⭐ Please star this project if you find it useful!
This README is for EmbedIO v2.x. Click here if you are using EmbedIO v1.x.
A tiny, cross-platform, module based, MIT-licensed web server for .NET Framework and .NET Core.
- Written entirely in C#, using our helpful library SWAN
- Network operations use the async/await pattern: Responses are handled asynchronously
- Multiple implementations support: EmbedIO can use Microsoft
HttpListener
or internal Http Listener based on Mono/websocket-sharp projects - Cross-platform: tested on multiple OS and runtimes. From Windows .NET Framework to Linux MONO.
- Extensible: Write your own modules -- For example, video streaming, UPnP, etc. Check out EmbedIO Extras for additional modules
- Small memory footprint
- Create REST APIs quickly with the out-of-the-box Web API module
- Serve static or embedded files with 1 line of code (also out-of-the-box)
- Handle sessions with the built-in LocalSessionWebModule
- WebSockets support
- CORS support. Origin, Header and Method validation with OPTIONS preflight
- Supports HTTP 206 Partial Content
- Support Xamarin Forms
- And many more options in the same package
Some notes regarding WebSocket and runtimes support:
Runtime | HTTP implementation | WebSocket support | Notes |
---|---|---|---|
NET452 | Unosquare and Microsoft | Yes | Support Win7+ OS, Linux and macOS. |
NET472 | Unosquare and Microsoft | Yes | Support Win8+ OS. |
NETSTANDARD13 | Unosquare | Yes | Support Windows, Linux and macOS using native System.Net library |
NETSTANDARD20 | Unosquare and Microsoft | Yes | Support Windows, Linux and macOS using native System.Net library |
UAP | Unosquare | No | Support Windows Universal Platform until version 2.1.1. |
WebApiController
is renewed. Reduce the methods overhead removing the WebServer and Context arguments. See examples below.RoutingStrategy.Regex
is the default routing scheme.
IHttpListener
is runtime/platform independent, you can choose UnosquareHttpListener
implementation with NET472 or NETSTANDARD20. This separation of implementations brings new access to interfaces from common Http objects likeIHttpRequest
,IHttpContext
and more.IWebServer
is a new interface to create custom web server implementation, like a Test Web Server where all the operations are in-memory to speed up unit testing. Similar to TestServer from OWIN- General improvements in how the Unosquare
HttpListner
is working and code clean-up.
Note - We encourage to upgrade to the newest EmbedIO version. Branch version 1.X will no longer be maintained, and issues will be tested against 2.X and resolved just there.
- Write a cross-platform GUI entirely using React/AngularJS/Vue.js or any Javascript framework
- Write a game using Babylon.js and make EmbedIO your serve your code and assets
- Create GUIs for Windows services or Linux daemons
- Works well with LiteLib - add SQLite support in minutes!
- Write client applications with real-time communication between them using WebSockets
- Write internal web server for Xamarin Forms applications
You can start using EmbedIO by just downloading the nuget.
PM> Install-Package EmbedIO
> dotnet add package EmbedIO
By adding the namespace Unosquare.Labs.EmbedIO
to your class, you can use some helpful extension methods for IHttpContext
, IHttpResponse
and IHttpRequest
. These methods can be used in any Web module (like Fallback Module) or inside a WebAPI Controller method.
Below, some common scenarios using a WebAPI Controller method as body function:
For reading a dictionary from a HTTP Request body you can use RequestFormDataDictionary. This method works directly from IHttpContext
and returns the key-value pairs sent by using the Contet-Type 'application/x-www-form-urlencoded'.
[WebApiHandler(HttpVerbs.Post, "/api/data")]
public async Task<bool> PostData()
{
var data = this.RequestFormDataDictionary();
// Perform an operation with the data
await SaveData(data);
return true;
}
For reading a JSON payload and deserialize it to an object from a HTTP Request body you can use ParseJson. This method works directly from IHttpContext
and returns an object of the type specified in the generic type.
[WebApiHandler(HttpVerbs.Post, "/api/data")]
public async Task<bool> PostJsonData()
{
var data = this.ParseJson<MyData>();
// Perform an operation with the data
await SaveData(data);
return true;
}
EmbedIO doesn't provide the functionality to read from a Multipart FormData stream. But you can check the HttpMultipartParser Nuget and connect the Request input directly to the HttpMultipartParser, very helpful and small library.
There is another solution but it requires this Microsoft Nuget.
For writing a binary stream directly to the Response Output Stream you can use BinaryResponseAsync. This method has an overload to use IHttpContext
and you need to set the Content-Type beforehand.
