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Upgrading to DotVVM 1.1

Because DotVVM 1.1 brought support for ASP.NET Core, we had to do many fundamental changes inside the framework, and there are several breaking changes.

If your app is built on DotVVM 1.0, you need to take the following steps to upgrade to DotVVM 1.1 on OWIN.

1. Install the DotVVM.Owin NuGet Package

In the 1.0 version, the DotVVM NuGet package included the framework and the hosting infrastructure together in one library.

In the 1.1 version, we have moved the OWIN hosting infrastructure to a separate package, and that's why you need to add it to your project.

2. Change OwinContext to GetOwinContext() or to HttpContext

The Context object which is available in the viewmodel, had the OwinContext property which could access the information about the current HTTP request and manipulate with the response.

Because the API changed on ASP.NET Core, we have added the HttpContext property which provides a unified API for OWIN and ASP.NET Core. However, there are some differences and there are not all features available in the original OwinContext property.

If you want to get the real OWIN context, you can call the GetOwinContext() extension method and get the same API. The GetOwinContext() method is in the Dotvvm.Framework.Hosting namespace.

3. Change OwinContext.Authentication to GetAuthentication()

The same thing applies to OwinContext.Authentication property. You can use the GetAuthentication() extension method to get this API quickly.

4. Change DotvvmRequestContext to IDotvvmRequestContext in Custom Presenters

In the 1.0 version, the IDotvvmRequestContext declared the ProcessRequest method with an argument of type DotvvmRequestContext, which was wrong.

In the 1.1 version, we fixed this, so the argument is IDotvvmRequestContext, which allows to mock the context easily when testing the presenter.

5. DefaultViewModelLoader requires IServiceProvider

If you derived from the DefaultViewModelLoader class to do the dependency injection in the viewmodels, you need to request the IServiceProvider argument in the constructor of your class, and pass it to the constructor of DefaultViewModelLoader.

public class WindsorViewModelLoader : DefaultViewModelLoader
{
    private readonly WindsorContainer container;

    public WindsorViewModelLoader(WindsorContainer container)
    {
        this.container = container;
    }

    ...
}

6. ServiceLocator changes to IServiceProvider

Since Microsoft has brought their own dependency injection mechanisms in the ASP.NET Core, to make the things unified, we have used this infrastructure in DotVVM too.

If you registered custom services in the DotvvmConfiguration.ServiceLocator, you have to change the registrations to the following ones:

var dotvvmConfiguration = app.UseDotVVM<DotvvmStartup>(applicationPhysicalPath, options: options =>
{
    options.Services.AddSingleton<IViewModelLoader>(serviceProvider => new WindsorViewModelLoader(container));
});

You will need to import the Microsoft.Extensions.DependencyInjection namespace to do so.

Also, you can only register services in the UseDotVVM method by passing a method to the options parameter.

If you try to add services in the IServiceProvider later, it may fail because the object denies changes to its configuration after the first service is resolved.

7. Make ActionFilter and ExceptionFilter Methods Async

We needed to change all methods on the ActionFilterAttribute and ExceptionFilterAttribute to async versions.

protected override Task OnCommandExceptionAsync(IDotvvmRequestContext context, ActionInfo actionInfo, Exception exception) 
{
    ...
}

Also, if you want to intercept only some of the methods, you don't need to derive from the ActionFilterAttribute, but you can only implement one of the following interfaces:

  • IPageActionFilter contains page-level events - OnPageLoadingAsync, OnPageLoadedAsync and OnPageExceptionAsync.

  • ICommandActionFilter contains command-related events - OnCommandExecutingAsync and OnCommandExecutedAsync.

  • IViewModelActionFilter contains viewmodel-related events - OnViewModelCreatedAsync and OnViewModelDeserializedAsync and OnViewModelSerializingAsync (which replaces the OnResponseRendering).

8. Rename the HideNonAuthenticatedUsers to HideForAnonymousUsers on RoleView

If you are using the <dot:RoleView> control, please rename the HideNonAuthenticatedUsers to HideForAnonymousUsers property which makes better sense.

9. Resource Registrations Changed

To support advanced scenarios, we had to change the way how resources are registered.

The ScriptResource and StylesheetResource classes don't have the Url property any more, they got the Location property instead. Additionally, the Location is not a string, but it can be of the following classes:

  • UrlResourceLocation specifies just the URL where the resource can be found. You can use either absolute URL (e.g. to point to some CDN), a relative URL to your server, or even a data URI. DotVVM will render the <script> or <link> element with the exact URL you have specified.

  • LocalFileResourceLocation expects the app-relative filesystem path to the script or stylesheet file. This path should not start with / - it would point to the root of the filesystem. DotVVM will render the <script> or <link> element which points to a DotVVM resource handler (~/dotvvmResource/checksum/resourceName) that will serve the resource. This is useful for bundling or advanced scenarios.

  • EmbeddedResourceLocation can extract the embedded resource from an assembly. This is very useful if you need to pack some DotVVM controls in a library and embed the resources in the DLL file.

Also, we have dropped the following properties from the ScriptResource class:

  • CdnUrl is replaced with LocationFallback property and supports multiple fallback locations.

  • EmbeddedResourceAssembly property which switched the resource to the embedded resource mode, was replaced with the EmbeddedResourceLocation object.

  • GlobalObjectName was moved to LocationFallback.JavascriptCondition.

In basic scenarios, you just need to replace the Url with Location and wrap the string URL in the UrlResourceLocation:

config.Resources.Register("bootstrap", new ScriptResource()
{
    // Url = "~/Scripts/bootstrap.min.js",
    Location =new UrlResourceLocation("~/Scripts/bootstrap.min.js"),
    
    Dependencies = new[] { "bootstrap-css", "jquery" }
});

If you have used the embedded resources, you should use the following way of working with CdnUrl, GlobalObjectName and EmbeddedResourceAssembly:

configuration.Resources.Register(ResourceConstants.JQueryResourceName,
    new ScriptResource()
    {
        // CdnUrl = "https://code.jquery.com/jquery-2.1.1.min.js",
        // Url = "DotVVM.Framework.Resources.Scripts.jquery-2.1.1.min.js",
        // EmbeddedResourceAssembly = typeof (DotvvmConfiguration).Assembly.GetName().Name,
        // GlobalObjectName = "window.jQuery"

        Location = new UrlResourceLocation("https://code.jquery.com/jquery-2.1.1.min.js"))
        {
            LocationFallback = new ResourceLocationFallback(
                "window.jQuery",
                new EmbeddedResourceLocation(typeof(DotvvmConfiguration).GetTypeInfo().Assembly, "DotVVM.Framework.Resources.Scripts.jquery-2.1.1.min.js"))
        }
    });

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