What to choose as a server application, ASP.Net or WCF?

Question

ASP.NET

Subject.
A certain web service is planned, there will be a web muzzle, plus a mobile application.
And now the question arose, is it not better to make wcf as a backend, which will be accessed by both the web face (naturally with its own back) and mobile applications?
I can’t say anything about the load and so on, well, of course, the calculation should be on frequent calls to the backend.
What advantages do I see of the wcf + web + mobile bundle
?
2) Such a division will allow updating and developing separate areas separately.
Cons
More difficult to develop and maintain.
Who can advise what?

Answer 1

Hello.
When it comes to communication with the web face and mobile clients (in the future, not only wp), I like to use asp.net mvc web api as a backend . This may seem more complicated than a simple wcf, especially since wcf has the ability to make a rest service, so I will try to justify the advantages of the web api.
1. Versatility out of the box. web-api works via http and returns data in json. They are easy to assemble in a web application, and any client can always access them simply by sending an http request.
2. mvc web api is very easy to attach to the frontend using knockout.js or angular.js. In fact, it works "out of the box" - you make a request, you get a built model in js.
3. Even in a desktop application through .net, you can always easily and, most importantly, asynchronously work with the web api through the HttpClient class (it is also available for WP).
4. No .net? It's just an http request, it's easy to knock from other platforms.
5. How to host a WCF service? It's not that difficult, but you want simplicity, everything just has to work. web api is hosted in the same way as a regular asp.net application - in iis.

Answer 2

WCF also supports TCP, UDP, MSMQ and the ability to write your own protocol, which is no less important. If you have experience in Asp.Net Mvc, then Web-api will be much more familiar than WCF, because the application structure is the same. Personally, my opinion is that a service for working with text data should be done on a web-api, and a service for working with files (if necessary at all (upload/send)) should be done on WCF. Transferring files over TCP is slightly faster than over HTTP . + there are no transactions in web-api as in WCF.