Startup Modules

Startup modules for ASP.NET Core.

Create modular and focused Startup-like classes for each of your application's features/components/modules and keep your startup file sane.

Windows	Linux	NuGet

Installation

StartupModules is available on NuGet

Getting started

Create a startup module

Creating a startup module is easy. Create a new class and implement the IStartupModule interface:

public class MyStartupModule : IStartupModule
{
    public void ConfigureServices(IServiceCollection services, ConfigureServicesContext context)
    {
    }

    public void Configure(IApplicationBuilder app, ConfigureMiddlewareContext context)
    {
    }
}

You'll notice the familiair ConfigureServices and Configure methods. A convient context-object is passed to both of them providing useful services while configuring your application, such as IHostingEnvironment and IConfiguration. A scoped IServiceProvider is present in the ConfigureMiddlewareContext as well.

Configure startup modules

You can configure startup modules using the UseStartupModules when building the web host in Program.cs:

public static IWebHostBuilder CreateWebHostBuilder(string[] args) =>
    WebHost.CreateDefaultBuilder(args)
        .UseStartupModules()
        .UseStartup<Startup>();

This will automatically discover startup modules (and application initializers) in the entry assembly of your application. You can also specify an array of assemblies to discover startup modules from:

.UseStartupModules(typeof(Startup).Assembly, typeof(SomeTypeInAnotherAssembly).Assembly)

You can have more control of the configuration using the overload with the options:

.UseStartupModules(options =>
{
    // Discover from entry assembly
    o.DiscoverStartupModules();

    // Discover from specific assemblies
    o.DiscoverStartupModules(typeof(Startup).Assembly, typeof(SomeTypeInAnotherAssembly).Assembly);

    // Add individual startup modules
    o.AddStartupModule<MyStartupModule>();
})

Application Initializers

Application initializers allow you to write asynchronous startup logic for your application, such as configuring your Entity Framework database context and executing migrations. Applications initializers are, just like startup modules, discovered automatically as well.

public class DatabaseInitializer : IApplicationInitializer
{
    private readonly AppDbContext _dbContext;

    public DatabaseInitializer(AppDbContext dbContext)
    {
        _dbContext = dbContext;
    }

    public async Task Task Invoke()
    {
        await _dbContext.MigrateAsync();
    }
}

You can specify any number of dependencies available in your application via the constructor of an application initializer. The dependencies will be resolved from a scoped service provider instance and will be disposed after application startup. This prevents common pitfalls such as a resolving a singleton database context and leaking its connection for the lifetime off the application and avoids the hassle of creating a service provider scope yourself.