ServiceStack client compression

Question

I want to compress the request sent from a client.

I've found the Q/A: ServiceStack - How To Compress Requests From Client

But when using this code I get a SerializationException from the server that the content should start with a '{' and not '\u001F...'

Is this solution still valid or is there another way to compress client request payload?

---

UPDATE 1: Here is the output from Fiddler. Request:

POST http://xxxxxx:8104/entries HTTP/1.1
Accept: application/json
User-Agent: ServiceStack .NET Client 4,51
Accept-Encoding: gzip,deflate
Content-Encoding: gzip
Content-Type: application/json
Host: xxxxxx:8104
Content-Length: 187
Expect: 100-continue

[binary data not shown here]

And the response:

HTTP/1.1 400 Bad Request
Transfer-Encoding: chunked
Content-Type: application/json; charset=utf-8
Server: Microsoft-HTTPAPI/2.0
Date: Tue, 03 Jan 2017 07:22:57 GMT

427
{"ResponseStatus":{"ErrorCode":"SerializationException","Message":"Could not deserialize 'application/json' request using Namespace.NameOfDto'\nError: System.Runtime.Serialization.SerializationException: Type definitions should start with a '{', expecting serialized type 'NameOfDto', got string starting with: \u001F \b\u0000\u0000\u0000\u0000\u0000\u0004\u00005  \n @\u0010  e 1 P W :h\u001D :D M'YЙ \u001D B| F   7 \r\n   at ServiceStack.Text.Common.DeserializeTypeRefJson.StringToType(TypeConfig typeConfig, String strType, EmptyCtorDelegate ctorFn, Dictionary`2 typeAccessorMap)\r\n   at ServiceStack.Text.Common.DeserializeType`1.<>c__DisplayClass1_0.<GetParseMethod>b__1(String value)\r\n   at ServiceStack.Text.JsonSerializer.DeserializeFromString(String value, Type type)\r\n   at ServiceStack.Text.JsonSerializer.DeserializeFromStream(Type type, Stream stream)\r\n   at ServiceStack.Serialization.JsonDataContractSerializer.DeserializeFromStream(Type type, S
27e
tream stream)\r\n   at ServiceStack.Host.Handlers.ServiceStackHandlerBase.CreateContentTypeRequest(IRequest httpReq, Type requestType, String contentType)","StackTrace":"   at ServiceStack.Host.Handlers.ServiceStackHandlerBase.CreateContentTypeRequest(IRequest httpReq, Type requestType, String contentType)\r\n   at ServiceStack.Host.RestHandler.CreateRequest(IRequest httpReq, IRestPath restPath, Dictionary`2 requestParams)\r\n   at ServiceStack.Host.RestHandler.CreateRequest(IRequest httpReq, IRestPath restPath)\r\n   at ServiceStack.Host.RestHandler.ProcessRequestAsync(IRequest httpReq, IResponse httpRes, String operationName)"}}
0

Client:

public class GzipJsonServiceClient : JsonServiceClient
{
    public GzipJsonServiceClient()
    {
        SetRequestFilter();
    }

    public GzipJsonServiceClient(string baseUri)
        : base(baseUri)
    {
        SetRequestFilter();
    }

    public override void SerializeToStream(IRequest requestContext, object request, Stream stream)
    {
        using (var gzipStream = new GZipStream(stream, CompressionMode.Compress))
        {
            base.SerializeToStream(requestContext, request, gzipStream);
            gzipStream.Close();
        }
    }

    private void SetRequestFilter()
    {
        RequestFilter = req =>
        {
            if (req.Method.HasRequestBody())
            {
                req.Headers.Add(HttpRequestHeader.ContentEncoding, CompressionTypes.GZip);
            }
        };
    }
}

Request code:

var client = new GzipJsonServiceClient(uri) { Timeout = TimeSpan.FromSeconds(10) };
var request = new NameOfDto();
client.Post(request);

The service side is from Visual Studio template, hosting ServiceStack service inside Windows service. It's pretty vanilla, with one method which isn't reached:

public void Post(NameOfDto request)
{
    var appHost = (AppHost)HostContext.AppHost;
    ...
}

Answer 1

Support for client Gzip + Deflate compression has been added to ServiceStack HttpListener Server and all C# Service Clients in this commit.

This lets you send client requests with the new RequestCompressionType property, e.g:

var client = new JsonServiceClient(baseUrl)
{
    RequestCompressionType = CompressionTypes.GZip,
};

var response = client.Post(new NameOfDto { ... });

This feature is available from v4.5.5+ that's now available on MyGet.

Answer 2

OK, so I figured out a way to solve my issue, using Newtonsoft JSON nuget. Though I would prefer if there was an "out-of-the-box" solution with ServiceStack in which I didn't have to modify the DTO.

I added the IRequiresRequestStream interface to my DTO:

[Route("/entries", "POST")]
public class NameOfDto : IRequiresRequestStream
{
    [ApiMember(IsRequired = true)]
    public string OneOfManyProperties { get; set; }

    public Stream RequestStream { get; set; }
}

Then created new class:

public static class GZipRequestStreamParser
{
    public static T ParseRequestStream<T>(Stream requestStream)
    {
        using (var gzipStream = new GZipStream(requestStream, CompressionMode.Decompress))
        using (var reader = new StreamReader(gzipStream))
        {
            var serializedObject = reader.ReadToEnd();
            var deserializedObject = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<T>(serializedObject);
            return deserializedObject;
        }
    }
}

Finally updated the end-point:

public void Post(NameOfDto request)
{
    request = GZipRequestStreamParser.ParseRequestStream<NameOfDto>(request.RequestStream);

    var appHost = (AppHost)HostContext.AppHost;

    // work with request object!
}