Asp.Net MVC and Web API

Question

Hi,   I am new to coding using MVC so I would be grateful if anyone was able to help me out, could you please keep it simple so I am able to understand  I have created an application which reads data from my web API and then places that data into a table on my MVC view. I have got it all working but I am unsure on one bit of code in my MVC  home controller I just found it on the internet and it worked for me but I wanted to actually understand what it was doing.   public ActionResult Student() { List lst = new List (); HttpClient client = new HttpClient(); client.BaseAddress = new Uri("http://localhost:6193/"); client.DefaultRequestHeaders.Accept.Add( new System.Net.Http.Headers.MediaTypeWithQualityHeaderValue("application/json")); HttpResponseMessage response = client.GetAsync("api/students").Result; if (response.IsSuccessStatusCode) { //lst = response.Content.ReadAsAsync >().Result; var content = response.Content; var contentstream = content.ReadAsStringAsync().Result; List students = System.Web.Helpers.Json.Decode >(contentstream); return View(students); } return View(lst);   Thank you

Afzaal Ahmad Zeeshan · Answer

A very good question, asking for clarification. :-)   The code is a very simple one actually. The code just starts a new client from your own website and uses it to send another request to your API.    First of all, the code creates a new instance of the HttpClient object: HttpClient client = new HttpClient();
client.BaseAddress = new Uri("http://localhost:6193/");
client.DefaultRequestHeaders.Accept.Add(
new System.Net.Http.Headers.MediaTypeWithQualityHeaderValue("application/json")); That done, then the code create a new request, and loads the data from your API. Which is location at api/students URL.  HttpResponseMessage response = client.GetAsync("api/students").Result; Upto this point, the site has received the response, either an error or a successful response. Then the code checks whether it is a success or a failure. In the same block it return the list of the students to the view as the model. if (response.IsSuccessStatusCode)
{
//lst = response.Content.ReadAsAsync >().Result;
var content = response.Content;
var contentstream = content.ReadAsStringAsync().Result;
List students = System.Web.Helpers.Json.Decode >(contentstream);
return View(students);
}
return View(lst); If the result is success, then students would be returned, otherwise lst would be passed as the view. I hope, I cleared the concept of the code for you. :-)

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Asp.Net MVC and Web API

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