Pass an array of integers to ASP.NET Web API?

Question

I have an ASP.NET Web API (version 4) REST service where I need to pass an array of integers.

Here is my action method:

Answer 1

Easy way to send array params to web api

API

public IEnumerable<Category> GetCategories([FromUri]int[] categoryIds){
 // code to retrieve categories from database
}

Jquery : send JSON object as request params

$.get('api/categories/GetCategories',{categoryIds:[1,2,3,4]}).done(function(response){
console.log(response);
//success response
});

It will generate your request URL like ../api/categories/GetCategories?categoryIds=1&categoryIds=2&categoryIds=3&categoryIds=4

Answer 2

public class ArrayInputAttribute : ActionFilterAttribute
{
    private readonly string[] _ParameterNames;
    /// <summary>
    /// 
    /// </summary>
    public string Separator { get; set; }
    /// <summary>
    /// cons
    /// </summary>
    /// <param name="parameterName"></param>
    public ArrayInputAttribute(params string[] parameterName)
    {
        _ParameterNames = parameterName;
        Separator = ",";
    }

    /// <summary>
    /// 
    /// </summary>
    public void ProcessArrayInput(HttpActionContext actionContext, string parameterName)
    {
        if (actionContext.ActionArguments.ContainsKey(parameterName))
        {
            var parameterDescriptor = actionContext.ActionDescriptor.GetParameters().FirstOrDefault(p => p.ParameterName == parameterName);
            if (parameterDescriptor != null && parameterDescriptor.ParameterType.IsArray)
            {
                var type = parameterDescriptor.ParameterType.GetElementType();
                var parameters = String.Empty;
                if (actionContext.ControllerContext.RouteData.Values.ContainsKey(parameterName))
                {
                    parameters = (string)actionContext.ControllerContext.RouteData.Values[parameterName];
                }
                else
                {
                    var queryString = actionContext.ControllerContext.Request.RequestUri.ParseQueryString();
                    if (queryString[parameterName] != null)
                    {
                        parameters = queryString[parameterName];
                    }
                }

                var values = parameters.Split(new[] { Separator }, StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries)
                    .Select(TypeDescriptor.GetConverter(type).ConvertFromString).ToArray();
                var typedValues = Array.CreateInstance(type, values.Length);
                values.CopyTo(typedValues, 0);
                actionContext.ActionArguments[parameterName] = typedValues;
            }
        }
    }

    public override void OnActionExecuting(HttpActionContext actionContext)
    {
        _ParameterNames.ForEach(parameterName => ProcessArrayInput(actionContext, parameterName));
    }
}

Usage:

    [HttpDelete]
    [ArrayInput("tagIDs")]
    [Route("api/v1/files/{fileID}/tags/{tagIDs}")]
    public HttpResponseMessage RemoveFileTags(Guid fileID, Guid[] tagIDs)
    {
        _FileRepository.RemoveFileTags(fileID, tagIDs);
        return Request.CreateResponse(HttpStatusCode.OK);
    }

Request uri

http://localhost/api/v1/files/2a9937c7-8201-59b7-bc8d-11a9178895d0/tags/BBA5CD5D-F07D-47A9-8DEE-D19F5FA65F63,BBA5CD5D-F07D-47A9-8DEE-D19F5FA65F63

Answer 3

In case someone would need - to achieve same or similar thing(like delete) via POST instead of FromUri, use FromBody and on client side(JS/jQuery) format param as $.param({ '': categoryids }, true)

c#:

public IHttpActionResult Remove([FromBody] int[] categoryIds)

jQuery:

$.ajax({
        type: 'POST',
        data: $.param({ '': categoryids }, true),
        url: url,
//...
});

The thing with $.param({ '': categoryids }, true) is that it .net will expect post body to contain urlencoded value like =1&=2&=3 without parameter name, and without brackets.

Answer 4

You may try this code for you to take comma separated values / an array of values to get back a JSON from webAPI

 public class CategoryController : ApiController
 {
     public List<Category> Get(String categoryIDs)
     {
         List<Category> categoryRepo = new List<Category>();

         String[] idRepo = categoryIDs.Split(',');

         foreach (var id in idRepo)
         {
             categoryRepo.Add(new Category()
             {
                 CategoryID = id,
                 CategoryName = String.Format("Category_{0}", id)
             });
         }
         return categoryRepo;
     }
 }

 public class Category
 {
     public String CategoryID { get; set; }
     public String CategoryName { get; set; }
 } 

Output :

[
{"CategoryID":"4","CategoryName":"Category_4"}, 
{"CategoryID":"5","CategoryName":"Category_5"}, 
{"CategoryID":"3","CategoryName":"Category_3"} 
]

Answer 5

Or you could just pass a string of delimited items and put it into an array or list on the receiving end.

Answer 6

My solution was to create an attribute to validate strings, it does a bunch of extra common features, including regex validation that you can use to check for numbers only and then later I convert to integers as needed...

This is how you use:

public class MustBeListAndContainAttribute : ValidationAttribute
{
    private Regex regex = null;
    public bool RemoveDuplicates { get; }
    public string Separator { get; }
    public int MinimumItems { get; }
    public int MaximumItems { get; }

    public MustBeListAndContainAttribute(string regexEachItem,
        int minimumItems = 1,
        int maximumItems = 0,
        string separator = ",",
        bool removeDuplicates = false) : base()
    {
        this.MinimumItems = minimumItems;
        this.MaximumItems = maximumItems;
        this.Separator = separator;
        this.RemoveDuplicates = removeDuplicates;

        if (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(regexEachItem))
            regex = new Regex(regexEachItem, RegexOptions.Compiled | RegexOptions.Singleline | RegexOptions.IgnoreCase);
    }

    protected override ValidationResult IsValid(object value, ValidationContext validationContext)
    {
        var listOfdValues = (value as List<string>)?[0];

        if (string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(listOfdValues))
        {
            if (MinimumItems > 0)
                return new ValidationResult(this.ErrorMessage);
            else
                return null;
        };

        var list = new List<string>();

        list.AddRange(listOfdValues.Split(new[] { Separator }, System.StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries));

        if (RemoveDuplicates) list = list.Distinct().ToList();

        var prop = validationContext.ObjectType.GetProperty(validationContext.MemberName);
        prop.SetValue(validationContext.ObjectInstance, list);
        value = list;

        if (regex != null)
            if (list.Any(c => string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(c) || !regex.IsMatch(c)))
                return new ValidationResult(this.ErrorMessage);

        return null;
    }
}