Intermediate .NET Topics

This section covers intermediate-level concepts in .NET development, building upon the foundational knowledge from the basic concepts.

Asynchronous Programming (async/await)

Learn how to write non-blocking code to improve application responsiveness and scalability. This is crucial for I/O-bound operations like network requests and file access.

Key concepts include:

• Understanding the Task Parallel Library (TPL)
• Using the async and await keywords
• Handling exceptions in asynchronous operations
• Best practices for asynchronous programming

// Example: Fetching data asynchronously
public async Task<string> FetchDataAsync(string url)
{
    using (HttpClient client = new HttpClient())
    {
        string result = await client.GetStringAsync(url);
        return result;
    }
}
        

Dependency Injection (DI)

Explore Dependency Injection, a design pattern that promotes loose coupling and testability in your applications. .NET Core and later versions have built-in DI support.

Understand:

• DI containers and lifetime scopes (Transient, Scoped, Singleton)
• Registering services
• Resolving dependencies
• Integrating DI with ASP.NET Core

Entity Framework Core (EF Core)

Dive into Entity Framework Core, a modern object-relational mapper (ORM) for .NET. It simplifies data access by allowing you to work with databases using C# objects.

Topics include:

• Code-first, database-first, and model-first approaches
• DbContext and DbSet
• Migrations for database schema management
• Querying data with LINQ
• CRUD operations

// Example: Querying data with EF Core
var blogs = await context.Blogs
    .OrderBy(b => b.Url)
    .Where(b => b.Rating > 3)
    .ToListAsync();
        

Unit Testing and Integration Testing

Learn the importance of testing for building robust applications. This section covers writing effective unit tests and integration tests for your .NET code.

We'll cover:

• Unit testing frameworks (xUnit, NUnit, MSTest)
• Writing testable code
• Assertions and mocking
• Setting up integration tests
• Test-Driven Development (TDD) principles

LINQ (Language Integrated Query)

Master LINQ, a powerful feature that allows you to write queries against various data sources (collections, databases, XML) using a consistent syntax.

Explore LINQ for:

• Data filtering, projection, and ordering
• Grouping and aggregation
• Set operations (Union, Intersect, Except)
• Joining collections

var numbers = new List<int> { 5, 4, 1, 3, 9, 8, 6, 7, 2, 0 };
var evenNumbers = numbers.Where(n => n % 2 == 0).ToList();
        

Configuration and Options Pattern

Understand how to manage application configuration effectively using the Options pattern. This is essential for making your applications flexible and deployable in different environments.

Learn about:

• Reading configuration from various sources (appsettings.json, environment variables, command-line arguments)
• Defining strongly-typed options classes
• Binding configuration to options objects
• Accessing options in your application