CODEWITHSUNDEEP
c#inversion-of-control
Jordan
Jordan

Reputation: 9901

What framework uses `IServiceProvider`?

Is the IServiceProvider basically just a generic interface for any IOC container, or is it used for a specific framework? I'm rolling my own light weight IOC container and I am wanting to know if I should implement it. Are there any other interfaces that I should implement? I'm not really interested in either MEF or Unity. I've used both extensively and they don't really work for my current project.

Upvotes: 5

Views: 4137

Answers (4)

Phillip Scott Givens
Phillip Scott Givens

Reputation: 5464

I think it is a pretty general use interface, so you can use it with anything. It almost should not even be in the Framework Class Library. For one specific use, Alex D. James of the WCF Data Services team has a blog about it.

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/alexj/archive/2010/01/07/creating-a-data-service-provider-part-2-iserviceprovider-datasources.aspx

I do not think it has anything to do with IoC containers. I have used Unity and Autofac quite a bit and have never seen it used with either. As for rolling your own, I would suggest you define your own container interface in the more standard generic way:

public interface IContainer
{
    T Resolve<T>();
}

That is pretty standard with some variation, but you could also just use IServiceProvider if that fits your needs.

And on that note, unless this is just an academic exercise, you might want to read "Dependency Injection". Mark Seemann covers every container out there and quite a bit of theory and practice. That is, I highly recommend it.

https://www.amazon.com/Dependency-Injection-NET-Mark-Seemann/

Upvotes: 2

David
David

Reputation: 2272

ASP.NET 5 uses IServiceProvider in "self-hosted" mode, that is, when hosting an ASP.NET application and the runtime in a console application or service.
(An object of type Microsoft.Framework.Runtime.Common.DependencyInjection.ServiceProvider -- which implements IServiceProvider -- is passed to your console app constructor.)

Thus, if you wanted to use a different IoC container in ASP.NET 5, you might want to implement this interface. Or wrap the other IoC container in a class which implements this interface.

Upvotes: 1

Ricardo Peres
Ricardo Peres

Reputation: 14535

The new (as of .NET 4) Runtime Caching API also uses it: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.runtime.caching.objectcache.host.aspx.

And also Visual Studio designer.

Upvotes: 0

meklarian
meklarian

Reputation: 6625

IServiceProvider is an imported (or perhaps held-over) COM interface that is intended to be used for private features in the context of the object whom you interrogate for a Service. The term 'Service' is applied rather loosely here, it originally meant any COM object that could be returned based upon what GUID is given.

IServiceProvider @ MSDN (.NET reference)
IServiceProviderImpl Class @ MSDN (C++ ATL reference)

In .NET, you don't need to implement it unless you have a client that specifically supports it, and in many cases you won't need to add yet another level of indirection that is implied by using IServiceProvider. Also, you can devise your own scheme to share common objects or implement other use patterns based upon IoC / Dependency Injection that are more flexible or more rigid as dictated by your needs.

One good historical context for IServiceProvider is the IE Browser Plugin Spec. Here, it is used to allow plugin components to use Browser Host features in-context. In a COM context, this interface is useful because it hides the details of instantiation and also can be used as part of a object construction and utilization strategy to avoid reference loops.

WebBrowser Customization (Part 2) @ MSDN

Upvotes: 4

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