WCF Web Service connection test utility

Question

I am creating a configuration utility that can be used to change the web service configuration. I am doing this as my application has a lot of exes and contains a lot of configuration files.

This is also used to change the configuration for the web service as there are a lot of services and I need and easy way to change the server and the virtual directory in the connection string through a utility.

So what I am trying to do is use the service url and try connect to it to check if the connection can be established without needing to create a proxy.

So far this is what I am doing:

string url = "http://localhost/VirtualDirectory/Service.svc";
HttpWebRequest request = WebRequest.Create(url) as HttpWebRequest;

request.Credentials = new NetworkCredential("UserName", "Password");

using(HttpWebResponse response = request.GetResponse() as HttpWebResponse)
{
    if (response.StatusCode == HttpStatusCode.OK)
    { MessageBox.Show("Connection successful!"); }
    else
    { MessageBox.Show("Connection failed!!!"); }
}

But I am getting "The remote server returned an error: (401) Unauthorized." and the exception status is "System.Net.WebExceptionStatus.ProtocolError"

But when I am trying to connect to the web service using these credentials from the browser, I am able to connect and see the service xml.

I am not sure if it is something that I am doing wrong or if there is anything that is wrong from the IIS side(IIS 7.5). I see that for the service, anonymous authentication is enabled and rest is disabled in IIS.

I could not get the solution from another SO question. But it can be a possible duplicate. Please provide a link in such a case.

Thanks.

Answer 1

I figured out the problem and the solution as well for this. What I did not realize that the service was expecting an "Authorization" custom header which I was not providing, as I didn't notice it. My bad.

Below is the code that worked for me:

string url = @"http://" + ServerName + @"/" + VirtualDirectoryName
    + @"/Service.svc";
HttpWebRequest request = WebRequest.Create(url) as HttpWebRequest;

NetworkCredential nc = new NetworkCredential("Username", "Password");
request.Credentials = nc;
string credentials = "Username:Password";
request.Headers.Add("Authorization", "Basic " 
    + Convert.ToBase64String(Encoding.Default.GetBytes(credentials)));
CredentialCache cache = new CredentialCache();
cache.Add(new Uri(url), "Basic", nc);
request.Credentials = cache;
request.PreAuthenticate = true;

bool pingSuccess = false;
var ping = new Ping();
PingReply reply;
try
{
    reply = ping.Send(ServerName);
    if (reply.Status == IPStatus.Success)
        pingSuccess = true;
}
catch
{
    string msg = "Connection to the server failed.\nCheck server name.";
    MessageBox.Show(msg, _error, MessageBoxButtons.OK, MessageBoxIcon.Error);
    return;
}
using (HttpWebResponse response = request.GetResponse() as HttpWebResponse)
{
    if (response.StatusCode == HttpStatusCode.OK)
    {
        MessageBox.Show("Server connection successful!", 
            _info, 
            MessageBoxButtons.OK, 
            MessageBoxIcon.Information);
    }
    else
    {
        if (pingSuccess)
        {
            string msg = "Server is Available but connection failed." 
                + "\nCheck virtual directory name.";
            MessageBox.Show(msg, 
                _error, 
                MessageBoxButtons.OK, 
                MessageBoxIcon.Error);
        }
    }
}