Question

I have a console app with config:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?> <configuration>
    <configSections>
        <section name="unity" type=
           "Microsoft.Practices.Unity.Configuration.UnityConfigurationSection, 
             Microsoft.Practices.Unity.Configuration" />
    </configSections>
    <unity xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/practices/2010/unity">
        <assembly name="UnityDi.Contracts" />
        <assembly name="UnityDi.Domain" />
        <assembly name="UnityDi.Services" />
        <assembly name="UnityDi.Repositories" />
        <namespace name="UnityDi.Contracts" />
        <namespace name="UnityDi.Domain" />
        <namespace name="UnityDi.Services" />
        <namespace name="UnityDi.Repositories" />
        <container>
            <register type="IUser" mapTo="User"></register>
            <register type="IUserService" mapTo="UserService"></register>
            <register type="IUserRepository" mapTo="UserRepository"></register>
        </container>
    </unity> 
</configuration>

and Program.cs

namespace UnityDi.Console
{
    using System;
    using Contracts;
    using Microsoft.Practices.Unity;
    using Microsoft.Practices.Unity.Configuration;

    public static class Program
    {
        private static readonly IUnityContainer Container = 
           new UnityContainer().LoadConfiguration();

        public static void Main()
        {
            var dummyUserOne = GetUserReference();

            dummyUserOne.UserId = 1;
            dummyUserOne.FullName = "Bilbo Baggins";

            var dummyUserTwo = GetUserReference();

            dummyUserTwo.UserId = 2;
            dummyUserTwo.FullName = "Frodo Baggins";

            var userService = GetUserServiceReference(); 

            userService.Add(dummyUserOne);
            userService.Add(dummyUserTwo);

            var users = userService.GetAllUsers();

            foreach (var user in users)
            {
                Console.WriteLine(user.FullName);
            }

            Console.ReadLine();
        }

        private static IUser GetUserReference()
        {
            return Container.Resolve<IUser>();
        }

        private static IUserService GetUserServiceReference()
        {
            return Container.Resolve<IUserService>();
        }
    }
}

That works really well.

I’ve been doing a lot of searching around and find that solutions published integrating Unity with MVC3 seem to be very verbose in their approach.

Within the context of the code above (and with a requirement to wire up Entity Framework code first), what’s the SIMPLEST way for me to integrate Unity with MVC3 and work with my data like above?

I want to use the exact same approach to creating my objects in MVC as above.

Thanks!

Richard

P.s. The closest I found was Unity.Mvc but I can’t get it to work like above. I’m probably being stupid though. This is new to me.

EDIT: Working with the proposed answer.

In Web.config for the MVC app (with Unity.Mvc package added)

[snip]
<container>
    <register type="IUser" mapTo="User"></register>
    <register type="IUserService" mapTo="UserService"></register>
    <register type="IUserRepository" mapTo="UserRepository">
        <lifetime type="HierarchicalLifetimeManager" />
    </register>
</container>

Then in Bootstrapper.cs

namespace Unity.Mvc.Resources
{
    using System.Web.Mvc;
    using Microsoft.Practices.Unity;
    using Microsoft.Practices.Unity.Configuration;
    using Unity.Mvc3;

    public static class Bootstrapper
    {
        public static void Initialise()
        {
            var container = BuildUnityContainer();

            DependencyResolver.SetResolver(new UnityDependencyResolver(container));
        }

        private static IUnityContainer BuildUnityContainer()
        {
            var container = new UnityContainer().LoadConfiguration();

            container.RegisterControllers();

            return container;
        }
    }
}

Then in the controller (bit of an a-ha moment when I realised the Interface can be any Unity knows about, including it’s own):

private readonly IUnityContainer container;

public HomeController(IUnityContainer container)
{
    this.container = container;
}

public ActionResult Index()
{
    var dummyUserOne = GetUserReference();

    dummyUserOne.UserId = 1;
    dummyUserOne.FullName = "Bilbo Baggins";

    var dummyUserTwo = GetUserReference();

    dummyUserTwo.UserId = 2;
    dummyUserTwo.FullName = "Frodo Baggins";

    var userService = GetUserServiceReference();

    userService.Add(dummyUserOne);
    userService.Add(dummyUserTwo);

    var users = userService.GetAllUsers();

    return View(users);
}

private IUser GetUserReference()
{
    return container.Resolve<IUser>();
}

private IUserService GetUserServiceReference()
{
    return container.Resolve<IUserService>();
}

And again, it works 🙂

That just leaves the Entity Framework aspect. Need to get DbContext wired up to work with my Domain objects without introducing additional dependencies… Any pointers? Really, very much appreciated.

Answer 1

1. Install the Unity.Mvc3 nuget package.
2. go to the bootstrapper code and add your mapping (get it working like that then fiddle around with doing it in a config file if you so desire)

3. The bootstrapper will ‘hook’ into mvc to let it know for controller resolution to use unity.
   ex:

   container.RegisterType<ICustomerRepository, CustomerRepository>();

4. Any constructors for controllers will look for any interfaces unity needs to do mappings on. If it has to inject IService, it will (As long as it knows about it).
   If it has to repeat this process throughout the object grab (IService required IRepository, etc on down the graph) as long as unity knows about it, it will wire everything up.

For the additional question on the Entity Framework, I use an IContext class. In here I define IDbSet Customers. This is similar to this implementation:
http://leomburke.wordpress.com/category/entity-framework/