ASP.NET Web API - Overview

This article is relevant to entity models that utilize the deprecated Visual Studio integration of Telerik Data Access. The current documentation of the Data Access framework is available here.

HTTP is not just for serving up web pages. It is also a powerful platform for building APIs that expose services and data. HTTP is simple, flexible, and ubiquitous. Almost any platform that you can think of has an HTTP library, so HTTP services can reach a broad range of clients, including browsers, mobile devices, and traditional desktop applications. ASP.NET Web API allows developers to expose their applications, data and services to the web directly over HTTP. ASP.NET Web API is a framework for building web APIs on top of the .NET Framework.

For more advanced ASP.NET Web API demos, you could refer to the Telerik Data Access Samples Kit. It is an easy to use resource browser that includes various demos and relevant information for the developers. The samples are grouped by technology (ASP.NET, Silverlight, WPF, WCF, N-Tier, etc.) and can be filtered by programming language (C# or VB) and complexity (levels 100-400). The Telerik Data Access Samples Kit is intended for browsing the code samples offline, so it should be downloaded and installed separately from the Telerik Data Access product.

This tutorial demonstrates best practices for managing ASP.NET Web API with Telerik Data Access used for the Data Access Layer. You will learn how to create a sample Web API and how to consume it from a client application. To complete the walkthrough, you must have the following installed:

• Telerik Data Access
• SofiaCarRental sample database

In this section:

• Creating a New Web Application and Domain Model
• Creating ASP.NET Web API Controllers
• Extending the Generated API Controllers
• Calling the Web API from the Browser
• Calling the Web API with Javascript and jQuery
  
• Reading and Displaying Data
• Inserting Data
• Updating Data
• Deleting Data
• IIS Deployment

Samples Kit Demos

The Telerik Data Access Samples Kit includes the following ASP.NET Web API demos:

• ASP.NET Web API with Kendo UI - demonstrates the best practices for implementing a solution with an Web API services, Kendo UI as a User Interface layer and Telerik Data Access used in the Data Access Layer.
• ASP.NET Web API with WPF MVVM - demonstrates ASP.NET Web API services consumed by a WPF application that implements the MVVM pattern.