos are stops along the way sometimes. With the free content, you need to identify the path from A to B yourself and then figure out which stops you need to hit. With the paid courses, you get the path and all of the stops. For instance, I just released a course titled Upgrading to .NET Core from Start to Finish. In order to show you the complete way (or as complete as I can), I took the source code from my C# Application from Start to Finish and the two add-on courses. That gave me a real-world example application with four different major project types to upgrade (Class Library, WinForms, WPF, and ASP.NET MVC). I upgraded all four project types, showed how to deal with the bugs that arose from moving to .NET Core, then I walked you through implementing the new .NET Core features into the upgraded apps, how to refactor the apps to use those features (even when it was messy and difficult), and showed how to deploy the applications three different ways. I try to teach you everything you need to know to do the job in the real world. I have worked in the real world for two decades. I know the difference between a clean, neat tutorial and what really happens when you try to use that technique in a production environment (hint: it doesn't work well because the real world is messy). I try to teach you in a way that prepares you to actually get the job done.
Does that help?
IAmTimCorey absolutely! 🍻
@@IAmTimCorey A+ Content