Publishing Metadata Endpoints
Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) services publish metadata by publishing one or more metadata endpoints. Publishing service metadata makes the metadata available using standardized protocols, such as WS-MetadataExchange (MEX) and HTTP/GET requests. Metadata endpoints are similar to other service endpoints in that they have an address, a binding, and a contract, and they can be added to a service host through configuration or in code. To enable publishing metadata endpoints, you must add the ServiceMetadataBehavior service behavior to the service. By default, WCF services do not publish metadata endpoints, so you must explicitly add them to your service to enable metadata publishing for your service.
In This Section
- How to: Publish Metadata for a Service Using a Configuration File
Demonstrates how to configure a WCF service to publish metadata so that clients can retrieve the metadata using a WS-MetadataExchange or an HTTP/GET request using the ?wsdl query string.
- How to: Publish Metadata for a Service Using Code
Demonstrates how to enable metadata publishing for a WCF service in code so that clients can retrieve the metadata using a WS-MetadataExchange or an HTTP/GET request using the ?wsdl query string.