Can WCF discovery be used to display a WCF endpoint using named pipes?

Question

I have an application that uses discovery that can be deployed locally on the same PC or remote from the service it uses. Is there a way to open a named pipe binding through WCF discovery? If not, I suggest that I can negotiate after discovering the service to determine the most appropriate binding.

Answer 1

Yes it is possible. But since the address will be listed as "localhost" (the only possible address for net.pipe), you will likely need some kind of test to make sure that the service is actually running on the same machine as the discovery client.

public class StackOverflow_7068743
{
    [ServiceContract]
    public interface ITest
    {
        [OperationContract]
        string Echo(string text);
    }
    public class Service : ITest
    {
        public string Echo(string text)
        {
            return text + " (via " + OperationContext.Current.IncomingMessageHeaders.To + ")";
        }
    }
    public static void Test()
    {
        string baseAddressHttp = "http://" + Environment.MachineName + ":8000/Service";
        string baseAddressPipe = "net.pipe://localhost/Service";
        ServiceHost host = new ServiceHost(typeof(Service), new Uri(baseAddressHttp), new Uri(baseAddressPipe));
        host.Description.Behaviors.Add(new ServiceDiscoveryBehavior());
        host.AddServiceEndpoint(new UdpDiscoveryEndpoint());
        host.AddServiceEndpoint(typeof(ITest), new BasicHttpBinding(), "");
        host.AddServiceEndpoint(typeof(ITest), new NetNamedPipeBinding(NetNamedPipeSecurityMode.None), "");
        host.Open();
        Console.WriteLine("Host opened");

        DiscoveryClient discoveryClient = new DiscoveryClient(new UdpDiscoveryEndpoint());
        FindResponse findResponse = discoveryClient.Find(new FindCriteria(typeof(ITest)));
        Console.WriteLine(findResponse.Endpoints.Count);

        EndpointAddress address = null;
        Binding binding = null;
        foreach (var endpoint in findResponse.Endpoints)
        {
            if (endpoint.Address.Uri.Scheme == Uri.UriSchemeHttp)
            {
                address = endpoint.Address;
                binding = new BasicHttpBinding();
            }
            else if (endpoint.Address.Uri.Scheme == Uri.UriSchemeNetPipe)
            {
                address = endpoint.Address;
                binding = new NetNamedPipeBinding(NetNamedPipeSecurityMode.None);
                break; // this is the preferred
            }

            Console.WriteLine(endpoint.Address);
        }

        if (binding == null)
        {
            Console.WriteLine("No known bindings");
        }
        else
        {
            ChannelFactory<ITest> factory = new ChannelFactory<ITest>(binding, address);
            ITest proxy = factory.CreateChannel();
            Console.WriteLine(proxy.Echo("Hello"));
            ((IClientChannel)proxy).Close();
            factory.Close();
        }

        Console.Write("Press ENTER to close the host");
        Console.ReadLine();
        host.Close();
    }
}