[WebApiHandler(HttpVerbs.Get, "/api/binary")]
public async Task<bool> GetBinary()
{
var stream = new MemoryStream();
// Call a fictional external source
await GetExternalStream(stream);
return await this.BinaryResponseAsync(stream);
}
Both HTTP listeners (Microsoft and Unosquare) can open a web server using SSL. This support is for Windows only (for now) and you need to manually register your certificate or use the WebServerOptions
class to initialize a new WebServer
instance. This section will provide some examples of how to use SSL but first a brief explanation of how SSL works on Windows.
For Windows Vista or better, Microsoft provides Network Shell (netsh
). This command line tool allows to map an IP-port to a certificate, so incoming HTTP request can upgrade the connection to a secure stream using the provided certificate. EmbedIO can read or register certificates to a default store (My/LocalMachine) and use them against a netsh sslcert
for binding the first https
prefix registered.
For Windows XP and Mono, you can use manually the httpcfg
for registering the binding.
The more practical case to use EmbedIO with SSL is the AutoRegister
option. You need to create a WebServerOptions
instance with the path to a PFX file and the AutoRegister
flag on. This options will try to get or register the certificate to the default certificate store. Then it will use the certificate thumbprint to register with netsh
the FIRST https
prefix registered on the options.
If you already have a certificate on the default certificate store and the binding is also registered in netsh
, you can use Autoload
flag and optionally provide a certificate thumbprint. If the certificate thumbprint is not provided, EmbedIO will read the data from netsh
. After getting successfully the certificate from the store, the raw data is passed to the WebServer.
Please note the comments are the important part here. More info is available in the samples.
namespace Unosquare
{
using System;
using Unosquare.Labs.EmbedIO;
using Unosquare.Labs.EmbedIO.Modules;
class Program
{
/// <summary>
/// Defines the entry point of the application.
/// </summary>
/// <param name="args">The arguments.</param>
static void Main(string[] args)
{
var url = "http://localhost:9696/";
if (args.Length > 0)
url = args[0];
// Our web server is disposable.
using (var server = new WebServer(url))
{
// First, we will configure our web server by adding Modules.
// Please note that order DOES matter.
// ================================================================================================
// If we want to enable sessions, we simply register the LocalSessionModule
// Beware that this is an in-memory session storage mechanism so, avoid storing very large objects.
// You can use the server.GetSession() method to get the SessionInfo object and manupulate it.
// You could potentially implement a distributed session module using something like Redis
server.WithLocalSession();
// Here we setup serving of static files
server.RegisterModule(new StaticFilesModule("c:/web"));
// The static files module will cache small files in ram until it detects they have been modified.
server.Module<StaticFilesModule>().UseRamCache = true;
// Once we've registered our modules and configured them, we call the RunAsync() method.
server.RunAsync();
// Fire up the browser to show the content if we are debugging!
#if DEBUG
var browser = new System.Diagnostics.Process()
{
StartInfo = new System.Diagnostics.ProcessStartInfo(url) { UseShellExecute = true }
};
browser.Start();
#endif
// Wait for any key to be pressed before disposing of our web server.
// In a service, we'd manage the lifecycle of our web server using
// something like a BackgroundWorker or a ManualResetEvent.
Console.ReadKey(true);
}
}
}
}
Many extension methods are available. This allows you to create a web server instance in a fluent style by dotting in configuration options.
namespace Unosquare
{
using System;
using Unosquare.Labs.EmbedIO;
internal class Program
{
/// <summary>
/// Defines the entry point of the application.
/// </summary>
/// <param name="args">The arguments.</param>
private static void Main(string[] args)
{
var url = "http://localhost:9696/";
if (args.Length > 0)
url = args[0];
// Create Webserver and attach LocalSession and Static
// files module and CORS enabled
var server = WebServer
.Create(url)
.EnableCors()
.WithLocalSession()
.WithStaticFolderAt("c:/web");
var cts = new CancellationTokenSource();
var task = server.RunAsync(cts.Token);
Console.ReadKey(true);
cts.Cancel();
// Wait before dispose server
task.Wait();
server.Dispose();
}
}
}
The WebApi module supports two routing strategies: Wildcard and Regex. By default, the WebApi module will use the Regex Routing Strategy trying to match and resolve the values from a route template, in a similar fashion to Microsoft's Web API.
A method with the following route /api/people/{id}
is going to match any request URL with three segments: the first two api
and people
and the last
one is going to be parsed or converted to the type in the id
argument of the handling method signature. Please read on if this was confusing as it is
much simpler than it sounds. Additionally, you can put multiple values to match, for example /api/people/{mainSkill}/{age}
, and receive the
parsed values from the URL straight into the arguments of your handler method.
