This book caters to two audiences:

• Readers who have completed my book for beginners, C# 12 and .NET 8 – Modern Cross-Platform Development Fundamentals, and now want to take their learning further.
• Readers who already have basic skills and knowledge about C# and .NET and want to learn practical skills and knowledge to build real-world applications and services.

Companion books to continue your learning journey

This book is the second of three books in a trilogy that continues your learning journey through .NET 8:

1. The first book covers the fundamentals of the C# language, the .NET libraries, and ASP.NET Core for web development. It is designed to be read linearly because skills and knowledge from earlier chapters build up and are needed to understand later chapters.
2. This second book covers more specialized topics like internationalization and popular third-party packages including Serilog and...

Microsoft calls platforms for building applications and services app models or workloads.

Understanding .NET

.NET, .NET Core, .NET Framework, and Xamarin are related and overlapping platforms for developers used to build applications and services. If you are not familiar with the history of .NET, then I will point you to each of these .NET concepts at the following link, which is from the C# 12 and .NET 8 – Modern Cross-Platform Development Fundamentals book:

https://github.com/markjprice/cs12dotnet8/blob/main/docs/ch01-dotnet-history.md

Building websites and apps using ASP.NET Core

Websites are made up of multiple web pages loaded statically from the filesystem or generated dynamically by a server-side technology such as ASP.NET Core. A web browser makes GET requests using Unique Resource Locators (URLs), which identify each page and can manipulate data stored on the server using POST, PUT, and DELETE requests.

With many...

Before you start programming, you’ll need a code editor for C#. Microsoft has a family of code editors and Integrated Development Environments (IDEs), which include:

• Visual Studio 2022 for Windows
• Visual Studio Code for Windows, Mac, or Linux
• Visual Studio Code for the Web or GitHub Codespaces

Third parties have created their own C# code editors, for example, JetBrains Rider, which is available for Windows, Mac, or Linux but does have a license cost. JetBrains Rider is popular with more experienced .NET developers.

Developers can install lots of additional template packs:

1. Start a browser and navigate to https://www.nuget.org/packages.
2. Enter vue in the Search for packages… textbox and note that about 210 packages are returned.
3. Click Filter, select a Package Type of Template, click Apply, and note the list of about 25 available templates, including one published by Microsoft.
4. Click on Vue.Simple.Template and then click Project website, and note the instructions for installing and using this template, as shown in the following commands:

   dotnet new --install "Vue.Simple.Template"
   dotnet new simplevue
   

5. Close the browser.

Since .NET 6, the default project template for console apps uses the top-level program feature introduced with .NET 5. It is important to understand how it works with the automatically generated Program class and its <Main>$ method.

Let’s explore how the top-level program feature works when you define functions:

1. Use your preferred coding tool to create a new project, as defined in the following list:
   • Project template: Console App / console
   • Project file and folder: TopLevelFunctions
   • Solution file and folder: Chapter01
   • Do not use top-level statements: Cleared
   • Enable native AOT publishing: Cleared
2. In Program.cs, delete the existing statements, define a local function at the bottom of the file, and call it, as shown in the following code:

   using static System.Console;
   WriteLine("Top-level functions example");
   WhatsMyNamespace...

Git is a commonly used source code management system. GitHub is a company, website, and desktop application that makes it easier to manage Git. Microsoft purchased GitHub in 2018, so it will continue to be closely integrated with Microsoft tools.

I created a GitHub repository for this book, and I use it for the following:

• To store the solution code for the book, which will be maintained after the print publication date.
• To provide extra materials that extend the book, like errata fixes, small improvements, lists of useful links, and longer articles that cannot fit in the printed book.
• To provide a place for readers to get in touch with me if they have issues with the book.

Raising issues with the book

If you get stuck following any of the instructions in this book, or if you spot a mistake in the text or the code in the solutions, please raise an issue in the GitHub repository:

...

This section is all about how to find quality information about programming on the web.

Reading documentation on Microsoft Learn

The definitive resource for getting help with Microsoft developer tools and platforms is in the technical documentation on Microsoft Learn, and you can find it at the following link: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/docs.

Getting help for the dotnet tool

At the command prompt, you can ask the dotnet tool for help with its commands. The syntax is:

dotnet help <command>

This will cause your web browser to open a page in the documentation about the specified command. Common dotnet commands include new, build, and run.

Test your knowledge and understanding by answering some questions, getting some hands-on practice, and exploring with deeper research the topics in this chapter.

Exercise 1.1 – Test your knowledge

Use the web to answer the following questions:

1. Why is it good practice to add the following setting to your project files? And when should you not set it?

   <TreatWarningsAsErrors>true</TreatWarningsAsErrors>
   

2. Which service technology requires a minimum HTTP version of 2?
3. In 2010, your organization created a service using .NET Framework and WCF. What is the best technology to migrate it to and why?
4. Which code editor or IDE should you install for .NET development?
5. What should you beware of when creating Azure resources?

Exercise 1.2 – Review the online-only sections

To preserve space in the print book, there are some optional online-only sections available in the GitHub...

In this chapter, you:

• Were introduced to the app and service technologies that you will learn about in this book.
• Set up your development environment.
• Learned where to look for help.

In the next chapter, you will learn how to use SQL Server to store and manage relational data.

Learn more on Discord

To join the Discord community for this book – where you can share feedback, ask questions to the author, and learn about new releases – follow the QR code below:

https://packt.link/apps_and_services_dotnet8