Can I use WCF RIA Services with existing web APIs?

Question

I'm new to this kind of development, and so far I've only seen tutorials on WCF RIA services which create new ADO.Net data models from a database.

However I am working with a system which provides you with web APIs for interacting with the data (which I am able to contain and use in my own web service, which will in turn interact with my silverlight application).

Is it possible/sensible to use WCF RIA services in this case? Or shall I just use a regular WCF Service which uses these APIs?

Thanks!

Answer 1

I think you should first really understand the power of WCF RIA Services as explained in the msdn documentation http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee707344(v=vs.91).aspx

"A common problem when developing an n-tier RIA solution is coordinating application logic between the middle tier and the presentation tier. To create the best user experience, you want your RIA Services client to be aware of the application logic that resides on the server, but you do not want to develop and maintain the application logic on both the presentation tier and the middle tier."

So, as soon as you are in the domain service, you are in a classic WCF Service, so here you could interact with possibly anything you wish (including external web API). Though, the avantages to use WCF RIA Services is smaller if the logic of your application is already embed in a Web API.