Getting Started with .NET Core: A Beginner’s Guide

The world of programming is diverse, complex, and yet equally rewarding. If you are considering learning .NET Core, you’re in the right place. In this beginner’s guide, we’ll help you navigate through the basics of .NET Core, its features, how to set it up, and how you can start building your first application.

1. What is .NET Core?
2. Setting up .NET Core
3. Your First .NET Core Application
4. Learning ASP.NET Core
5. Using Entity Framework Core
6. Building Microservices with .NET Core

.NET Core is an open-source, cross-platform framework from Microsoft that allows developers to build modern applications, whether it be web apps, mobile backends, microservices, or even desktop applications.

Its cross-platform capabilities ensure you can run your applications on any platform, including Windows, Linux, and MacOS. The modular design allows you to include only the necessary libraries and functionalities, making your apps lightweight and efficient.

To get started with .NET Core, you need to install the .NET Core SDK (Software Development Kit) which includes everything you need to develop and run .NET Core applications.

You can download the .NET Core SDK from the official .NET Core download page.

After successful installation, you can verify the installation by opening a new command prompt and typing:

dotnet --version

This should display the installed version of .NET Core.

To create your first .NET Core application, follow these steps:

1. Open the command prompt.
2. Navigate to the directory where you want your project to live.
3. Type dotnet new console -n HelloDotNetCore and press Enter. This creates a new console application named “HelloDotNetCore”.
4. Navigate into the newly created project directory with cd HelloDotNetCore.
5. Type dotnet run to compile and run the application.

Your application will output “Hello World!” to the console.

ASP.NET Core is the web development framework within .NET Core. It’s a fantastic platform for building RESTful applications, web APIs, and even websites.

To create a new ASP.NET Core Web App, use the following commands:

dotnet new webapp -n MyFirstWebApp
cd MyFirstWebApp
dotnet run

This will create a new ASP.NET Core Web App and run it. You can navigate to http://localhost:5000 in your web browser to see your application in action.

Entity Framework Core (EF Core) is a lightweight, extensible, open-source, and cross-platform version of Entity Framework, a popular Object/Relational Mapping (ORM) framework for .NET.

With EF Core, you can interact with your database using .NET objects, and it will take care of creating SQL queries for you, making data access clean and easy.

To start using EF Core, you first need to install it. In your .NET Core project directory, run the following command:

dotnet add package Microsoft.EntityFrameworkCore

Now, you can use EF Core to model your data, perform CRUD operations, and manage database migrations, all in

a type-safe and developer-friendly way.

Microservices is an architectural style that structures an application as a collection of loosely coupled services. With .NET Core, you can easily build scalable, testable microservice applications.

ASP.NET Core is ideal for building microservices due to its performance, cross-platform capabilities, and its strong support for building RESTful services. Moreover, with the integration of Docker containers and orchestration tools like Kubernetes, scaling and managing your microservices has never been easier.

The .NET Core CLI (Command Line Interface) includes a template for creating a simple microservice. You can use the following command to create one:

dotnet new webapi -n MyMicroservice

This command creates a new web API project that you can use as a starting point for your microservice.

Learning .NET Core opens up a world of opportunities for aspiring developers. Whether you’re interested in web development training, building microservices, or simply want to learn a new skill, .NET Core has something for everyone. It’s a robust, versatile, and powerful framework that continues to be an industry standard for many organizations. Happy coding!