Why use HttpClient for Synchronous Connection

Question

I am building a class library to interact with an API  I need to call the API and process the XML response  I can see the benefits of using HttpClient for Asynchronous connectivity  but what I am doing is purely synchronous  so I cannot see any significant benefit over using HttpWebRequest   If anyone can shed any light I would greatly appreciate it  I am not one for using new technology for the sake of it

User · Answer

I d re-iterate Donny V  answer and Josh s       The only reason I wouldn t use the async version is if I were trying   to support an older version of  NET that does not already have built   in async support      and upvote if I had the reputation    I can t remember the last time if ever  I was grateful of the fact HttpWebRequest threw exceptions for status codes    400   To get around these issues you need to catch the exceptions immediately  and map them to some non-exception response mechanisms in your code   boring  tedious and error prone in itself  Whether it be communicating with a database  or implementing a bespoke web proxy  its  nearly  always desirable that the Http driver just tell your application code what was returned  and leave it up to you to decide how to behave   Hence HttpClient is preferable

User · Answer

public static class AsyncHelper         private static readonly TaskFactory  taskFactory   new         TaskFactory CancellationToken None                      TaskCreationOptions None                      TaskContinuationOptions None                      TaskScheduler Default        public static TResult RunSync lt TResult gt  Func lt Task lt TResult gt  gt  func            gt   taskFactory              StartNew func               Unwrap                GetAwaiter                GetResult         public static void RunSync Func lt Task gt  func            gt   taskFactory              StartNew func               Unwrap                GetAwaiter                GetResult        Then  AsyncHelper RunSync      gt  DoAsyncStuff       if you use that class pass your async method as parameter you can call the async methods from sync methods in a safe way   it s explained here   https   cpratt co async-tips-tricks

User · Answer

In my case the accepted answer did not work   I was calling the API from an MVC application which had no async actions   This is how I managed to make it work   private static readonly TaskFactory  myTaskFactory   new TaskFactory CancellationToken None  TaskCreationOptions None  TaskContinuationOptions None  TaskScheduler Default   public static T RunSync lt T gt  Func lt Task lt T gt  gt  func                           CultureInfo cultureUi   CultureInfo CurrentUICulture          CultureInfo culture   CultureInfo CurrentCulture          return  myTaskFactory StartNew lt Task lt T gt  gt  delegate                       Thread CurrentThread CurrentCulture   culture              Thread CurrentThread CurrentUICulture   cultureUi              return func               Unwrap lt T gt    GetAwaiter   GetResult            Then I called it like this   Helper RunSync new Func lt Task lt ReturnTypeGoesHere gt  gt  async      gt  await AsyncCallGoesHere myparameter

User · Answer

but what i am doing is purely synchronous   You could use HttpClient for synchronous requests just fine   using  var client   new HttpClient          var response   client GetAsync  http   google com   Result       if  response IsSuccessStatusCode                var responseContent   response Content               by calling  Result you are synchronously reading the result         string responseString   responseContent ReadAsStringAsync   Result           Console WriteLine responseString             As far as why you should use HttpClient over WebRequest is concerned  well  HttpClient is the new kid on the block and could contain improvements over the old client

User · Answer

If you re building a class library  then perhaps the users of your library would like to use your library asynchronously  I think that s the biggest reason right there   You also don t know how your library is going to be used  Perhaps the users will be processing lots and lots of requests  and doing so asynchronously will help it perform faster and more efficient   If you can do so simply  try not to put the burden on the users of your library trying to make the flow asynchronous when you can take care of it for them   The only reason I wouldn t use the async version is if I were trying to support an older version of  NET that does not already have built in async support

[c#] Why use HttpClient for Synchronous Connection

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