Asp.Net MVC4 + Web API Controller Delete request >> 404 error

Question

I have a VS2012 MVC4 solution where I test Web API Controllers.

I successfully tested the GET, POST, PUT but the DELETE still got me an http 404 error. When I set a

Answer 1

If the error you are receiving is an html content type from IIS, error 404.0

Make sure you have the section in your web.config that is added by the Web Api template. By default IIS will not serve the DELETE verb, and this config overrides the behavior.

  <system.webServer>
    <handlers>
      <remove name="ExtensionlessUrlHandler-ISAPI-4.0_32bit" />
      <remove name="ExtensionlessUrlHandler-ISAPI-4.0_64bit" />
      <remove name="ExtensionlessUrlHandler-Integrated-4.0" />
      <add name="ExtensionlessUrlHandler-ISAPI-4.0_32bit" path="*." verb="GET,HEAD,POST,DEBUG,PUT,DELETE,PATCH,OPTIONS" modules="IsapiModule" scriptProcessor="%windir%\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319\aspnet_isapi.dll" preCondition="classicMode,runtimeVersionv4.0,bitness32" responseBufferLimit="0" />
      <add name="ExtensionlessUrlHandler-ISAPI-4.0_64bit" path="*." verb="GET,HEAD,POST,DEBUG,PUT,DELETE,PATCH,OPTIONS" modules="IsapiModule" scriptProcessor="%windir%\Microsoft.NET\Framework64\v4.0.30319\aspnet_isapi.dll" preCondition="classicMode,runtimeVersionv4.0,bitness64" responseBufferLimit="0" />
      <add name="ExtensionlessUrlHandler-Integrated-4.0" path="*." verb="GET,HEAD,POST,DEBUG,PUT,DELETE,PATCH,OPTIONS" type="System.Web.Handlers.TransferRequestHandler" preCondition="integratedMode,runtimeVersionv4.0" />
    </handlers>
  </system.webServer>

Answer 2

According to the answer by Russell I took a look in web config and found two lines in handlers method

....
<add name="ExtensionlessUrlHandler-Integrated-4.0" path="*." verb="*" type="System.Web.Handlers.TransferRequestHandler" preCondition="integratedMode,runtimeVersionv4.0" />
<remove name="ExtensionlessUrlHandler-Integrated-4.0" />

I've removed the last one and it worked.

Just an example of usage on client (typescript)

    public deleteComment(commentId: number) {
        var url = 'api/comments/' + commentId;
        return this.$http.delete(url);
    }

and server side

    [Route("{id:int}")]
    public async Task<IHttpActionResult> Delete(int id){
        await _snippetService.DeleteComment(id);
        return Ok();
    }

Answer 3

HTTP DELETE does not have a body. You need to pass the id as a query string parameter.

Answer 4

Ran across the 404 running on Mac using Dotnet Core.

In my case I changed the attribute annotation from HttpDelete to HttpDelete("{id}")