ContractDescription Class
[ This article is for Windows Phone 8 developers. If you’re developing for Windows 10, see the latest documentation. ]
Describes a contract that specifies what an endpoint communicates to the outside world.
Assembly: System.ServiceModel (in System.ServiceModel.dll)
The ContractDescription type exposes the following members.
| Name | Description | |
|---|---|---|
 | ContractDescription(String) | Initializes a new instance of the ContractDescription class with a specified name. |
| ContractDescription(String, String) | Initializes a new instance of the ContractDescription class with a namespace-qualified name specified. |
| Name | Description | |
|---|---|---|
 | CallbackContractType | Gets or sets the type of callback contract that the contract description specifies. |
| ConfigurationName | Gets or sets the configuration name for the contract description. |
| ContractType | Gets or sets the contract type that the contract description specifies. |
| Name | Gets or sets the name of the contract. |
| Namespace | Gets or sets the namespace for the contract. |
| Operations | Gets the collection of operation descriptions associated with the contract. |
| Name | Description | |
|---|---|---|
| Equals(Object) | Determines whether the specified Object is equal to the current Object. (Inherited from Object.) |
 | Finalize | Allows an object to try to free resources and perform other cleanup operations before the Object is reclaimed by garbage collection. (Inherited from Object.) |
| GetHashCode | Serves as a hash function for a particular type. (Inherited from Object.) |
| GetType | Gets the Type of the current instance. (Inherited from Object.) |
| MemberwiseClone | Creates a shallow copy of the current Object. (Inherited from Object.) |
| ToString | Returns a string that represents the current object. (Inherited from Object.) |
A contract is a collection of operations that specifies what the endpoint communicates to the outside world. Each operation is a message exchange. For example, a request message and an associated reply message form a request/reply message exchange.
A ContractDescription object is used to describe contracts and their operations. Within a ContractDescription, each contract operation has a corresponding OperationDescription object that describes aspects of each operation that is part of the contract, such as whether the operation is one-way or request/reply. Each OperationDescription object also describes the messages that make up the operation using a MessageDescriptionCollection object. The ContractDescription object also contains a reference to an interface that defines the contract using the programming model. This interface is marked with ServiceContractAttribute attribute and its methods that correspond to endpoint operations are each marked with the OperationContractAttribute attribute.
A duplex contract defines the following logical sets of operations:
A set that the service exposes for the client to call.
A set that the client exposes for the service to call.
The programming model for defining a duplex contract is to split each set in a separate interface and apply attributes to each interface. In this case, ContractDescription contains a reference to each of the interfaces that groups them into one duplex contract.
Similar to bindings, each contract has a Name and Namespace that uniquely identify it in the metadata of the service.