Asp.Net with WCF service configuration file issue

Question

I have a ASP.Net Web Forms application (project 1), an Entity Framework data access library (project 2) and a WCF service library (project 3). The Asp.Net project has an *svc file that redirects calls to the corresponding WCF service in project 3. I am debugging locally using VS 2012 (+ its integrated server) and thus NO IIS is used.
I am encountering the following problem: if I use a page inside project 1 to get some data from the EF database, everything works fine, but when I use a remote WCF client to call the same method, if fails. The error says that the connection string for the database couldn't be found. Upon investigating, I figured out that the if I call the query from the ASP project, the connection string located in Web.config file of project 1 is correctly used. However, if I call the query over the WCF service, the App.config of the service library is used (which of course doesn't contain any connection strings).
Up until now I thought that .NET does NOT support fragmented configuration files for DLLs (this is the reason why you have to copy over the endpoint/service configuration elements from the service App.config to the ASp.Net Web.config file).
So does anybody know how I can get my service to use the Web.config instead it's very own App.Config, which it shouldn't use anyways?

Edit: added code for *svc file and service interface + service implementation

SimulatorWcfServices.svc (project 1: the main ASP.Net Web Application):

<%@ ServiceHost Language="C#" Debug="true" Service="Blub.SimulatorWcfServices.DataExchangeService" %>

IDataExchangeService.cs (project 3: the SimulatorWcfServices service library)

  [ServiceContract]
    public interface IDataExchangeService
    {
        [OperationContract]
        IDictionary<string,string> GetData();
    }

DataExchangeService.cs (project 3: the SimulatorWcfServices service library)

 [AspNetCompatibilityRequirements(RequirementsMode = AspNetCompatibilityRequirementsMode.Allowed)]
    public class DataExchangeService : IDataExchangeService
    {
        public IDictionary<string, string> GetData()
        {
            return new DataAccessImplementation.DataDAO().GetAllData(); //call to project 2
        }
    }

@TMcKeown McKeown: if I do this, the Service doesn't work at all because it does not know its configuration. It seems to get its whole configuration from the App.config in the service DLL. Gandarez: my whole problem is that the WCF service does NOT use the Web.config... — Cleo
then this service is not coded as a .svc web resource OR you are specifically looking for that config. — T McKeown
I don't know what a ".svc web resource" is; so I have added my code for clarification... — Cleo

Cleo Cleo · Accepted Answer · 2014-07-31T13:24:19

I solved the issue by switching my webserver used for debugging from "Local IIS Webserver" to "Visual Studio Development Server" (Project --> Properties --> Web --> Server). So basically I downgraded the used server. Now its uses the correct Config file and the assemblies seem to be loaded in correct order and not only partially.

Asp.Net with WCF service configuration file issue

1 Answers