How do I use the IBM Watson Dialog service using c#?

Question

A client is using IBM's Watson Dialog service and I cannot find any examples of someone doing even the most basic stuff using .Net (c# specifically).

IBM only shows examples using Curl, Node, and Java...

My first goal is to be able to add a new xml file (dialog tree) to the watson service. Seems simple enough, but I have been beating my head for a while now.

Answer 1

So I finally got this working by cobbling together the help of about a dozen google searches on related topics. Thought I would post the working version here.

Below is my code which will upload an xml file to the Watson Dialog service using C# in a MVC controller.

The front end is a form that takes a friendly name (which I turn into a .xml file name), and an upload of the file itself (using dropzone).

I am sure there could be optimizations, but I hope this helps someone. The good news is, that this can be used as a foundation to do just about any Watson Dialog service call (add, update, delete).

    public ContentResult Save(FormCollection form)
    {
        try
        {
            var name = form["txtDialogName"];

            var filename = name + ".xml";
            byte[] bytes = null;

            foreach (string s in Request.Files)
            {
                var file = Request.Files[s];

                using (Stream inputStream = file.InputStream)
                {
                    MemoryStream memoryStream = inputStream as MemoryStream;
                    if (memoryStream == null)
                    {
                        memoryStream = new MemoryStream();
                        inputStream.CopyTo(memoryStream);
                    }

                    bytes = memoryStream.ToArray();
                }

                break;
            }

            if (bytes == null)
            {
                var contentResult = new ContentResult
                {
                    ContentType = "application/json",
                    Content = null
                };
                return contentResult;
            }


            var basePath = ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["WatsonPath"];

            var username = ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["WatsonUsername"];
            var password = ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["WatsonPassword"];
            string credentials = Convert.ToBase64String(Encoding.ASCII.GetBytes(string.Format("{0}:{1}", username, password)));

            var values = new[]
                         { new KeyValuePair<string, string>("name", filename) };

            using (var client = new HttpClient())
            using (var formData = new MultipartFormDataContent())
            {
                client.DefaultRequestHeaders.Authorization = new AuthenticationHeaderValue("Basic", credentials);

                foreach (var keyValuePair in values)
                {
                    formData.Add(new StringContent(keyValuePair.Value), string.Format("\"{0}\"", keyValuePair.Key));
                }

                formData.Add(new ByteArrayContent(bytes),
                               '"' + "file" + '"',
                               '"' + filename + '"');

                var response = client.PostAsync(basePath + "/v1/dialogs", formData).Result;
                var result = response.Content.ReadAsStringAsync().Result;
                if (!response.IsSuccessStatusCode)
                {
                    var contentResult = new ContentResult
                    {
                        ContentType = "application/json",
                        Content = response.ReasonPhrase
                    };
                    return contentResult;
                }

                var successResult = new ContentResult
                {
                    ContentType = "application/json",
                    Content = result
                };

                return successResult;
            }
        }
        catch (Exception ex)
        {
            HandleError(ex);
            var contentResult = new ContentResult
            {
                ContentType = "application/json",
                Content = "false"
            };
            return contentResult;
        }
    }