During server setup:
var server = new WebServer("http://localhost:9696/", RoutingStrategy.Regex);
server.RegisterModule(new WebApiModule());
server.Module<WebApiModule>().RegisterController<PeopleController>();
And our controller class (using default Regex Strategy) looks like:
public class PeopleController : WebApiController
{
public PeopleController(IHttpContext context)
: base(context)
{
}
[WebApiHandler(HttpVerbs.Get, "/api/people/{id}")]
public bool GetPeople(int id)
{
try
{
if (People.Any(p => p.Key == id))
{
return this.JsonResponse(People.FirstOrDefault(p => p.Key == id));
}
}
catch (Exception ex)
{
return this.JsonExceptionResponse(ex);
}
}
// You can override the default headers and add custom headers to each API Response.
public override void SetDefaultHeaders() => this.NoCache();
}
The previous default strategy (Wildcard) matches routes using the asterisk *
character in the route. For example:
- The route
/api/people/*
will match any request with a URL starting with the two first URL segmentsapi
andpeople
and ending with anything. The route/api/people/hello
will be matched. - You can also use wildcards in the middle of the route. The route
/api/people/*/details
will match requests starting with the two first URL segmentsapi
andpeople
, and end with adetails
segment. The route/api/people/hello/details
will be matched.
During server setup:
var server = new WebServer("http://localhost:9696/", RoutingStrategy.Regex);
server.RegisterModule(new WebApiModule());
server.Module<WebApiModule>().RegisterController<PeopleController>();
public class PeopleController : WebApiController
{
public PeopleController(IHttpContext context)
: base(context)
{
}
[WebApiHandler(HttpVerbs.Get, "/api/people/*")]
public bool GetPeople()
{
try
{
var lastSegment = this.Request.Url.Segments.Last();
if (lastSegment.EndsWith("/"))
return this.JsonResponse(People);
int key = 0;
if (int.TryParse(lastSegment, out key) && People.Any(p => p.Key == key))
{
return this.JsonResponse(People.FirstOrDefault(p => p.Key == key));
}
throw new KeyNotFoundException("Key Not Found: " + lastSegment);
}
catch (Exception ex)
{
return this.JsonExceptionResponse(ex);
}
}
}
The SetDefaultHeaders
method will add a no-cache policy to all Web API responses. If you plan to handle a differente policy or even custom headers to each different Web API method we recommend you override this method as you need.
During server setup:
server.RegisterModule(new WebSocketsModule());
server.Module<WebSocketsModule>().RegisterWebSocketsServer<WebSocketsChatServer>("/chat");
And our web sockets server class looks like:
/// <summary>
/// Defines a very simple chat server
/// </summary>
public class WebSocketsChatServer : WebSocketsServer
{
public WebSocketsChatServer()
: base(true)
{
// placeholder
}
public override string ServerName => "Chat Server"
protected override void OnMessageReceived(IWebSocketContext context, byte[] rxBuffer, IWebSocketReceiveResult rxResult)
{
var session = this.WebServer.GetSession(context);
foreach (var ws in this.WebSockets)
{
if (ws != context)
this.Send(ws, rxBuffer.ToText());
}
}
protected override void OnClientConnected(
IWebSocketContext context,
System.Net.IPEndPoint localEndPoint,
System.Net.IPEndPoint remoteEndPoint)
{
this.Send(context, "Welcome to the chat room!");
foreach (var ws in this.WebSockets)
{
if (ws != context)
this.Send(ws, "Someone joined the chat room.");
}
}
protected override void OnFrameReceived(IWebSocketContext context, byte[] rxBuffer, IWebSocketReceiveResult rxResult)
{
// placeholder
}
protected override void OnClientDisconnected(IWebSocketContext context)
{
this.Broadcast("Someone left the chat room.");
}
}
Name | Author | Description |
---|---|---|
Butterfly.EmbedIO | Fireshark Studios, LLC | Implementation of Butterfly.Core.Channel and Butterfly.Core.WebApi using the EmbedIO server |
embedio-cli | Unosquare | A dotnet global tool that enables start any web folder or EmbedIO assembly (WebAPI or WebSocket) from command line. |
EmbedIO.BearerToken | Unosquare | Allow to authenticate with a Bearer Token. It uses a Token endpoint (at /token path) and with a defined validation delegate create a JsonWebToken. The module can check all incoming requests or a paths |
EmbedIO.LiteLibWebApi | Unosquare | Allow to expose a sqlite database as REST api using EmbedIO WebApi and LiteLib libraries |
EmbedIO.OWIN | Unosquare | EmbedIO can use the OWIN platform in two different approach: You can use EmbedIO as OWIN server and use all OWIN framework with EmbedIO modules. |
Microsoft.AspNetCore.Server.EmbedIO | Dju | EmbedIO web server support for ASP.NET Core, as a drop-in replacement for Kestrel |
To YourKit for supports open source projects with its full-featured .NET Profiler, an amazing tool to profile CPU and Memory!