Roundup #24: JSON, .NET Core 3, Framework Reference, Orleans Dashboard

Sponsor: Do you build complex software systems? See how NServiceBus makes it easier to design, build, and manage software systems that use message queues to achieve loose coupling. Get started for free.

Here are the things that caught my eye this week. I’d love to hear what you found most interesting this week. Let me know in the comments or on Twitter.

Follow @CodeOpinion

The future of JSON in .NET Core 3.0

JSON has become an essential part of virtually all modern .NET applications and in many cases even surpassed the usage of XML. However, .NET hasn’t had a (great) built-in way to deal with JSON. Instead we’ve relied on Json.NET which continues to serve the .NET ecosystem well. Moving forward, we plan on making some changes to our JSON support.

Link: https://github.com/dotnet/announcements/issues/90

A first look at changes coming in ASP.NET Core 3.0

While we continue to work on finalizing the next minor version of ASP.NET Core, we’re also working on major updates to our next release that will include some changes in how projects are composed with frameworks, tighter .NET Core integration, and 3^rd party open source integration, all with the goal of making it easier and faster for you to develop. For broader context around .NET Core 3.0, we encourage you to check out our previous announcements around the addition of WinForms and WPF support to .NET Core 3.0 on Windows. We’ll publish more details about new features coming in ASP.NET Core 3.0 in the near future.

The big takeaway for me was that ASP.NET Core 3.0 will only run on .NET Core 3. This means no more .NET Standard support. In other words, no longer supporting .NET Framework. Link: https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/webdev/2018/10/29/a-first-look-at-changes-coming-in-asp-net-core-3-0/

ASP.NET Core 3.0 will only run on .NET Core

As announced on the .NET Blog earlier this month, .NET Framework will get fewer of the newer platform and language features that come to .NET Core moving forward, due to the in-place update nature of .NET Framework and the desire to limit changes there that might break existing applications. To ensure ASP.NET Core can fully leverage the improvements coming to .NET Core moving forward, ASP.NET Core will only run on .NET Core starting from 3.0. Moving forward, you can simply think of ASP.NET Core as being part of .NET Core.

Here’s a link to the discussions thread since the previous link contains the announcement. Link: https://github.com/aspnet/AspNetCore/issues/3753

Replace PackageReference to Microsoft.AspNetCore.App with FrameworkReference

Most NuGet packages provide both compilation and runtime assets. Microsoft.NETCore.App and Microsoft.AspNetCore.App effectively only provide the first – compilation references. Users must install other runtime assets to make .NET Core apps work but this is not obvious or intuitive, and not always possible: for example, Azure Web Apps, AWS, Google Cloud, etc. This violates a reasonable expectation of using a NuGet package, and has been a continual source of confusion for users.

Link: https://github.com/aspnet/AspNetCore/issues/3612