Question

I’m trying to create a basic webservice with WCF. It’s small, and will only be used internally between two servers, so there is no need for security of any kind. Unfortunately WCF demands a certificate:

The service certificate is not provided. Specify a service certificate in ServiceCredentials.

I don’t want to configure a certificate anywhere. Certificates are great for security, but also invariably come packaged with two days worth of headaches until you get them right just so, and I don’t want that right now.

I’m googling all around but cannot find an answer anywhere – can you disable this feature of WCF?

Added: Almost forgot, here’s my bindings ‘n stuff, just in case they’re useful:

<bindings>
  <wsFederationHttpBinding>
    <binding name="XXXServiceBinding" maxReceivedMessageSize="1073741824">
      <readerQuotas maxStringContentLength="1073741824" maxArrayLength="2147483647"/>
    </binding>
  </wsFederationHttpBinding>
</bindings>
<behaviors>
  <serviceBehaviors>
    <behavior name="XXXServiceBehavior">
      <dataContractSerializer maxItemsInObjectGraph="2147483646"/>
      <serviceMetadata httpGetEnabled="true"/>
      <serviceDebug includeExceptionDetailInFaults="true"/>
    </behavior>
  </serviceBehaviors>
</behaviors>
<services>
  <service name="XXX.XXX" behaviorConfiguration="XXXServiceBehavior">
    <endpoint address="xxx" contract="XXX.IXXX" binding="wsFederationHttpBinding" bindingConfiguration="XXXServiceBinding">
      <identity>
        <dns value="XXX Test Service"/>
      </identity>
    </endpoint>
    <endpoint address="mex" binding="mexHttpBinding" contract="IMetadataExchange"/>
  </service>
</services>

Added 2: Oh, right, VS2010, .NET 4.0. Windows 7, integrated VS webserver.

Answer 1

What does your web.config bindings section look like? Using basicHttpBinding with clientCredentialType="None" should as far as I know run without any certificates. Ie:

  <system.serviceModel>
    <bindings>
      <basicHttpBinding>
        <binding name="BasicHttpBinding_IServiceWS">
          <security mode="None">
            <transport clientCredentialType="None" />
          </security>
        </binding>
      </basicHttpBinding>
    </bindings>
   ....